Composable Commerce:
The Future Of eCommerce
Imagine how frustrating it would be for consumers if the only way they could buy a loaf of bread was to purchase a tray of sandwiches. Not only would they be stuck with whatever lunch meat, cheese and condiments they didn’t want, but they’d also have to disassemble the sandwiches themselves. It’s a ridiculous scenario, but it’s not far off from the experience retailers had for a long time when setting up their sites. The idea that businesses should buy a one-size-fits-most tech stack from a single provider made launching their online shopping presence relatively easy. However, it also forced them to accept a lot of elements they didn’t need or want.
Today, there’s a better way forward in the form of composable commerce. This modular approach allows retailers to pick and choose the elements they want to create the best possible eCommerce experience for their customers. This concept is redefining digital business strategies by giving companies the ability to adapt to changing market conditions more easily.
What Is Composable Commerce?
In essence, composable commerce is an approach to designing eCommerce solutions that emphasizes modularity, flexibility and scalability. There are three core traits to this technology:
Cloud-native: All software is designed for and run in the cloud. This means solutions are highly scalable to meet high influxes of customers and don’t require heavy investments in on-premise infrastructure.
Component-based: Each aspect of these platforms, from shopping carts to loyalty programs to checkout, is independent and interchangeable. Through the use of well-designed APIs, all of these components can be swapped in or out with minimal disruption.
Tech-agnostic: Composable commerce gives companies the freedom to choose any applications, tools and programming languages without worrying about compatibility. They are not beholden to using any proprietary technology.
How Does Composable Commerce Benefit You?
By creating a customized, scalable and flexible eCommerce solution, businesses of any size across all industries can benefit in numerous ways. Composable commerce offers three distinct advantages:
Infinite scale: Your business can adjust to surges in demand fast enough that you won’t have to worry about losing customers. You even have the ability to scale into new markets, activate new channels and run multiple brands without straining your e-commerce platform.
Unlimited flexibility: If one aspect of your platform isn’t performing as you want it to, swapping in a new module to handle it becomes a trivial matter with composable commerce. You won’t need to tear everything down and start over from square one. Where legacy platforms struggle with change, composable commerce is always ready to adapt and evolve.
Lower costs: Paying only for what you need is another crucial advantage of this approach. Choosing the solutions that best fit your requirements without needing to buy features you don’t need means you can save a lot of money. There’s also no need for maintenance fees or backward compatibility testing.
Infographic created by
commercetools, a composable commerce platform company
Making Composable Commerce Work for You
Taking advantage of all the benefits this approach has to offer means doing your due diligence before choosing a platform:
You’ll need to define your business goals if you haven’t already.
Make sure to plan your implementation carefully and define if you need partners to help you in this process.
It’s imperative that you shop around for the platform that will provide you with an API-first approach to integrations and a composable-friendly design.
it’s recommended to integrate components with a phased approach to ensure the smoothest process.
Once you have all the pieces in place, you should be able to provide your customers with a seamless e-commerce experience and stay on top of the ever-changing marketplace. For more ideas about composable commerce and what it can do for your business, take a look at the accompanying resource.
