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Today’s eCommerce consumers are no longer confined to a single channel or device for their shopping needs. They have a ton of options, including mobile apps and social media platforms. As a result, businesses are striving to establish a robust multi-channel presence to swiftly engage with their customers. One highly effective approach to achieving this goal is through the implementation of Headless Commerce.
In recent years, investors have shown a significant interest in Headless Commerce platforms and associated solutions, recognizing their pivotal role in shaping the future of online commerce.
Forbes reports that between 2020 and 2021 alone, more than $1.65 billion in funding was directed toward Headless technologies. In response to this evolving landscape, Shopify unveiled the Hydrogen solution in June 2021, designed to facilitate the development of headless Commerce storefronts.
The following article aims to provide a comprehensive understanding of Shopify Hydrogen, shedding light on both its pros and cons.
Shopify offers businesses the Hydrogen framework solution, originally based on React but now being developed with Remix, in conjunction with the global hosting solution known as Oxygen.
In the past, Shopify website developers utilized the platform’s templating language known as Liquid, which often faced performance limitations. Consequently, to ensure top-notch website performance for headless commerce, Shopify businesses require a specialized solution.
Typically, businesses implementing headless projects on Shopify Plus opt for the React framework over Liquid due to its superior technical aspects. Moreover, headless stores on Shopify Plus offer heightened flexibility, customization, and scalability compared to standard headless stores on Shopify.
Therefore, Shopify has introduced a solution that allows both Shopify Plus and standard Shopify businesses to build and advance the most optimized headless eCommerce websites possible. This led to the creation of the Hydrogen framework solution and Oxygen hosting.
Shopify Hydrogen is a React-based framework that empowers developers to craft distinctive and entirely customized frontend Shopify experiences. This framework encompasses all the essential structures, components, and pre-built tools necessary for developers to swiftly create headless stores and deliver personalized user experiences.
Shopify Oxygen is a worldwide hosting solution designed to store custom content, like Hydrogen stores, directly within the Shopify platform. Previously, Shopify businesses seeking to develop Headless Commerce had to depend on third-party hosting providers (e.g., Netlify).
In contrast, Oxygen is supported by Shopify’s extensive global infrastructure, featuring over 100 server locations worldwide. Thanks to this, Hydrogen stores can seamlessly and directly integrate with Oxygen hosting through the Storefront API, eliminating the need for reliance on third-party providers.
In the first quarter of 2023, Shopify unveiled Hydrogen v2, highlighting the web development tool called Remix. This tool has earned recognition from developers as one of the top React frameworks, trailing only behind Next.js. Consequently, Shopify acquired Remix and designated it as the cornerstone of the Shopify Hydrogen solution.
The reason for this lies in the fact that Hydrogen v1 faced performance-related criticisms after some time in operation. The acquisition of Remix is a part of Shopify’s efforts to rectify these issues, leading to the emergence of Hydrogen v2.
While developers tend to favor Next.js over Remix due to its open structure, allowing for greater customization and offering a more favorable developer experience, it doesn’t guarantee output quality and website performance.
Conversely, Remix employs a closed structure that mandates developers to adhere to the framework’s template. This approach closely aligns with Shopify’s SaaS model, providing a web development framework and enforcing developers to follow specific principles during deployment.
This adherence ensures website performance and significantly enhances conversion rates. Therefore, Remix is the ideal solution chosen by Shopify to address the existing performance gaps in Hydrogen stores and enhance the eCommerce experience for customers.
Hydrogen represents Shopify’s investment in the development of Headless eCommerce. Therefore, it’s fair to classify any Shopify store using the Hydrogen framework and Oxygen hosting as a Headless Shopify store.
The Headless architecture has consistently garnered praise from industry experts, who anticipate its continuous evolution. Shopify’s decision to incorporate React – the JavaScript library for frontend interface development – as the cornerstone of the Hydrogen solution underscores this platform’s forward-looking perspective on the future of eCommerce, firmly rooted in the Headless trend.
The launch of Shopify Hydrogen aims to assist businesses in building professional Headless eCommerce websites and providing customers with a seamless multi-channel experience.
Therefore, Shopify extends the capability to seamlessly integrate Hydrogen stores with various third-party applications and platforms like Klaviyo, Gorgias, and Rebuy (to enhance the customer experience), as well as Sanity, Contentful, and Builder.io (for Headless CMS implementation).
Learn more about Headless CMS:
Numerous enterprises choose to implement Headless eCommerce because it grants them full control over the development of the frontend interface, free from the limitations of specific platforms. Shopify Hydrogen also empowers businesses to construct entirely personalized headless website interfaces and integrate essential features for expansion.
Hydrogen solution empowers businesses to leverage the potential of Headless eCommerce, but it’s predominantly a technically-driven endeavor without a user-friendly drag-and-drop interface for non-technical users to easily access and modify.
Hence, the development process necessitates the engagement of highly proficient developers with programming expertise and a specific comprehension of Hydrogen and Oxygen. In this scenario, businesses have two choices: establish an in-house team of developers or partner with an external specialized entity for swift deployment.
Because it relies on the React framework, Hydrogen can assist developers in creating custom frontends, but the backend CMS functionality must be connected to enable the headless eCommerce website’s operation.
However, as of now, Hydrogen is limited to integrating with specific CMS platforms like Sanity, Contentful, and Builder.io, leaving businesses responsible for connecting with others independently.
Much like CMS platforms, Hydrogen supports businesses in integrating with third-party provider applications, but it has rather limited options. Currently, there are only 13 available applications that businesses can incorporate into their Hydrogen store.
In the many years of implementing Headless eCommerce for numerous clients across various countries, SECOMM has noticed an increasing demand for creating Headless websites using the Shopify platform. Now, businesses have a choice: they can either leverage Shopify’s tech stack (Hydrogen and Oxygen) or build a custom stack tailored to their unique requirements.
This further solidifies Shopify as one of the most flexible eCommerce platforms today, leading the way towards the next generation of eCommerce experiences.
Contact us or call SECOMM’s hotline (02871089908) for a free consultation.
BigCommerce is one of the most popular eCommerce website-building platforms today. Its flexibility, user-friendliness, cost-effectiveness, and a wide array of built-in tools and features make it a preferred choice for businesses of all sizes.
This article aims to clarify the definition of BigCommerce, its features, pros and cons to provide businesses with valuable insights into the multitude of platforms available for selection.
Established in 2009, BigCommerce is a user-friendly platform tailored for businesses of all sizes and technical expertise to start developing their own eCommerce websites. Over the years, BigCommerce has emerged as one of the most feature-rich platforms, encompassing all the essentials for website creation, search engine optimization, marketing, and more, all at a cost-effective implementation.
In addition, BigCommerce is known as a SaaS eCommerce solution, which means businesses subscribe on a monthly basis, and the platform takes care of hosting, maintenance, and system security matters.
BigCommerce provides three pricing plans tailored for small and medium-sized businesses (Standard, Plus, Pro), priced between $29 and $299 per month, each equipped with essential features. Moreover, the platform offers a customizable plan (Enterprise) for large businesses based on their deployment requirements.
The table below illustrates the cost variations among these four pricing plans and includes some relevant factors:
Despite several differences, all four packages share some common points:
Key features of BigCommerce, available in all four pricing plans, include:
The features available in the ‘Standard’ plan are consistent across all four pricing plans. However, there are some advanced features that are not included, and businesses may need to consider upgrading their plan to access these specific features. Here’s a breakdown:
In addition to the ‘Standard’ features, this plan offers:
The ‘Pro’ plan encompasses all ‘Standard’ and ‘Plus’ features, along with:
Designed for large-scale enterprises, this top-tier package includes all features from the previous packages and introduces several advanced capabilities:
BigCommerce, designed as a SaaS platform, boasts user-friendliness catering to both tech-savvy and non-technical users. It offers a wide range of themes to facilitate swift website development and provides an array of tools for executing promotional campaigns.
When compared to other SaaS platforms, BigCommerce stands out for its capacity to offer a comprehensive set of built-in features and tools across its pricing plans. This results in cost savings for businesses, reducing their reliance on third-party applications and plugins, which can often incur extra expenses. Moreover, these features have been fine-tuned to boost performance and streamline the eCommerce management process.
BigCommerce also provides its users with the BigCommerce mobile app, enhancing the convenience of managing, monitoring, and updating their eCommerce websites.
Unlike Shopify, which offers a range of reports and analytics based on the pricing plan chosen, BigCommerce provides professional-level reporting and analytics across all its solution packages. These encompass customer reports, sales reports, financial reports, marketing reports, and more. Moreover, for businesses in need of more extensive data capabilities, BigCommerce offers a wide app library for easy integration with third-party software
BigCommerce distinguishes itself from competitors by providing multi-store support across all of its pricing plans. This feature is especially advantageous for businesses that operate multiple stores or are active in various segments, such as B2B and B2C. With the Standard plan, a business can create up to 3 stores, while the Plus and Pro plans allow for 5 and 8 stores, respectively. In contrast, Shopify, a leading SaaS platform, offers multiple store capabilities exclusively through its Shopify Plus solution, which starts at a monthly cost of $2,000.
Using BigCommerce helps businesses save costs in various aspects such as hosting, maintenance, updates, and security. BigCommerce handles these tasks, eliminating the need for additional expenses. Regardless of the chosen pricing plan, BigCommerce doesn’t impose transaction fees, provides unlimited bandwidth and file storage without extra charges, and permits the creation of an unlimited number of staff accounts.
In addition, compared to Shopify, where businesses may incur significant costs to integrate third-party apps and utilities for enhanced functionality, BigCommerce includes essential features tailored to each plan. This integrated approach results in significantly more cost-efficient operations.
When compared to other SaaS platforms like Shopify or Squarespace, the cost of using the BigCommerce platform seems relatively higher.
Plus, businesses must continue to pay this ongoing fee along with any charges for third-party services (if applicable) on a monthly basis, without ownership or control over the source code and system data.
