The daunting task of selecting a Digital commerce platform

Atul Jain
14-05-2023

With eCommerce sales forecasted to reach $6.38 trillion in 2024, there is no doubt that even well-established a successful brick-and-mortar business must consider a integrated offline-online customer experience to remain competitive.

If your business is looking to either get started or transition to a eCommerce platform that align with your strategic ambitions,  I have curated this article as a checklist of considerations for selecting right eCommerce solution- whether for small,  medium size business or big enterprise.

To choose the appropriate solution, we must start from ground up, beginning with a thorough understanding of your business requirements.

What is your business requirements?

For businesses that wish to make this transition or enhance their online presence, choosing the right eCommerce solution is vital. Consider factors such as your product portfolio, inventory size, anticipated transaction volumes, integration requirements with existing systems like ERPs, OMS or CRMs, and capabilities like multi-locale support and scalability.  

For instance, one of our clients operates across 15 European countries, each with its own distinct ERP system. Therefore, it’s imperative to employ a robust commerce platform capable of seamlessly integrating across multiple locales, navigating the complexities of these varied systems. Conversely, some clients seize business opportunities by swiftly bringing specific features online, which necessitates a platform with extensive plugin options and rapid development kits to ensure swift time-to-market.

How is your tech team maturity ?

Evaluate the technical expertise available within your organization to ensure compatibility with the chosen platform. Some platforms may require advanced engineering capabilities for customization and management, while others provide intuitive interfaces and out-of-the-box solutions.  For example, Commercetools demands good engineering capabilities to implement a MACH architecture, Intershop necessitates platform-specific knowledge for extensive customization. Maintaining these customizations can be challenging for businesses with relatively limited resources. Here too, understanding your organizational capabilities and business needs is crucial. Will you choose an enterprise-grade platform that offer significant flexibility but demands extensive technical knowledge, or a more plug-and-play platform to get started? 

Given the intricate requirements and continuous maintenance these platforms necessitate, collaborating with a specialized agency can provide the additional expertise required. When selecting a partner, look for agencies that offer not just technical execution but also strategic insights, ensuring they align with your business objectives and have team with proven track record in your industry.

Furthermore, vendors typically have a network of partners varying in size, expertise, and regional or industry focus. Choosing the right partner involves more than matching capabilities; it requires a shared vision for co-innovation. Opt for a partner that acts as an extension of your team rather than a mere service provider. This approach allows you to leverage their expertise in both the specific technological architecture of the platform and the strategic nuances of your market, thus ensuring that even if an off-the-shelf solution does not fully meet your needs, you have the support to tailor a solution that does. This partnership can significantly enhance your competitive position by delivering outcomes that are finely tuned to your strategic requirements.

 

What to assess?

Let’s move into aspects of a platform you need to consider and checklist when choosing the right solution:  

Analyze Vision & Roadmap

When selecting an eCommerce solution provider, it is crucial to analyze their vision and roadmap to ensure alignment with your digital transformation strategy. Understanding whether their capabilities can meet the growth needs and demands of your organization is essential. Additionally, assess how they are innovating and incorporating the latest trends into their roadmap. This comprehensive evaluation helps ensure that the provider can support your business objectives effectively.

Delve into User Experience and Design Flexibility

The success of your eCommerce venture hinges significantly on the user experience (UX) and design flexibility offered by the chosen platform. Superior UX enhances customer satisfaction and engagement, ultimately driving faster conversions and sales. Look for a platform that provides a high degree of customization, allowing you to tailor the shopping experience to align with your brand identity and meet the specific preferences of your target audience. It's crucial that the platform is mobile-friendly, with features such as AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) and PWA (Progressive Web Apps), ensuring seamless accessibility across various devices. Additionally, prioritize platforms that offer fast-loading pages and intuitive navigation, minimizing bounce rates and maximizing user retention.

Evaluate Commerce Features & Capabilties

Grasping the capabilities and features of your eCommerce platform is essential. This knowledge allows you to understand which functionalities are immediately available and where additional customization may be necessary. While a feature-rich platform can minimize the need for extensive custom development, it may prove overly complex if many of its features remain unused—indicating that it might be excessive for your needs. For businesses with simpler operational models, there are numerous other platforms that might be more appropriate. However, if you are a B2B wholesaler or manufacturer dealing with complex processes, platforms like Cloudsuite and Intershop provide comprehensive features that meet the sophisticated needs of many B2B companies.

Assess Integration Capabilities

When scrutinizing an eCommerce solution, you are urged to meticulously evaluate its integration and extension capabilities. This involves a thorough examination of how seamlessly the platform integrates with pivotal tools and systems used within the business ecosystem, including payment gateways, shipping services, social media platforms, and accounting software. Seamless integration is crucial for fostering operational efficiency and delivering a unified user experience.

