Part 2 of 6 · Platform MCP (Shopify first)
Requirements — Platform MCP (Shopify first)
The access, data, people and decisions you need before you connect your store platform and catalog to Claude.
Free
Connecting a live store to an AI assistant is easy to do badly. Get these in place first.
Accounts and tools
- Admin access to your store platform, with permission to install apps and create API credentials. On Shopify, that means the store owner or a staff account given those permissions.
- A Claude plan that lets you connect MCP servers.
- A safe place to test changes before they reach the live store, such as a development store, or a small set of test products that are hidden from customers.
Data
- A full export of your catalog, so you can see its real state before anything is connected.
- A list of the attributes and custom fields your products use (on Shopify, metafields), with what each one is for.
- Your collections, and the rules behind any automated ones.
- Known gaps and problems: missing descriptions, inconsistent titles, duplicates, products without images.
- If another system feeds your catalog, such as an ERP or a PIM, a clear picture of which fields it owns.
Access and security
- One person who holds the store credentials the connection uses, and knows where they’re stored.
- A list of what the connection needs to read, and what it needs to change. Start from the smallest set that does the job.
People and time
- A catalog owner: the person who knows what good product data looks like for your store.
- Someone to review bulk changes before they go live. On a solo store, that’s you, with time set aside for it.
Decisions to make first
- Read-only or read-write. Whether Claude starts by only reading your store, or can change it from day one.
- What it can touch. Product content, collections, prices, inventory, orders. Each is a separate decision.
- Customer data. Whether Claude needs to see customers’ personal information at all. If it doesn’t, keep it out of reach.
- Approval rules. Which changes need a human to sign off before they go live, and what counts as a bulk change.
- Source of truth. Where a field should be fixed when the store and another system disagree.
- Your first job. One catalog task you do by hand today, to hand over first.
Next: the Checklist, so you know what a 4 looks like before you start.