On the other hand, open-source platforms such as Magento or OpenCart require businesses to make a one-time payment for both usage and service integration fees, granting them long-term ownership of the source code and system data.
Just like other SaaS eCommerce platforms in the market, BigCommerce retains ownership and control over the source code and data of the entire eCommerce website system.
In practical terms, this means that all of a business’s eCommerce data becomes closely tied to BigCommerce’s database. Therefore, if a business wishes to migrate to another platform in the future, it can only access CSV files containing a portion of its data.
Additionally, while it’s exceptionally rare, in the unlikely event that BigCommerce were to suddenly cease all operations, all data related to a business’s activities on this platform could potentially be lost.
At the time of writing, BigCommerce provides users with a selection of 12 free themes and approximately 180 paid themes. This count is somewhat limited in comparison to other SaaS platforms like Wix or Squarespace.
The free themes come with modern and professional interfaces, suitable for businesses to start their eCommerce website journey. However, these themes are quite similar to each other, differing mainly in color schemes.
In reality, despite the claim of having 12 themes, users often discover only around 5-6 truly distinctive options.
The paid themes, on the other hand, come with a price tag ranging from $195 to $395, and some of them may have similar designs.
However, BigCommerce offers a significant advantage: all the free and paid themes are visually appealing and highly responsive. This means that these themes can automatically adapt their layouts to suit various screen sizes, including smartphones, tablets, desktop computers, and more.
For many years providing eCommerce solutions for clients across the globe, SECOMM has observed a growing trend when it comes to eCommerce website development, particularly on the BigCommerce platform.
To gain a deeper understanding of BigCommerce and how to deploy it the right way, feel free to reach out to us or call our hotline at 02871089908 for free consultations.
The 2022 Headless CMS market was valued at approximately $592.43 million and is projected to reach $672.09 million by the end of 2023. These figures come as no surprise as Headless CMS has become increasingly popular in recent years due to the numerous benefits it offers to businesses. These benefits include cost-effectiveness, the ability to distribute and repurpose content across various channels, high customization and flexibility to work with any technology or framework, a future-proof architecture that can seamlessly integrate with third-party services, and adaptability to emerging technologies.
These advantages have encouraged businesses to adopt Headless CMS to enhance their online presence. However, the first crucial step is selecting the most suitable platform from the many excellent options available.
This article will provide an overview of the top 10 leading Headless CMS platforms, highlighting their distinctive features, as well as their pros and cons, to assist businesses in making an informed choice
Sanity stands out as a cloud-based Headless CMS platform that provides businesses with a suite of tools for content creation, editing, organization, and publication. Renowned for its remarkable flexibility and impressive scalability, this platform accommodates projects of varying complexity, from straightforward to intricate. Sanity offers robust support for developers working with an array of frameworks including React, Vue, Next.js, Nust.js, Remix, Svelte, Eleventy, Gatsby, and more.
Moreover, it extends its compatibility to multiple programming languages like JavaScript, PHP, Rust, and others, enabling businesses to seamlessly integrate with diverse platforms such as Shopify, BigCommerce, Algolia, Commerce Layer, Mux, Cloudinary, Transifex, and more.
Sanity offers four solution packages for businesses to choose from:
Storyblok is a leading API-first Headless CMS that prioritizes businesses’ ability to effortlessly generate, oversee, and disseminate content across multiple platforms. This software offers a user-friendly interface, empowering content marketers to efficiently oversee and adapt content without demanding extensive technical proficiency. Storyblok also aids developers through various APIs like GraphQL, Management API, and Content Delivery API, and is compatible with frameworks such as React, Vue.js, Angular, Nuxt.js, Next.js, and Gatsby.
Storyblok offers a variety of solution packages for businesses, including:
Contentful stands out as an API-first Headless CMS, prized for its adaptability and remarkable scalability. It enables businesses to effortlessly craft, oversee, and distribute content across diverse channels and devices, encompassing websites, applications, IoT gadgets, and beyond. Contentful boasts a rich assortment of APIs, such as REST, GraphQL, Content Management API, Content Delivery API, and Content Preview API, among others.
Contentful currently offers three solution packages:
Strapi is an open-source JavaScript-based Headless CMS celebrated for its robust customization and expansive capabilities. Strapi provides developers with a wide array of APIs, including REST, GraphQL, Entity Service, Query Engine APIs, and more. Furthermore, it seamlessly integrates with popular frameworks such as Vue.js, Angular, React, Next.js, Eleventy, Svelte, and more.
Notably, Strapi boasts a user-friendly interface, empowering content marketers to swiftly create, edit, and publish content without the need for extensive programming skills. This reduces reliance on developers. Additionally, Strapi shines with its Omnichannel capabilities, enabling content dissemination across diverse channels, including websites, apps, and IoT devices.
Strapi offers four solution packages for businesses to choose from:
Self-hosted (self-hosted by the business)
Cloud (hosted by Strapi)
Hygraph is a federated content platform that enables the integration of content data from various sources and backends into a single storage repository through a GraphQL API without the need to move or create multiple copies of that content.
Headless CMS vs Federated Content Platform
user interface, enabling the distribution of content across various digital channels. However, in line with technological advancements, CMS providers are attempting to consolidate all content data within the CMS itself, creating what is known as a Content Hub, from which they distribute content.
Nonetheless, this approach has its drawbacks as it necessitates continuous data synchronization, which may not always ensure data accuracy when delivered to diverse channels. In such scenarios, a Federated Content Platform offers a pragmatic solution by integrating and storing content and data from any third-party system via GraphQL API or REST API, subsequently distributing the original data to multiple channels.
Looking at the scenario with Hygraph, it serves as a central hub for integrating and storing data from various sources. Acting as an API gateway, any changes made to the original data are first updated within Hygraph and then distributed to one or more front-end platforms. Users of Hygraph can access this updated data from multiple sources but are unable to make direct edits, preventing the proliferation of multiple data versions.
Hygraph offers three main solution packages for businesses:
Brands that use Hygraph include Samsung, Shure, Booking.com, Philips, Telenor, Ashley, Dr. Oetker, Neat, Dmarket, Flybondi.com, etc.
To learn more about Headless CMS and choose the right deployment platform, please contact SECOMM or call our hotline at (028) 7108 9908 for a free consultation.
OpenCart and Magento have consistently been pitted against each other as open-source platforms for businesses in need of building specialized eCommerce websites, particularly for enterprises and corporations.
So, which of these open-source eCommerce platforms, OpenCart or Magento, is the right fit for your business?
OpenCart is a freely developed open-source eCommerce platform designed in PHP. It’s favored for its user-friendliness and simplicity, boasting an easy-to-navigate admin dashboard that allows product management, promotions, order processing, and reporting without requiring technical expertise.
OpenCart offers two options for businesses:
As per Build With data, OpenCart has been adopted by over 400,000 websites, primarily by small to medium-sized businesses in the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, Ukraine, and Brazil.
Related Reading: What is OpenCart? Key Pros and Cons of OpenCart
Magento (Adobe Commerce), much like OpenCart, is an open-source eCommerce platform developed using the PHP programming language. Magento stands as the ‘pinnacle’ among all open-source eCommerce platforms due to its comprehensive control and high scalability, offering a plethora of specialized features.
At present, Magento provides three primary editions, which are:
According to BuildWith, Magento supports over 160,000 websites, with significant popularity among large businesses in the United States, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Germany.
Given the differences in service offerings between the paid versions of OpenCart and Magento, this SECOMM article will focus on comparing the two free versions.
Related Reading: What is Magento? Key Pros and Cons of Magento
Overall, OpenCart and Magento are both open-source platforms developed using PHP. They are both robust eCommerce platforms with powerful features and a multitude of additional utilities.
The usage costs of OpenCart and Magento are quite alike, as both offer free enterprise versions that can be downloaded and installed without any charges.
Since they are open-source platforms, both possess exceptional customization capabilities for integrating third-party add-ons.
This enables businesses to effortlessly install and manage various management systems like POS, ERP, CRM, and others within a single system.
OpenCart offers an extensive library of extensions, with approximately 13,000 extensions at your disposal. Likewise, Magento boasts a vast collection of extensions, with over 5,000 to choose from.
Both platforms enable businesses to enhance their eCommerce websites with a plethora of additional features using these extensions, eliminating the need for coding concerns.
OpenCart is recognized as being more user-friendly for beginners, primarily due to its intuitive interface and straightforward installation process. However, businesses should still possess a basic level of technical knowledge related to hosting, FTP (File Transfer Protocol), security upgrades, and the like.
Within the admin dashboard, users can effortlessly navigate through sections such as ‘Catalog,’ “Extensions”, “Sales”, “System”, “Reports”, and “Help”.
Magento isn’t a “playground” suited for beginners due to its intricate installation process, which demands a high level of technical expertise to set up.
While Magento 2 is considered more user-friendly than Magento 1, the admin dashboard still offers a multitude of options that can pose challenges for newcomers, especially when it comes to understanding Magento-specific terminology, resulting in a time-consuming learning curve.
OpenCart provides around 500 themes, available in both free and paid options (ranging from $60 to $70), catering to diverse industries. This platform enables businesses to preview their website’s appearance with various themes before making a purchase. Subsequently, businesses can customize these themes according to their specific needs.
In the case of Magento, businesses have three options for creating user interfaces:
In summary, both OpenCart and Magento offer a wide selection of budget-friendly themes, but Magento allows for more extensive customization to optimize the eCommerce website’s interface.
In terms of scalability, OpenCart is suitable for small and medium-sized business websites because it can only handle a limited number of products and transactions. On the other hand, Magento is specifically designed to manage large and complex eCommerce websites, capable of handling thousands of products and daily transactions without performance issues.