Embracing open architecture and app/plugin marketplaces enhances integration scalability, tailoring it to the unique demands of each business. Leading platforms such as BigCommerce, Adobe, and Shopify exemplify this ethos by offering expansive marketplaces for integrations and plugins. Moreover, select platforms feature integration hubs that facilitate low-code integration, simplifying the process for businesses across a spectrum of technical proficiencies. However, irrespective of the chosen platform, the implementation of robust middleware remains paramount to ensuring the fluid and dependable integration of disparate systems and tools.

Evaluate Scalability

When assessing scalability, consider the seasonal fluctuations in your business operations, such as the surge in traffic during peak periods like Black Friday, New Year, seasonal promotions, or paid campaigns. Designing your platform to handle only peak traffic can lead to underutilization and increased operational costs during slower periods. Conversely, optimizing for average traffic levels may result in performance challenges during traffic spikes. Therefore, your platform should possess the capability to dynamically adjust its scaling based on real-time traffic demands to ensure peak performance while minimizing costs. It should be able to accommodate the growth of your business, including increased product listings, higher traffic volumes, and expanded customer bases, without encountering significant performance issues or necessitating a complete platform switch in the near future.

Ideally, to match today’s digital ecosystem, your business should consider a SaaS solution, microservices architecture, and cloud hosting to leverage elastic scaling capabilities effectively. By dynamically allocating resources to meet traffic spikes, your platform can proactively prevent performance bottlenecks and maintain optimal website performance.

Review Security Features

The repercussions of a security breach are far-reaching, encompassing financial losses, reputational damage, and legal liabilities. Given these stakes, prioritizing security is non-negotiable. In this context, it is crucial to choose a platform that adopts the MACH (Microservices, API-driven, Cloud-Native, Headless) architecture. MACH architecture inherently enhances security by its very design.

Microservices enable the compartmentalization of functionalities, reducing the attack surface and mitigating the impact of potential breaches. API-driven approaches ensure controlled and authenticated access to system functionalities, minimizing the risk of unauthorized access. Furthermore, the cloud-native nature of MACH architecture leverages advanced security features provided by cloud service providers, including secure hosting, SSL certificates, and compliance with industry standards such as Payment Card Industry (PCI) regulations. When selecting e-commerce platforms, your business must prioritize those that offer robust security measures aligned with the principles of MACH architecture, ensuring the protection of customer data and transactions in an increasingly volatile digital environment.

Analyse the cost

When evaluating eCommerce solutions, the cost of ownership emerges as a foremost consideration. This encompasses not only the initial setup fees and ongoing hosting expenses but also transaction fees, add-ons, and any additional costs associated with customization or third-party integrations. For example Cloudsuite has comparatively simple price structure. However, it's imperative to broaden the scope beyond monetary aspects alone. Businesses must also factor in the cost of team resources and the efficiency of operational processes. Certain platform developers may be scarce and command higher fees, influencing the overall budget allocation. Furthermore, if the chosen platform complicates business processes and impedes operational efficiency, it can result in heightened overhead costs over time. Hence, a thorough assessment of the cost implications of an e-commerce solution necessitates consideration of both financial expenses and their impact on team resources and operational workflows.

Assess Market Presence and Reviews

Before making a decision, thoroughly research each e-commerce platform's market presence and reputation. Explore reviews and testimonials from businesses similar to yours to gain insights into their experiences with the platform. Pay attention to both positive and negative feedback, as they can highlight potential advantages and drawbacks that may impact your decision. A platform with a strong market presence and positive reviews is likely to offer reliable performance and customer satisfaction, enhancing your confidence in its suitability for your business needs. To eliminate any doubts, request a demo and try out a trial version.

Exploring Customer Support and Community

When selecting the right eCommerce solution, it's essential to delve into the level of customer support offered by the platform provider. Assess factors such as the availability of support, response times to queries or issues, and the variety of support channels available. A robust customer support system ensures that you receive timely assistance when encountering challenges or seeking guidance. Additionally, consider the strength of the user community associated with the platform. A vibrant user community can serve as a valuable resource, providing insights, advice, and troubleshooting assistance based on shared experiences.

Conduct a Proof of Concept

Whenever feasible, consider conducting a proof of concept (PoC) with your top e-commerce platform choices. A PoC allows you to assess how each platform performs under real-world conditions and evaluate its compatibility with your specific business requirements. Through this hands-on testing approach, you can gain invaluable insights into the platform’s functionality, usability, and scalability. Additionally, a PoC provides an opportunity to identify any potential challenges or limitations early on, enabling you to make informed decisions and adjustments before fully committing to a particular platform.

Conclusion

Embarking on the journey of selecting the right e-commerce solution demands a thorough examination of various factors, encompassing both your current and future business needs as well as platform requirements. This strategic assessment serves as the cornerstone for aligning your business with a solution tailor-made to navigate the ever-evolving eCommerce landscape with unwavering confidence. It is imperative to recognize that the platform and architecture you choose will not only address your immediate needs but also lay the groundwork for sustained growth and competitiveness in the dynamic digital realm. To delve deeper into this pivotal decision-making process and explore customized solutions tailored to your unique business objectives, feel free to reach out to us. Let us embark on this transformative journey together.