You are thinking about cost like a middle manager. If you are using Shopify, that isn't a cost, it is an investment. It isn't like legal or finance, usually, because it is product-related and can be used to reduce prices/improve service.
Health care insurance (in the US) is, ironically although not surprisingly given your obvious ineptitude, one of the all-time best examples. US administration costs are larger than most countries public health budgets. Insurers in retail lines, although not in health care, picked this up very quickly because of distribution changes in the 90s. They invest heavily into tech, and the ones that have invested most heavily are seeing the fastest top-line.
It is great some people still think this way though. One of the great market inefficiencies of the last ten years was firms/investors being unable to distinguish between a cost and an investment.
Legal, finance, Shopify are all useless without a product to sell. Hence, costs.
Your business acumen is messed up. If your product is stagnant like most financial products, importance shifts to other things like marketing, cross-selling, etc. Don't get confused between the profit center and the cost center that occurs when products are stagnant.
Yes, some tech has improved things like better analytics and tracking for companies such as personalized car insurance or paperless but notice how this improves the core products features or cost.
"If you are using Shopify, that isn't a cost, it is an investment. It isn't like legal or finance, usually, because it is product-related and can be used to reduce prices/improve service."
No, just no. If I am Apple selling iPhones, no investment in Shopify or websites is going to help me make better iPhones.
Shopify is not product-related. What you mention is a Mandatory marketing expense which is also a cost center. You either have your marketing team or you hire an external marketing agency.
You mention distribution. Marketing without a product to sell is useless. Hence, costs.
Insurance and other financial companies need marketing to sell. It is a mandatory expense for them. It is not their product but their product is stagnant so it matters very little.
However for Facebook, marketing is their product, profit center. There are other orgs who sell marketing automation software. There it is a profit center.
How does this weird chicken-and-egg situation make sense to you? You seem to have this weird notion of which things come from other things??? It is very odd. Why are you posing a situation in which someone is using Shopify without a product?
Financial products aren't stagnant. This is a wild non sequitir generalisation which doesn't really indicate careful thought (they aren't stagnant, duh). And yes, as I said, tech is used to improve the product...it is an investment...that is why you can capitalise development costs.
And yes, just yes. Again, you seem to (somehow) have picked the worst possible example for your argument. Have you been to an Apple store? Is it just a IPhone lying on the ground? No, the stores are product-related. Literally, you picked the company in the world that has specialised most heavily in trying to added product value through their stores. They are not a cost, they are an investment (even companies that have a low-cost store format...that is a reflection of their product/brand/etc. and again, this will keep coming up, some of these costs are literally capitalised and literally investments on the balance sheet).
Again, another bizarre point about which things come from other things...a distinction which presumably makes sense to you. Again though, marketing is an investment, it is how consumer staples companies have built up brands (again, it is something that some investors also capitalise onto the balance sheet). Marketing is also not regarded as a "cost center" in any business...at this point, I can only assume/hope you are trolling...but just read any financial report of a consumer-facing company. Any.
These rigid groups you have in your mind are very weird too. X is cost center, Y is marketing, Z is a cost...it has been fun for me but...this isn't how the real world works.
You sound like a multi-level marketing person who tells you to join calling it an investment.
I pose the situation of using Shopify without a product to prove my point. Shopify isn't a valid expense with a product but you can have a product without Shopify. You might have to some really inefficient selling like door-to-door and leave money on the table but the point is you could do it.
Yes, financial products are stagnant. Insurance companies stat tables don't change that much. Credit cards from Capital One's perspective have not changed that much. Maybe from Visa's perspective it is considered profit center and have to change but thats because they make the credit cards and do the processing.
Profit center and cost center classification is important because it tells you what the business really cares about.
Yes marketing is important for companies and even more so for companies that are distributors and don't make their own products. Walmart does not make its own products but it doesn't need so much marketing because there is only a few players. Capital One is also a distributor but it puts a heavy emphasis on marketing because the selling credit cards is very competitive.
I'll give you a point. For distributors in a competitive space like selling credit cards, marketing is the profit center because a good marketing campaign is how they win.
Health care insurance (in the US) is, ironically although not surprisingly given your obvious ineptitude, one of the all-time best examples. US administration costs are larger than most countries public health budgets. Insurers in retail lines, although not in health care, picked this up very quickly because of distribution changes in the 90s. They invest heavily into tech, and the ones that have invested most heavily are seeing the fastest top-line.
It is great some people still think this way though. One of the great market inefficiencies of the last ten years was firms/investors being unable to distinguish between a cost and an investment.