When it comes to flexibility, OpenCart provides a variety of extensions and add-ons to enhance website functionality. However, its flexibility may be somewhat constrained when dealing with intricate custom requirements. In contrast, Magento offers a higher degree of flexibility, enabling businesses to customize every aspect of their website. It boasts a comprehensive system of modules and better compatibility with third-party integrations, allowing businesses to tailor and expand their website to suit their specific needs.
Overall, Magento surpasses OpenCart in terms of scalability for eCommerce websites.
OpenCart offers two types of support to its users:
Magento provides a Help Center, but its support staff primarily focuses on Adobe Commerce, which may not fully address the needs of businesses using Open Source. However, Magento boasts a global developer community of over 13,000 individuals, making it relatively straightforward to find solutions.
OpenCart doesn’t assume responsibility for the security of eCommerce websites as it operates on an open-source platform. This means that OpenCart’s code and framework are publicly available, rendering websites more susceptible to potential attacks.
In contrast, despite also being an open-source platform, Magento places a strong emphasis on security. Magento has consistently released security patches since 2015 to identify vulnerabilities. This commitment ensures that eCommerce websites built on Magento maintain a high level of security, instilling confidence in online shoppers.
Through the use of third-party tools such as Mage Report and Mage Scan, businesses can assess their security status. Additionally, Magento employs CSP (Content Security Policy), which offers a structured set of principles for restricting browser content to trusted services only. This allows browsers to determine which web tools to block and which ones to trust.
Even though both OpenCart and Magento are provided with free licenses, there is a significant difference in the development costs for eCommerce websites.
While Magento comes with a higher implementation cost than OpenCart, it offers a plethora of features for eCommerce websites. These include advanced search capabilities with Elasticsearch and OpenSearch, content editing tools that don’t require coding, support for categorizing a wider range of product types, and advanced shipping configuration, among others. In contrast, adding these features to OpenCart would necessitate the use of numerous extensions and increased storage resources to ensure efficient operation.
Considering the evaluations presented earlier, OpenCart proves to be a suitable choice for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) seeking to establish their eCommerce websites. In contrast, Magento is an excellent fit for both SMEs and large corporations with specific and highly customizable eCommerce system requirements. Magento allows businesses to own a tailor-made system by either starting with a basic eCommerce website and gradually enhancing it or by creating a comprehensive system from the ground up.
With our extensive experience in implementing eCommerce solutions for clients across diverse countries, SECOMM comprehends the challenges and complexities that businesses encounter when selecting the ideal platform for constructing a professional eCommerce system.
Contact SECOMM today or call our Hotline at (02871089908) for a complimentary consultation.
In Headless eCommerce architecture, the user interface (frontend) is separated from the business logic and database (backend), operating independently and communicating with each other through Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). The backend of the eCommerce system can be linked to multiple frontends to deliver a seamless omnichannel experience for customers.
This omnichannel capability has driven many businesses to adopt Headless eCommerce to adapt to market trends and attract a large customer base across all potential channels.
However, from the planning stage to achieving the goals, it’s a long journey with several crucial steps that require dedicated efforts from businesses. Among them, selecting the right platform for Headless eCommerce development is essential. Currently, there are four prominent platforms in the market: Adobe Commerce, Shopify Plus, BigCommerce Enterprise, and Commercetools.
This article will focus on helping you as a business make the right decision by listing the selection criteria and pros and cons of each platform.
You need to ensure that the chosen platform supports the Headless architecture, allowing the separation of the frontend user interface from the backend system. The separation provides omnichannel capabilities, enabling you to deliver seamless and consistent customer experiences across all channels (e.g., websites, mobile devices, IoT devices, etc.).
APIs are crucial for integrating with various different user interfaces. Therefore, you should seek a platform with the ability to provide customizable APIs for seamless data exchange.
Next, you need to consider the scalability of the platform, especially for large-scale enterprises with extensive and complex product catalogs or significant inventory management needs. A highly scalable platform can easily adjust its size based on requirements, handle high traffic, and ensure top-notch performance even during peak shopping seasons.
The ability to integrate with third-party solutions is also crucial when selecting a platform. Third-party tools serve specific business needs and drive eCommerce efficiency. You can prioritize platforms with strong integration capabilities and compatibility with a wide range of third-party tools and services, including payment gateways, shipping, content management systems (CMS), analytics tools, and more.
Alongside performance and scalability, customization capability holds great significance for any business pursuing a platform to deploy Headless eCommerce. Evaluating the platform’s flexibility in design and user experience becomes crucial, ensuring effortless customization of frontend to meet specific business needs.
Security is of utmost importance for any eCommerce platform. When choosing, you must ensure the platform adheres to standard security measures, such as secure payment PCI DSS, SSL encryption, and more.
Data analytics and reporting play a vital role in optimizing eCommerce operations and making informed decisions. Therefore, you should seek a platform with powerful analytics and reporting capabilities to provide comprehensive insights into customer behavior, sales effectiveness, conversion rates, and other essential metrics.
Opting for a Headless eCommerce development on a platform that provides valuable support resources like developer documentation, forums, and support communities, or responsive customer service directly from the platform, can bring significant benefits. You should ensure they have access to necessary assistance throughout the entire implementation process.
Ultimately, the cost is a determining factor for any eCommerce business’s choice. These costs may encompass licensing fees, hosting, development, maintenance, or integration expenses with third-party services. You must assess these costs in relation to the platform’s capabilities, ensuring they align with your budget and long-term business goals.
By considering these criteria, you can select an appropriate Headless eCommerce platform that meets their business needs, provides a seamless customer experience, and supports their long-term growth objectives.
Magento is renowned as the world’s leading open-source eCommerce platform and currently ranks third in the market share among eCommerce platforms, following WooCommerce and Shopify
Magento has 2 editions:
Related Reading: What is PWA? 4 Key Benefits of Developing PWA
Shopify stands out as a leading SaaS eCommerce platform in the market, boasting over 3.75 million active stores in 2022.
Presently, Shopify provides two main editions:
Usage cost: Starts from $2,000/month and increases based on revenue.
Related Reading: What is Shopify Plus? The Pros and Cons of Shopify Plus
Similar to Shopify, BigCommerce is also one of the leading SaaS eCommerce platforms with notable features that help businesses establish a fast and easy online presence.
The BigCommerce Enterprise edition serves large-scale enterprises with various optimized business operation solutions. Among them, the BigCommerce Headless eCommerce solution stands out, enabling businesses to create a consistent customer experience along with many other supportive solutions that ensure quick website launch and easy customization.
Usage cost: Starts from $400/month and can go up to $20,000/month
commercetools is a pioneering platform for Headless eCommerce worldwide. Developed based on MACH principles (Microservice-based, API-first, Cloud-native, and Headless), Commercetools supports businesses in building and customizing eCommerce solutions tailored to their needs and their customers’ needs.
Usage cost: The pricing is not publicly available, and businesses need to contact Commercetools for further discussion. However, here are some reference points. The implementation cost starts from $300,000, and the licensing fee begins at $200,000 per year.
With extensive experience in advising platform selection and supporting eCommerce implementation for numerous businesses worldwide, SECOMM always emphasizes that choosing the right platform is the first step towards success.
Contact SECOMM or call directly at the hotline number (02871089908) now for a free consultation.
Previously, Traditional Content Management Systems (CMS) were the go-to solution for businesses to develop websites and establish an online presence. However, the Fourth Industrial Revolution and the rise of the Internet of Things (IoT) have brought about a redefinition of online presence.
Today, businesses worldwide compete to attract more customers from various digital channels like mobile apps, social media, and IoT devices. They can strive to deliver high-quality content across these channels to enhance the customer experience.
As a result, Headless CMS has gained popularity and replaced Traditional CMS. Headless CMS enables effective multi-channel content distribution, meeting the needs of businesses in the modern era.
This article explains what Headless CMS is and how it differs from Traditional CMS.
This is a content management system that separates the backend, where the content is stored (the body), from the frontend, the user interface (the head). That’s why it is called Headless.
Thanks to this separation, developers can use any technology they want for the backend without worrying about affecting the frontend. Meanwhile, marketers can create and store content once and deploy it across any digital channel because the content isn’t locked into a specific channel.
Simply because Headless CMS uses APIs to deliver a set of content across multiple channels, which is why it is sometimes referred to as an “API-first” CMS. Therefore, Headless CMS is particularly useful for implementing Omnichannel strategies to provide a consistent experience for customers.
Unlike Headless CMS, Traditional CMS architecture tightly links the backend with the frontend. Traditional CMS controls content creation, storage, and display through a single channel, typically a web browser. The tight coupling of the backend and frontend results in content getting intertwined with frontend code, making it challenging to reuse content across channels and significantly impacting the Omnichannel strategy.
While Headless CMS has gained widespread popularity as a flexible solution for multi-channel content distribution, Traditional CMS still plays a significant role in the business growth journey for many companies
Hence, when making a decision on which CMS approach to adopt, you need to carefully consider their development requirements and weigh the pros and cons of both Traditional CMS and Headless CMS.
Considering the pros and cons of both Traditional CMS and Headless CMS, it is evident that small and medium-sized businesses with simpler data structures, limited technical expertise, and programming skills may find Traditional CMS a better choice.
However, the advent of Headless CMS has provided a boost for businesses seeking to thrive in the digital race and adapt to the trends of Industry 4.0. Therefore, Headless CMS is particularly suitable for medium to large enterprises that deal with substantial content volumes. With Headless CMS, businesses can effectively manage their extensive content repositories, ensuring scalability and performance even under high traffic conditions.
The structured content storage backend allows businesses to reuse content across various digital channels. Furthermore, the API-based content distribution of Headless CMS enables seamless multi-channel content delivery, effectively enhancing the reach of target customers. Additionally, the flexibility and integration capabilities of Headless CMS make it easier for businesses to integrate the latest technologies into their existing systems and maintain robust security measures.
Overall, Headless CMS provides businesses in the digital era with outstanding capabilities for efficient content management, optimized distribution, and flexible adaptation to ever-changing market trends.
