Gold Only Ever Means One Thing: Proven
Here is exactly what has to happen before a listing earns it.
How Kairos Verifies a Store
Kairos verifies a store's revenue from its real order data, not its website traffic. It connects read-only to Shopify and matches reported revenue against the store's own order ledger, refunds subtracted.
That closes the loophole bot-traffic scams use on marketplaces that only check analytics.
Eight checks run first. The memo prints all eight, a human reviews every flag, and gold appears only when something was proven.
Three Tiers, One Honest Scale
Unverified
The seller told us their numbers. We haven't checked them. It's allowed on the marketplace - the open market works this way too - but the badge is amber so buyers know to look closer themselves.
Data Verified
A read-only Shopify connection, then 8 automated checks. Revenue comes from the store's own orders, at the order level, never just website sessions. The memo prints every result and names what each check could read. A human reviews every flag before we publish it.
Kairos Verified
Everything in Data Verified, plus a person. We check the seller really owns the store. We read the raw data by hand. We go looking for what breaks. And we get them on a recorded call. Sellers buy it for stores priced over EUR 100k. We say no when it doesn't hold up. Our name is on the memo, and we will tell you who did the work if you ask.
The three most recently verified stores also run on the Kairos homepage while their badge is live.
What verification is, and is not: we prove what the connected data can prove - orders, revenue, refunds - as of the date on the memo, and the memo says exactly what was checked. It is a point-in-time check of past data, not a warranty of the numbers beyond those checks and never a guarantee of future performance. It informs your due diligence; it does not replace it.
The Same 8 Checks Run on Every Listing
All automated first, then a human reviews anything that gets flagged before we publish the memo.
The memo publishes all 8 every time. 3 read the Shopify order ledger, so they can pass the day a store connects. 4 need a feed Kairos does not pull - ad spend, payment disputes, processor payouts, traffic sources - and those come back unchecked, never passed. Drift starts on the second weekly run.
- 1
Real orders, not website visits
We pull the store's Shopify order history and match reported revenue to actual order data - order-level, not just site traffic. That is the exact loophole bot-traffic scams use on marketplaces that only check Google Analytics.
Runs on the store's own orders
- 2
Ad spend makes sense next to revenue
When ad figures are on file, we hold spend against revenue. Ads claiming more sales than the store actually booked get flagged before a buyer sees the listing. In the paid tier a person opens the ad account and reads it by hand.
Needs ad spend - not connected
- 3
Where the revenue is concentrated
We check whether one month props up the whole year - that half reads the order ledger. The paid-versus-organic traffic split needs a traffic feed Kairos does not pull, so a store selling itself as "organic and loyal" gets that part read by a person in the paid tier, not by the engine.
Needs traffic source data - not connected
- 4
Recent revenue trend
We compare the last quarter to the quarter before it. A recent decline does not make the numbers wrong - they are still real - but a sharp drop gets flagged for a human, and the weekly re-check keeps watching it.
Runs on the store's own orders
- 5
Payouts match what was reported
Where the seller hands over payout totals from their processor, we match them against the revenue they reported. The money that actually landed has to match the sales.
Needs processor payouts - not connected
- 6
Refund rate vs the normal benchmark
We compare the store's refund rate to the ~2% industry benchmark. A store refunding way more than that gets flagged.
Runs on the store's own orders
- 7
Chargeback rate vs the normal benchmark
Same idea, against the ~0.5% benchmark. High chargebacks are a real risk signal for a buyer, and the card networks watch them.
Needs the payments disputes feed - not connected
- 8
Drift monitoring, every week
Once a listing goes live, we keep checking. If the real numbers drift more than 20% from what buyers were shown, the listing is automatically flagged for a human to re-review. The first run has nothing to compare against, so this one starts working from week two.
Starts on the second weekly run
Order-Level, Not Analytics-Level
Most marketplaces verify a store by looking at Google Analytics sessions and revenue. Sessions can be faked with bot traffic, and GA revenue is a setting the seller controls. Kairos checks the orders themselves - the store's own order ledger, refunds subtracted. That is a harder number to fake, and it is the number that transfers to a new owner.
We Also Count What We Reject
A checklist only means something if it can fail a listing. If a store's live numbers stop holding up, or drift more than 20% from what buyers were shown, the weekly re-check pulls the gold. The listing drops back to Unverified and goes in front of a person. If the numbers were faked, that person takes the listing down and the seller off the marketplace. We publish that rejection count on our scoreboard alongside deals closed, not just the wins. The same checklist runs on every store, whether or not ZenoX already has a commercial relationship with it.
The checks are run by the team that manages 200+ ecom ad accounts - EUR 200M+ in tracked sales. Who we are
ZenoX ad-management figures, not Kairos deal volume - Kairos hasn't closed a deal yet.
Be There When the First Badge Goes Gold
The checklist above is built. It has no store to run on yet. Get on the list and the first memo is one you can read.