With years of experience collaborating with businesses worldwide, SECOMM understands that effectively managing and distributing large volumes of content is a key goal for every eCommerce enterprise.
Contact SECOMM or call our hotline (02871089908) today to receive expert advice on effective multi-channel content distribution solutions, stand out from the competition, and adapt to the Industry 4.0 trends with Headless CMS.
The eCommerce platforms are often considered the “backbone” of any experienced business in the market. To embark on the eCommerce journey, your business needs to choose the right eCommerce platform to build your website.
In addition to Magento, WooCommerce, Shopify, Squarespace, PrestaShop, etcOpenCart become a popular choice for many international SMEs.
OpenCart is an open-source eCommerce platform based on the PHP programming language, developed by Daniel Kerr in 1998. Currently, OpenCart offers two versions: Free and Cloud Store (Paid).
For the Cloud Store version, you have three solution options to build your eCommerce website:
According to BuiltWith, there are over 2,500 websites built on this platform. Some famous brands using OpenCart include WeLoveFine, GT Omega, Arrowfile, and Kleshna.
OpenCart is a user-friendly platform, even for those without technical experience. You don’t need to invest much time in training staff to manage products, orders, customer information, or other features on the website.
Over the years, OpenCart’s marketplace has offered more than 13,000 functional modules and ready-to-use themes. You can find suitable themes for any industry along with 3rd-party extensions, payment gateways, shipping providers, marketing tools, analytics, and reporting, which enrich your journey of building an eCommerce system.
With its nature as an open-source eCommerce platform, OpenCart has the ability to be flexibly customized. Also, you can own and control the entire source code. That said, you’ll customize code components, create updates, or even develop new features within the system based on your needs.
In addition, OpenCart also has good scalability, enabling you to upgrade to multiple languages and currencies for your global expansion goals.
For eCommerce platforms like Shopify, and BigCommerce, operating on a licensing model. This means they charge fees for platform usage on a monthly/yearly basis. These platforms typically charge an average transaction fee of 1.5% to 2% per transaction. On the contrary, OpenCart’s Cloud Store version charges no fees.
OpenCart is an open-source platform built with one of the most complex programming languages — PHP. That means, to successfully develop your own eCommerce website, you should build a skilled in-house team or collaborate with an experienced agency.
Although OpenCart offers many features, it may not be sufficient for you to manage and operate your complex eCommerce website. It’s different when compared to another PHP-based open-source eCommerce platform like Adobe Commerce (also known as Magento). Adobe Commerce allows you to expand from one website to multiple websites while managing them under the same system effectively.
It’s worth noting that OpenCart doesn’t charge transaction fees and it’s affordable cost of using OpencCart’s Cloud Store compared to other platforms. However, you need to add up the expenses for integrating various extensions. Each extension typically costs a minimum of $20 per month.
But if you want to create a comprehensive eCommerce website system, you may need at least 10 extensions. As a result, when opting for OpenCart, you should be aware of the potential hidden costs associated with these extensions.
OpenCart, with its own set of pros and cons, is generally a suitable eCommerce platform for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). However, large-sized businesses looking for open-source eCommerce solutions may find platforms like Magento or Shopify Plus more fitting.
Having in-depth expertise and a track record of successfully developing complex eCommerce systems on Magento, such as Laybyland (Australia, US, New Zealand), Jasnor (Australia, New Zealand), and An Nam Group (Vietnam), SECOMM understands the challenges that businesses encounter when selecting and implementing an open-source eCommerce platform.
Get in touch with SECOMM today or call directly to the hotline at 02871089908 for a free consultation on tailored solutions for your eCommerce system development needs!
Shopify Plus is a platform designed for high-growth eCommerce businesses. Over the years, Shopify Plus has been the top choice for leading global brands such as GymShark, Fashion Nova, Kylie Cosmetics, and more.
Simply because the platform successfully provides its customers with exceptional features to optimize the customer experience and enhance the effectiveness of sales and marketing strategy.
Here are the top 6 core Shopify Plus features that benefit enterprise-level brands in eCommerce website development.
Related Readings: Top 10 Most Successful Shopify Plus eCommerce Websites
For retailers targeting sales in the global market, Shopify Plus is the go-to choice platform.
The platform provides a multi-store feature that allows businesses to create up to 9 additional stores in 20 different locations apart from the main store to track inventory and fulfill orders.
Each additional store will have its own domain, design, products, and customer data which can be managed from a single Shopify Plus account. This means businesses can easily switch between stores and manage everything from a single dashboard.
Not only Shopify Plus supports businesses in building a comprehensive eCommerce website while also facilitating Omnichannel implementation. The platform also allows businesses to provide their customers with a consistent shopping experience across channels, including websites, mobile apps, online marketplaces, social media, and physical stores.
The Shopify POS feature helps seamlessly integrate sales points from online to offline. Businesses can use Shopify POS to track orders and inventory at all active sales channels.
Shopify Flow is an eCommerce automation solution encouraged by Shopify for business implementing Shopify Plus.
Shopify Flow helps businesses handle repetitive tasks such as inventory management, fraud prevention, setting up loyalty programs, and fulfillment management quickly and automatically. This allows businesses to focus more on their core operations.
With Flow, businesses can rapidly build customized eCommerce automation workflows using visual, code-free blocks called triggers, conditions, and actions.
For example, an automated workflow to add customers to a loyalty program could unfold as follows:
LaunchPad allows businesses to set up and automate the essential processes for organizing promotional events, flash sales, and product launches.
Using LaunchPad, businesses can:
If standard Shopify businesses need to leverage apps or alternative solutions, Shopify Plus businesses have access to Shopify Scripts.
This feature is exclusively available for Shopify Plus merchants and allows for personalized customer experiences at the cart and checkout stages. Businesses can use the Script Editor app to gain more control over how customers interact with their eCommerce website by creating special offers, and discounts, adding upsells, cross-sells, and customizing the checkout experience.
With Shopify Scripts‘ high level of autonomy, businesses can freely experiment to deliver unique experiences for their customers.
Three types of scripts include
Here are some examples of scripts that can be customized:
Shopify Plus meets the highest standards of online security, and all Shopify Plus businesses have SSL certificates used to encrypt sensitive information, such as credit card details.
Moreover, Shopify Plus provides two-factor authentication and account recovery features to protect websites from unauthorized access.
In particular, businesses can obtain an Extended Validation SSL certificate, which offers the highest level of protection available on Shopify Plus. In this case, a green padlock icon will be displayed in the browser’s address bar, assuring customers that the business’s website is secure to use.
Shopify Plus also offers fraud analysis tools that allow businesses to monitor their website for detecting any suspicious activities. For example, when any fraudulent orders are detected, the tool will flag them for the business to decide whether to cancel or fulfill the order.”
Shopify Plus offers a range of features to support B2B eCommerce operations, including:
Additionally, businesses can set up wholesale channels to cater to customers with bulk purchasing needs.
Those are the 6 core features of Shopify Plus that you can leverage to boost your business operations efficiency and give your customers the best shopping experience.
Contact or call directly to the SECOMM hotline (02871089908) for a free consultation.
commercetools is a cloud-based eCommerce platform that provides a multi-channel approach, supporting businesses to build and manage eCommerce websites, mobile applications, and other sales channels seamlessly. Moreover, commercetools is a pioneer of Headless eCommerce.
Therefore, as businesses focus on enhancing multi-channel marketing and sales efforts to meet the increasing customer shopping experience demands, commercetools becomes particularly prominent.
Here are 10 brands that have utilized the commercetools platform to actualize their revenue and customer experience goals.
Chronext is a renowned global brand specializing in buying and selling luxury watches, boasting a collection of over 7,000 products. Offering a wide array of watches, including new, pre-owned, and classic pieces, Chronext’s expert watchmakers thoroughly inspect each watch before sale and provide a 24-month warranty.
Chronext has implemented an eCommerce website using commercetools, contributing to a 300% increase in page loading speed, a 40% boost in SEO ranking, and a 10% increase in conversion rate. As a result, Chronext has achieved a solid reputation in the luxury watch industry, becoming a trusted destination for watch enthusiasts
Promod is a French brand established in 1975, specializing in providing ready-to-wear fashion for women. This brand is currently present in France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, and Malta.
Promod has utilized commercetools to develop an exceptional eCommerce website, aiming to achieve the expected revenue level and deliver a seamless shopping experience for customers.
Since opening its first store in 1990, Ulta Beauty has evolved into the largest cosmetics retailer in the United States and a premier beauty destination for cosmetics enthusiasts. The brand offers over 25,000 products from around 500 beauty brands, including its own Ulta Beauty Collection with attractive pricing.
With the need for rapid-scale expansion and the flexibility to implement changes to the platform, Ulta Beauty chose commercetools for its Headless eCommerce solution. In 2022, Ulta Beauty officially launched an entirely new eCommerce website, enabling the brand to manage an extensive product portfolio with over 1.3 million SKUs. This upgrade enhanced the shopping experience with features like the Buy Online, Pickup In-Store (BOPIS) solution.
Since 1928, 66°North has been providing protective clothing for Iceland’s rescue teams, and this successful collaboration has driven the company to continue developing outdoor clothing and accessories with diverse designs. Today, 66°North has become a leading global brand in producing protective workwear suitable for all outdoor activities.
The 66°North website employs commercetools to transition from a monolithic model to a more flexible microservices-based system, tailored to the specific needs of 66°North. This collaboration has led to a 35% increase in average order value, a 75% repeat purchase rate, and a 50% increase in transactions per minute for the 66°North eCommerce website.
Danone is a leading global food and beverage company operating in four main business areas including Dairy and Plant-Based Products, Waters, and Nutritional Products for infants and patients. Danone currently sells products in over 120 markets.
During the crisis period of the Covid-19 pandemic, Danone accelerated its Direct-to-Consumer (D2C) eCommerce strategy and transitioned to a MACH model using commercetools to address shortages of infant formula in Europe. This move also aimed to adapt to sudden supply chain changes and local consumer demands. The addition of cart functionality to the brand websites helped customers access products more swiftly. Furthermore, this strategy allowed the company to expand its web capacity without encountering issues due to the sudden increase in access traffic.
Anyone with a passion for photography is likely familiar with Tamron – a global leader headquartered in Japan. This company specializes in supplying camera lenses of varying focal lengths, catering to all types of cameras. Their products are distributed through a network of partners, local agents, and online platforms such as Amazon.
As part of their strategy to explore new markets, the company embraced Headless eCommerce through the utilization of commercetools on their subsidiary’s online store in Europe, operating under the name Tamron Europe and based in Germany. The beauty of Headless eCommerce lies in its ability to decouple the user interface (frontend) from the underlying data storage (backend), allowing Tamron Europe to construct and personalize their online store to meet both present and future requirements.
With over 2 million mattresses sold and revenue exceeding 645 million euros in 2021, Emma The Sleep Company has become one of the fastest-growing sleep brands in the world.
Emma chose to partner with commercetools to develop a large-scale eCommerce platform to accommodate high traffic volumes. To encourage customer shopping on the website, the company introduced various attractive sales policies such as 0% financing, free shipping, free returns, and a 365-day trial period. Additionally, Emma’s eCommerce website is integrated with Instagram to interact more with customers by encouraging them to share images of their product experiences and tag Emma. As a result, the brand has attracted a considerable number of potential customers.
John Lewis & Partners (formerly known as John Lewis) is a renowned British retail brand with a rich history spanning over 150 years. The brand has utilized commercetools to aim towards the goal of transitioning from its legacy eCommerce platform to a microservices-led cloud service and flexible API-first approach.
The new John Lewis website offers a wide range of high-quality products, including clothing, household appliances, electronics, and beauty products. John Lewis provides a seamless shopping experience from offline stores to the app and eCommerce website. Through quality products, excellent customer care, and optimized payment policies, John Lewis has gradually established itself as a leading and trustworthy retail brand in the United Kingdom, catering to the diverse multi-channel shopping experiences of its customers.
Kmart is a renowned discount retail store chain in Australia, founded in 1969. To date, Kmart has over 200 stores across Australia and New Zealand, recognized as one of the most profitable discount retail chains in the land down under.
Kmart has undergone a transformation to a cloud-based platform – commercetools, leveraging serverless capabilities with a microservices architecture. By embracing this new technology, Kmart can flexibly customize and expand its eCommerce website to provide the best online shopping experience for customers, while also driving its digital transformation strategy.
Express is one of the world’s most renowned fashion brands, specializing in clothing and accessories for both men and women across various segments. Recognizing that the monolithic platform posed challenges to its growth, Express turned to Commercetools for a flexible, agile, and highly scalable eCommerce solution to adapt to market trends and the ever-changing shopping preferences of customers.
With a focus on stylish fashion products, Express’s website is designed with a minimalist yet modern and elegant aesthetic. Alongside a diverse range of promotional programs, Express offers customers multiple payment solutions to enhance their shopping experience, such as Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL), Buy Online, Pick Up In Store (BOPIS), and Express credit card.
Above are 10 businesses that have developed eCommerce websites with commercetools and achieved success in both branding and revenue. This success has become a source of inspiration for other businesses seeking solutions to elevate their business operations and enhance their competitive edge in the market.
With extensive experience deploying eCommerce solutions for clients in various countries, SECOMM understands the difficulties and challenges that businesses face during the implementation process.
Contact SECOMM today or call our hotline number (02871089908) directly for a free consultation.
Selecting the right platform to build an eCommerce website is always the first and foremost step in entering the billion-dollar market of online business.
According to Builtwith, there are more than 200 eCommerce platforms for building websites, with popular ones like Magento, WooCommerce, Shopify, and Wix leading the pack. Among them, there is one platform that many enterprise-level businesses favor, and that is Commercetools.
Since September 2021, Commercetools has raised a total of $308.1 million through six rounds of funding. In 2022, the platform achieved a net revenue milestone of $39.1 million, demonstrating its growth potential in the eCommerce industry.
This is a cloud-based eCommerce platform built on MACH architecture (Microservices-based, API-first, Cloud-native, Headless), allowing you to tailor your eCommerce experience to fit the exact needs of your business and customers.
Beyond this, Commercetools is the creator of Headless Commerce solution, which enables you to customize and intercharge the backend and frontend without affecting each other.
Due to years of investment in eCommerce technology, it has been recognized as a ‘Leading platform’ by reputable consulting firms such as Gartner Magic Quadrant, Forrester B2C Commerce Solutions Wave™, and IDC MarketScape: Headless Digital Commerce.
Some well-known brands that are using the platform include Audi, BMW, Volkswagen, Qantas, and more
Microservices-based is a software development architecture where applications are divided into smaller and independent components. In an eCommerce system, each microservice takes responsibility for a specific function and can undergo independent development, deployment, and management, separate from other microservices.
The Microservices-based architecture enhances flexibility and scalability, enabling developers and admins to easily maintain and update system components without affecting other parts.
This approach allows Commercetools to deploy frontend and backend components independently, resulting in faster, more reliable, and responsive performance compared to traditional approaches.
API-first is a software design approach that focuses on building Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) before developing an eCommerce system. Instead of developing the system first and then building corresponding APIs, API-first requires developers to define the necessary APIs upfront and then use these APIs to develop the entire eCommerce system.
This approach enhances system flexibility and scalability, reduces development time and ensures the compatibility and interaction between various functionalities.
Currently, Commercetools provides over 300 separate APIs that you can use to build your eCommerce website.
Cloud-native is a development and deployment architecture designed to leverage the cloud features such as flexibility, availability, security, and automation.
This architecture typically involves using distributed applications, microservices, automation and integrating extensions to achieve high readiness and scalability.
Commercetools leverage a cloud-native approach hosted on Google Cloud and Amazon Web Services (AWS), both well-known brands are widely used in certified data centers across Europe, the US, and APAC (Asia-Pacific).
Headless Commerce is an architecture where the user interface (UI) and the backend are decoupled and operate independently. In headless architecture, the UI is designed solely to focus on displaying content and interacting with users, while the backend is responsible for handling business logic, data storage, and providing APIs to interact with other applications.
The architecture provides high flexibility and scalability, allowing developers and admins to focus on a specific part of the system without having to change the entire architecture. It also enhances the application diversity and compatibility, as different UI software can be used to display content for users.
As a pioneer in Headless Commerce technology, Commercetools offers an open and decoupled environment that enables unlimited customization across all eCommerce channels.
Commercetools has its ability to be flexible with the API architecture, making it compatible with any system and app. This allows you to easily integrate and expand your eCommerce system according to your specific needs.
Commercetools supports Omnichannel including eCommerce websites, mobile apps, eCommerce marketplaces, social platforms, brick-and-mortar stores and more. This enables you to reach customers across multiple channels, boosting your conversion rates and revenue.
Because Commercetools is built on MACH architecture, it has an ability to flexibly scale by adding or removing distinct functions as needed. This facilitates easy adaptation to the ever-changing market trends.
Commercetools provides you with a personalization feature to improve your customer experience. This way, you can segment your customers based on their behaviors and preference, then offer them personalized promotions or product recommendations.
Commercetools is a highly customizable eCommerce platform, which requires a team of technical-skilled developers to deploy and maintain the eCommerce system.
Moreover, Commercetools is a relatively new platform compared to other popular ones like Shopify, Magento, WooCommerce, and more, so there may be fewer experienced agencies and developers available for you to choose from.
The cost of using Commercetools is quite high and will depend on your business’s total revenue, along with the development cost and the cost of integrating third-party plugins or apps.
If your business has a maximum annual revenue of around 100,000,000 USD, you would have to pay approximately 120,000 USD as an annual licensing fee for using Commercetools.
Commercetools is a platform that extensively applies advanced technologies to help businesses build highly complex eCommerce websites. However, it is primarily suitable for enterprise-level businesses, with substantial budgets to implement their specialized systems.
Related article: Top 10 eCommerce Websites Using Commercetools Platform
With years of experience implementing eCommerce solutions for various businesses around the world such as Changi Airport Group (Singapore), Laybyland (Australia), Vinamilk (Vietnam), Jasnor (Australia), My Market (Hong Kong), and more. SECOMM understands the potential of Commercetools for improving business operations, as well as the impediment involved in the development process.
Contact or call directly our hotline (+842871089908) to the SECOMM hotline for a free consultation.
Shopify Plus and Adobe Commerce are platforms that mid to large-sized companies consider when it comes to eCommerce development due to the customizability and scalability of the two.
Still, there are some major differences between Shopify Plus and Adobe Commerce that business owners should be aware of before making a start.
Adobe Commerce (formerly Magento Commerce) is an open-source eCommerce platform for medium, large, and enterprise-level businesses with high growth rates and customization demand. Adobe Commerce offers two versions:
Both are paid-for versions, which provide unlimited website development and customization opportunities. The difference is the on-premise version doesn’t provide hosting, while the on-cloud does. In addition, the on-cloud version provides a certain level of automatic updates, so the cost is higher compared to Adobe Commerce on-premise. Therefore, you can decide based on your specific needs.
Beyond this, there’s a free version offered, Magento Open Source, which comes with many essential features.
This is considered an upgraded version of the standard Shopify plans specifically for mid to large-scale businesses with rapid growth. Due to its nature as a SaaS platform, Shopify Plus is designed to be easy to use, allowing businesses to quickly implement it without the technical skills required.
Relating Article: The Pros and Cons of Shopify Plus
Development fee: Building a website on open-source platforms typically incurs higher costs compared to SaaS platforms. Therefore, the development costs with Adobe Commerce are higher than Shopify Plus, ranging from $100,000 to $500,000 per project, but it offers more scalability and custom features.
Adobe Commerce is an open-source platform, meaning developers can access the source code and easily customize it. This allows you to create specific features and custom integrations to meet your needs.
Shopify Plus also offers high customization with a wide range of available themes, plugins, and apps. However, as a SaaS platform, Shopify Plus doesn’t have the same level of customization as Adobe Commerce.
Both platforms have scalability and can handle huge traffic and transaction volumes. However, Adobe Commerce has higher scalability than Shopify Plus, especially for businesses with large, complex product catalogs or extensive inventory management needs.
The robust Adobe Commerce platform enables businesses to scale easily, handle increased website traffic and achieve high sales volumes. Moreover, Adobe Commerce provides you with a lot of advanced features to manage product catalogs, pricing, and promotions. This way, it benefits large-scale businesses.
In general, Adobe Commerce offers higher customization and scalability compared to Shopify Plus but its development process is complex and requires technical expertise and experience. On the other hand, Shopify Plus is known for its easy-to-use platform, allowing businesses without strong technical skills to quickly deploy their websites.
The ability to support multiple stores is a crucial factor for many large-scale eCommerce businesses operating in multiple locations when choosing a platform.
Shopify Plus offers up to 9 additional stores to track inventory and fulfill orders in different locations based on the main store, with a maximum of 20 locations. This means you can manage all stores from a single dashboard that contains all user data, staff accounts, sales analytics, etc.
On the contrary, Adobe Commerce allows you to manage an unlimited number of stores on a single admin panel. You can synchronize inventory and share product catalogs among the stores. The platform also allows you to freely make changes at different levels as well as set up ranges to manage product attributes at a local or global level. These features make Adobe Commerce a popular choice for multinational corporations and global B2B, B2C retailers.
Therefore, the choice between Shopify Plus and Adobe Commerce for multi-store support depends on the business model, scale, and specific development needs.
Adobe Commerce offers two main options for implementing Omnichannel:
Shopify Plus also supports businesses to implement Omnichannel. One notable feature of Shopify Plus is its robust point-of-sale (POS) system called Shopify POS, which seamlessly integrates sales points across various channels, from online to offline.
In a nutshell, Shopify Plus is for mid to large-sized businesses with rapid growth and a demand for highly customizable and scalable solutions. However, Adobe Commerce offers even more flexibility, scalability, and customization than Shopify Plus. In fact, the more flexible and customizable platform, the more complex and costly the implementation process becomes. As a result, you should consider your business scale and development needs to make the right decision.
Contact or call the SECOMM hotline (02871089908) to get a free consultation.
Despite the significant impact of Covid-19, the fashion industry is still on a roll, with the potential to reach $1 trillion globally by 2025 (according to Statista) thanks to eCommerce.
According to the IDEA 2022 research, the fashion eCommerce business in Vietnam is a highly competitive area, with up to 69 consumers using the eCommerce channel for every 100 fashion shoppers.
With the high potential of this commerce business, developing an eCommerce website is a must for success, necessitating the search for a platform on which to build a specialised eCommerce website for the fashion industry.
Businesses can use the following platforms to deploy fashion websites: Big Cartel, Haravan, Shopify, Woocommerce, and Magento.
UI/UX is a criterion that businesses frequently establish when creating an eCommerce website in order to develop a comfortable interface for a group of users who are passionate about fashion and maximise the capacity to engage with customers.
To meet the eCommerce business demands of fashion enterprises, organizations require a comprehensive functional system ranging from basic to complex, which includes:
To provide clients with a comprehensive shopping experience, fashion enterprises may frequently combine a number of payment options, shipping services, management software, and business analysis tools to enhance the e-commerce business system.
Numerous common payment options available today must be integrated into the website, including:
Often, firms at the start of a fashion business will not focus on the capacity to develop eCommerce websites in the future since platforms that enable this function are typically scarce. But, in terms of strategy, investing in a platform that supports this function can help organisations gain a competitive advantage over competitors in the market.
Haravan is a well-known SaaS eCommerce platform in the Vietnamese industry, offering a variety of options for both enterprises and individuals. Haravan is used by a variety of websites, including Juno, Biti’s, Maison, and others.
Pro:
Cons:
→ Rating: 2/4
Haravan is suitable for start-up furniture businesses or SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises) with operations mainly in Vietnam.
Haravan is considered to have a reasonably low and diverse eCommerce website implementation cost for various businesses:
Tuy nhiên, doanh nghiệp nên suy xét khi sử dụng Haravan trong dài hạn vì chi phí giấy phép sử dụng và các tiện ích mở rộng sẽ ngày càng tăng theo thời gian sử dụng.
However, businesses should consider when using Haravan in the long term because the cost of licenses and extensions will increase over time.
Shopify is a SaaS ecommerce platform favored by the international ecommerce business community because of its fast implementation time and reasonable starting cost.
Pro:
Cons:
→ Rating: 2/4
Shopify is considered suitable for start-ups or SMEs with global operations.
Starting an eCommerce business using Shopify is quite inexpensive at beginning, with several options:
Nevertheless, the long-term cost of utilising Shopify will rise owing to rising costs for extensions, yearly usage fees, and % per transaction on the system.
The typical time to develop an e-commerce website is 1-7 days or more, depending on the system’s complexity.
Big Cartel is a platform that assists in the creation of specialised eCommerce websites for the fashion industry or for art goods such as ceramics, paintings, and photographs. Big Cartel is used by several websites such as Atakontu, Indikidual, and others.
Pro:
Cons:
→ Rating: 2.5/4
Big Cartel will be appropriate for startups, SMEs, or new e-commerce participants that need to handle the complicated “issue” of fashion eCommerce.
Website setup expenses are modest, with few possibilities for solution packages such as Haravan or Shopify:
Big Cartel allows you to develop a fashion e-commerce website in as little as 1-2 weeks, depending on the system’s complexity.
WooCommerce is an open source platform, as a WordPress plug-in introduced in 2011 and allows businesses to use completely free. Popular websites using WooCommerce in Vietnam include Hai Trieu, Orchard, etc.
Pro:
Cons:
→ Rating: 3/4
WooCommerce is suitable for fashion businesses who are used to WordPress before and are in need of developing an eCommerce system.
Because it is an open source platform, fashion firms can use it for free; nevertheless, businesses must pay development costs while utilising the platform, such as:
An eCommerce website will take longer to create than the previous three platforms since it must be constructed from the ground up, which will take at least 1-3 months.
Magento is an open source platform with 2 versions: Magento Open Source (free) and Magento Commerce (paid). Some websites are using Magento such as Canifa, Hoang Phuc International, OnOff, etc.
Pro:
Cons:
→ Rating: 4/4
Magento is appropriate for a wide range of fashion business types, including B2B, B2C, and B2B2C, as well as a wide range of business sizes, including startups, SMEs, and huge corporations. Nevertheless, because the cost of deploying Magento is sometimes very high, Magento is favoured by major organisations.
Magento Open Source, like WooCommerce, is an open source platform, therefore it is free to use; nonetheless, businesses must consider the following costs:
Businesses will be working directly with Magento’s development team for Magento Commerce, thus they will have to pay licence fees as well as certain additional charges such as:
A complete Magento project typically requires 3 to 6 months of deployment time, with some projects requiring up to a year. The reason for this is the complicated functioning structure and the lack of Magento experts.
Cosmetics eCommerce is currently developing into a fresh and promising sales channel for companies in addition to the traditional sales channel. Businesses must work hard to sustain and achieve breakthrough growth through eCommerce platforms, though.
As a result, numerous cosmetics companies started developing online cosmetics business websites and found surprising success, such as Kylie Cosmetics, Hasaki, and Guardian,…
These websites’ success can be attributed to their early selection of an adequate and suitable eCommerce platform. Which platforms are appropriate for the cosmetics industry, then?
Salesforce Commerce Cloud (SFCC) is a highly flexible SaaS eCommerce platform that allows companies to offer the best B2B and B2C shopping experiences. Moreover, Salesforce gives Commerce Cloud access to Einstein AI to further enhance this system’s intelligence.
Top cosmetic brands currently using Salesforce Commerce Cloud to deploy eCommerce include L’Occitane, Lancôme, Loreal, Nars, Neutrogena, NYX Cosmetics, and Shiseido,…
Pros:
Cons:
=> SFCC is suitable for B2C and B2B cosmetic businesses.
Magento is a popular open-source commerce platform in the field of eCommerce, with nearly 200,000 websites in use. Currently, Magento has 2 versions: Magento Open Source (free), and Magento Commerce (paid).
Cosmetic eCommerce websites built successfully on the Magento platform with high brand awareness include Laneige, Sigma Beauty, and Hasaki,…
Pros:
Cons:
=> Magento is appropriate for a range of cosmetics business types, including B2B, B2C, and B2B2C, as well as for various business sizes, including start-ups, SMEs, and major companies. However, large organizations use Magento because it is frequently relatively expensive to deploy.
WooCommerce is a free WordPress plugin that allows businesses to transform a regular WordPress website into a professional eCommerce website with full features and easy customization with just a few simple steps.
A few good examples of big brands that have built successful eCommerce websites with WooCommerce and generated huge sales such as: MOI Cosmetics, Bo Shop, Nuty Cosmetics, AB Beauty World, Beauty Garden,. ..
Pros:
Cons:
=> WooCommerce will be suitable for cosmetics businesses that are familiar with the WordPress platform and want to develop an eCommerce system.
Shopify is a popular SaaS platform in the world that provides a variety of solutions for businesses of all sizes to successfully build eCommerce websites. After being in the market for about 20 years, Shopify has gradually grown to become one of the top eCommerce platforms in the world, trusted by many Vietnamese and foreign companies.
Kylie Cosmetics, Innisfree, Sulwhasoo, Cho Tinh Cua Boo, Guardian, and Ofélia are some examples of companies in the cosmetics industry leveraging Shopify for eCommerce websites and enjoying great success.
Pros:
Cons:
=> Shopify is considered suitable for start-ups or SMEs with global operations.
Haravan is a leading technology firm in Vietnam, that was founded in 2014, with the intention of eventually extending to many other Southeast Asian nations.
It specializes in offering businesses and merchants in Vietnam solutions for eCommerce, engagement marketing, and omnichannel retail.
Haravan has gained the trust of many companies in the cosmetics industry as a result of the efficiency of the website system that the business has created and the ground-breaking online retail sales.
The Face Shop, The World of Lipsticks, The World Skin Food, and Lam Thao Cosmetics are some well-known cosmetics companies in Vietnam that have launched eCommerce websites using the Haravan platform.
Pros:
Cons:
=> Haravan is suitable for start-up cosmetics businesses or SMEs (small and medium-sized enterprises) with operations mainly in Vietnam.
An extremely critical first step in developing a cosmetic eCommerce website is selecting the appropriate platform. Businesses may develop websites more quickly and affordably while enhancing their competitive advantage and sustainable growth by choosing the right eCommerce platform.
The improper platform, on the other hand, will cost firms a lot of money and effort to adopt and switch platforms repeatedly. Therefore, in order to select the best platform, organizations must take into account the objectives and issues with the current model.
With many years of experience in successfully implementing eCommerce for many customers in many countries, SECOMM specializes in providing consulting services with comprehensive and professional eCommerce implementation solutions.
Contact SECOMM today for free support and advice.
During the period of digital transformation and the strong impacts of the COVID-19 epidemic on the international markets as well as in Vietnam, the requirement to kick start and expand the eCommerce channel of the wine industry has accelerated faster than ever.
According to Nielsen, contrary to the expectation of a downward trend during the COVID-19 epidemic, the amount of alcohol sold through online stores during the Covid-19 epidemic increased by 27.6%. Particularly in Vietnam, many reports show that wine import volume in the past 3 years has always increased by 10% above average per year and tends to increase rapidly in the coming time, one of the reasons for the increase in wine imports is the changing trend from familiar alcoholic drinks to wine (Thanh Nien News).
However, to seize opportunities and deploy an effective eCommerce system for the wine industry businesses have to choose the most appropriate platform meticulously. Besides the platform that must match with the business model and the business plan, flexibility, and high scalability are the top two most important factors. Out of many highly-rated eCommerce platforms, the open-source Magento platform is well-chosen by many Wine eCommerce giants.
So how did Magento solve the eCommerce problems for the wine industry?
The eCommerce system for the Wine business not only needs to have a neat interface, and match with UX/UI standards but must have a high aesthetics level, and bring out the most unique characteristics of the industry to convey the brand and the production values to the specific customer segment of the industry – customers with “style”.
In addition to investing in high-quality images, arranging the layout scientifically and conveniently, such as the display of new arrivals, best-selling products, and most viewed products right on the homepage of the online store, the interface should reflect the distinctive characteristics of the industry and the unique highlight from the business to the customers.
One of the biggest challenges when implementing eCommerce in the wine industry is the system’s high complexity.
Most eCommerce businesses in the wine industry own a complex category system with a diverse number of products and a variety of product attributes. In addition, to ensure that the eCommerce system is running smoothly and stably with the number of visitors entering the system increasing gradually over time, and spikes during many promotional campaigns, the eCommerce system also needs to be well-designed and built carefully.
Furthermore, many wine business owners often have many sales channels and use many different management software such as POS, CRM, and ERP… this requires eCommerce platforms to be able to integrate, seamlessly and efficiently with third-party software without affecting individual system performance.
This integration also helps businesses overcome the limitations of manual operation, and increase automation for back-office, and sales management processes, ensuring high accuracy and operational efficiency for business operations, and development.
To ensure the development and operation of a complex eCommerce system that meets the above characteristics required the developers of the eCommerce system for the wine industry must be experienced and highly skilled.
One of the most important factors for eCommerce is the customer experience. Especially for the wine industry, which relies on personal interactions to build relationships with customers. However, the digital transformation that has been taking place in the wine industry since the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic means that the in-store shopping experiences are limited, in exchange for buying wine online through an eCommerce website.
Therefore, businesses need to ensure that they have a product information management system ready, products in stock, pricing displays, well-known brands, various payment options, and delivery services to give customers a complete shopping experience.
Not only have a system that delivers a complete experience on the buyer’s journey, but businesses also need to prepare to personalize the customer experience. Beginning the personalization from the content, the product displacement, to navigating the buyer’s journey will be the key to helping businesses score points in the consumers’ eyes, effectively boosting sales and building Customer Lifetime Value (CLV) for the brand.
This requires businesses to know how to leverage unique data on consumers that has already been calculated and developed by using cutting-edge digital technology to build specific customer profiles, create buying habits that match the consumer’s interest, also provide customized content that matches each consumer’s needs, and bring a unique shopping experience to each customer when buying products on the system.
Nowadays, besides the traditional way of buying goods offline, or through brick-and-mortar stores, shopping through mobile applications as well as through websites has become a common way. Having a business presence on multiple channels – in other words, integrated Omni-channels makes it easy for users to make purchases.
To deliver a seamless multi-channel experience, it is essential to ensure that each channel is optimized for operation, nondisruptively connecting through technological infrastructure improvements. Simultaneously, businesses also need to ensure that they have enough customer information and take full advantage of these data to build distinct competitiveness, ensuring a seamless experience on the system.
In addition, wine businesses must constantly develop technology to accompany generations of customers that have changed over time from the Baby Boomers (1946-1964), Gen X (1965-1980), Millenials- Gen Y (1980-1996), and lastly Gen Z (1997-2002). The customer segments are getting more complex by the day, requiring businesses must have a solid understanding and stay up-to-date with technology to optimize the system to bring the best shopping experience that is most appropriate for each generation.
Related article: Wine eCommerce shines brilliantly in the digital era
Magento is known as one of the leading eCommerce platforms for the wine industry with many outstanding advantages such as an open-source platform with high flexibility, a diverse ecosystem, optimal security, and owning all built-in features from basic to advanced for the eCommerce system.
The Magento platform owns an extensive ecosystem that contains many online features that support business in the wine industry such as managing customer information, handling wine allocation, and controlling inventory, as well as handling orders, etc.
These basic features have been built to help businesses operate an online commerce system without spending too much time designing, and developing special features. So businesses can kick start their eCommerce journey without spending too much time and money right from the start.
The Magento platform is known for its outstanding features and extensions that are developed to meet the rapidly evolving eCommerce market as well as the specialized requirements of each business. Thousands of advanced functions in themes, add-ons, products, Marketing, optimal payment solutions, and shipping,… built with flexibility and high usability have shown remarkable results when integrating into the system, meeting all operational needs, and long-term eCommerce development needs.
The Magento open-source eCommerce platform can accompany businesses with all business models from B2B, B2C, D2C to B2B2C, or from newly operated businesses to businesses that expanding their operating systems. Magento can support businesses to operate and develop, expand into many websites, many countries, multi-currency, and all can be managed on the same system.
Also, Magento has a stable operating system with the ability to handle up to 500,000 SKUs, and thousands of transactions in an hour, so the platform can support businesses operating a stable website that has an increasing amount of traffic over time or a sudden spike during the promotional period.
One of the outstanding features of the Magento open-source platform is the ability to easily integrate with third-party services such as payment, shipping & handling, analytics, and business management software to help operate the eCommerce system. seamlessly and efficiently.
Many eCommerce businesses in general, as well as the wine industry in particular, need secure, flexible, and diverse payment software from domestic cards to international cards to payment gateways (Paypal, Stripe, OnePay, ), e-wallet (Momo, ZaloPay…).
Ex: Trentham Estate, the business has integrated with the Stripe payment gateway to process recurring orders without the need for customers to interact each time with a new order. This has simplified the buying journey as well as the customer experience, helping customers quickly make purchase decisions. The application supports customers effectively on many interfaces and devices, from websites, mobile apps, credit cards, e-wallets, etc.
About shipping and handling, businesses can easily integrate last-mile delivery services and other shipping applications in the markets to help optimize the delivery processes. In addition, businesses can completely customize the delivery modes that are suitable for businesses and customers to get the best shopping experiences.
In addition, wine businesses can develop their delivery options that allow the system to automatically select the corresponding store according to the address provided by the customer, allow orders to be allocated to the nearest warehouse, resulting in higher delivery efficiency, helping customers receive products faster and more conveniently as with businesses The Warehouse has applied for their delivery in everyday business.
Ex: iShopChangi Wine (Singapore) has designed and developed a pick-up feature at the arrival or departure terminal for passengers that are departing, arriving, or transiting at Changi Airpor with their flight information. In addition, customers can also choose “Home Delivery” as long as it’s within Singapore. The system allows all groups of passengers to customize and choose the most convenient pick-up times to get the best out of the shopping experience.
In addition to the ability to integrate diverse payment and delivery methods, many wine businesses are turning to the Magento platform because of the easy integration between this platform and management software such as ERP, and CRM to get a seamless connection of all supply channels from offline to online.
Through the integration of the Magento platform, businesses can overcome the limitations of manual operation and increase the automation of back-office and sales management processes, ensuring high accuracy, and operational efficiency for long-term development.
Besides the built-in analytical tools available on the platform, wine businesses can fully integrate analytics and reporting software such as Business Intelligence (Power BI, Tableau, Looker,…) helping businesses easily analyze and utilise consolidated data, improving business strategy, optimizing the personalized shopping experience while using the system, and growing business, as well as getting the overall view of the business situation more accurately than using manual methods.
iShopChangi Wine website is an eCommerce website specializing in providing many famous wines worldwide with special offers for travellers entering or passing through Changi Airport, especially for the members of Changi Airport Group – CAG (Changi Rewards members) with many attractive promotions.
SECOMM accompanied by iShopChangi Wines begins the improvement starting with the interface, page layout, the product classification. Next, the business optimizes the entire operating system as well as the infrastructure on the existing website to ensure the website operates seamlessly, and stably.
Besides providing operational solutions, the business also focuses on keeping the system unique in terms of both aesthetics in design and the elements of brand development for both CAG and DFS. About functions, the business has developed a complex price calculation, and display system based on many tax principles for alcohol-containing products, as well as classifying customer groups to quickly process orders, as well as optimize the delivery feature at Singapore’s airport and bring the best buying experience.
iShopChangi Wines’ eCommerce system has effectively met the shopping needs of international tourists. The initial complex elements have been simplified into a standard UX/UI interface, and ensure a professional, outstanding overall look of a wine website.
Trentham Estate has been a long-standing Australian brand specializing in wine production and trading since 1988. Throughout the operation, the business has been honoured with hundreds of medals, titles, and significant awards in the wine industry. They were also appreciated for their flexible and creative winemaking method, producing various distinct flavour products.
Since the beginning, Trentham Estate Winery built and maintained a WordPress website to develop and manage all the branding activities. Until 2017, the company decided to switch to the open-source platform, Magento, to build a comprehensive website to be able to provide all wine products with a faster operation and management process.
Trentham Estate Winery and SECOMM built a complete website with the Magento platform to optimize the interface, bringing the unique features of the wine industry to businesses. Next is integrating the payment process with Stripe, and developing delivery on the eCommerce system according to the delivery frequency that suits the customer’s preferences. Finally, building the “Wine Club” program with many incentives for loyal customers, providing the best experiences, and increasing a source of revenue.
The Warehouse stands out from the Vietnamese market as a wine and spirits distributor, which is also one of the An Nam Group’s retail brands (Annam Gourmet Market, The Warehouse, Yves Rocher, Flormar). Since 2001, the brand has spent its efforts to partner with more than 80 well-known wineries worldwide. Those corporations have supported The Warehouse to bring the Vietnam Market high-quality products with peculiarities from parts of the world.
Starting eCommerce with the Magento platform, The Warehouse is extremely focused on fine-tuning the interface, including the Vietnamese and English content, high-quality images, and harmonious website layout for all products on each page, helping businesses show the unique brand’s characteristics as well as the wine industry.
In addition, the enterprise also optimizes user experience and maximizes revenue by developing a product display system with complex categories and attributes, integrating the OnePay payment gateway, also integrating, and synchronizing data from business management software POS, and ERP (Microsoft Dynamics AX) with the Magento platform to limit manual operation, increase automation, and operate all resources and processes flawlessly.
Currently, the business is expanding its business with the Magento platform to meet all the needs of customers across Vietnam.
eCommerce is an inevitable trend as well as a “weapon” for wine businesses to break the market limits. This is a good opportunity for wine businesses to quickly grasp, develop, and expand their business models. To start their eCommerce journey, wine businesses can choose to build their system with Magento, an open-source eCommerce platform.
Magento, an open-source eCommerce platform, is a suitable platform for the wine industry with all business models such as B2B, B2C, and B2B2C. With all of the advantages of having a lot of features from basic to advanced, diverse ecosystems, scalability, and the flexibility of the Magento eCommerce platform, wine businesses can completely design a website that meets all requirements and delivers the ultimate online shopping experience.
In addition, businesses can easily change and develop specialized features according to product characteristics to keep up with the rapid changes in the market and develop long-term goals. That is also one of the main reasons that many wine businesses have chosen the Magento platform to go hand in hand, such as The Warehouse, iShopChangi Wines, and The Trentham Estate Winery.
SECOMM has significant experience developing complicated Wine eCommerce websites in different countries, and we know the challenges that businesses face when selecting and implementing an eCommerce platform.
Contact SECOMM for a free consultation on eCommerce website development!
Read more: 5 eCommerce platforms for the wine industry businesses
The electronic commerce market in the liquor industry is currently experiencing robust development and has become a dominant trend in many different countries. In 2021 alone, the number of alcohol consumers increased by 10–20%, and those following the trend saw a growth of 40–50%, indicating significant progress in eCommerce for the alcohol industry in recent times (according to Wine Intelligent).
Not only limited to user growth, the global eCommerce market for wine is expected to grow by 7.7% annually (according to Statista) and reach a value of 1.68 trillion by 2025 (according to Cision). This presents both an opportunity and a challenge for liquor businesses to grasp and develop a business model suitable for the changing market in the digital era.
To embark on an online liquor business, the selection of an eCommerce platform needs careful consideration and precise decision-making. Choosing the right platform aligned with the budget and objectives helps businesses save time in construction, utilise human resources efficiently, and save costs in building and developing the system. Simultaneously, it assists businesses in reaching a large customer base, boosting sales, and seizing sustainable development opportunities in the future.
Currently, there are primarily two types of eCommerce platforms on the market: open-source and service-based. Each type of platform has certain advantages and disadvantages, and businesses need to carefully weigh criteria that align with their business model to choose a suitable platform.
Wine products belong to the premium segment in modern life. Therefore, customers always prioritize high-quality visuals, and eye-catching, user-friendly interfaces in the eCommerce system that are easy to use and navigate.
Businesses in the liquor industry need to focus on conveying the product’s value message not only through a well-designed and user-friendly interface but also one that has high aesthetic appeal, with distinctive features to communicate the brand and product values to the specific target customers of the industry. This approach ensures a comprehensive user experience when using the eCommerce system.
eCommerce platforms should have a diverse range of features, from basic to advanced, and even specialized features tailored for the liquor industry. This facilitates the efficient and sustainable development of the eCommerce system for businesses. Basic features include management, storefronts, sales, information management, statistics, revenue control, customer lists, invoices, shopping carts, and checkout, as well as reporting and analysis.
Advanced features related to themes, products, marketing, optimized payment solutions, discounts, and shipping cater to the operational and developmental needs of sustainable eCommerce for businesses. Specialized features for the liquor industry may include product allocation, inventory control, membership management (Wine club memberships management), implementing customer loyalty programmes, and product-specific discounts based on business needs.
Read more: SaaS eCommerce platforms vs Open-Source eCommerce platforms
For a seamless online business system in the liquor industry, businesses often integrate eCommerce platforms with other software and technology platforms they currently use, such as payment systems, shipping, ERP, POS, CRM, marketing management, etc.
This requires the eCommerce platform to have flexible, seamless, and effective integration capabilities with this software without compromising the execution of each system. This integration not only helps businesses overcome manual operational limitations but also increases automation for both back-office management and sales processes, ensuring high accuracy and operational efficiency for the business’s development.
In addition to supporting Cash On Delivery (COD), platforms need to integrate various payment software, including local and international card options, payment gateways (Paypal, Stripe, One Pay, etc.), and digital wallets (Momo, ZaloPay, etc.). The chosen eCommerce platform should have the ability to seamlessly integrate this payment software with high security, safety, and efficiency.
For delivery and logistics, businesses can integrate service providers and popular transportation tracking applications, optimizing and streamlining delivery processes. Businesses can customize and develop delivery modes suitable for customers, ensuring a comfortable and convenient buying and receiving experience for users. Integrating payment and delivery software helps shorten the purchasing journey, optimize the user experience, and prompt customers to make decisions quickly.
Businesses can fully integrate third-party enterprise management software such as ERP, CRM, POS, etc., with the eCommerce system to support efficient and seamless multi-channel eCommerce operations. This synchronizes data on products, categories, orders, and user information across systems, simplifying and automating the back-office management and sales processes, ensuring high accuracy and operational efficiency for sustainable development.
In addition to the marketing tools available on the eCommerce platform, businesses can integrate additional marketing tools such as email marketing software (MailChimp, Drip, etc.), marketing analysis software (Google Analytics, Google Adwords Keywords, etc.), and social media management software (Buffer, Hootsuite, etc.). Marketing management software helps businesses deploy marketing campaigns, attract customers, and increase conversion rates, maximizing both eCommerce and overall business revenue.
Choosing an eCommerce platform in the liquor industry with high scalability is crucial for businesses to grow sustainably. The platform should seamlessly accompany the business through various business models, from entering eCommerce for the first time to expanding the business system. It should support diverse business models such as B2B, B2C, D2C, and B2B2C.
Furthermore, the platform should assist businesses in operating and expanding by supporting the management of multiple websites, catering to multiple countries, and handling various currencies, all within a unified system. Beyond that, platforms with high scalability not only support expansion but also ensure stable system operation even when the website experiences gradual increases in traffic over time or experiences sudden spikes in traffic during promotional campaigns.
VineSpring is an eCommerce platform created by experts with in-depth knowledge of the wine industry’s operations. As a result, businesses will have an online eCommerce system with specialized features for the wine industry.
VineSpring offers a rich interface library, collaborating with various unique website designers specifically for the online wine industry. This allows businesses to easily build their brand without needing extensive technological knowledge.
Understanding the present needs of businesses, VineSpring has developed and optimized its platform to operate flexibly on various media, from desktops and tablets to personal mobile devices. This ensures businesses have a multimedia online presence and provides the best shopping experience.
With a CMS system on the VineSpring platform, businesses can fine-tune content and essential product information, brand details, and success stories tailored to their business development needs. This enables businesses to have a highly interactive website and a friendlier user experience.
The platform also supports businesses in terms of product shipping. VineSpring can integrate additional shipping software (ShipCompliant and ShipStation), assisting businesses in controlling information and making order tracking easy for customers on the website.
VineSpring directly integrates with Square POS software through an available technical team. The VineSpring POS system has a “tap, chip, and swipe” feature, enabling businesses to process orders quickly and conveniently. Additionally, VineSpring can integrate CRM software (Salesforce) to provide efficient solutions for management, sales, and customer care.
VineSpring supports businesses in marketing through the integration of email marketing software (Mailchimp) for list management and the creation of email marketing campaigns, increasing automation in operations.
Vinspring has a system of basic and some advanced features sufficient for businesses to operate at a basic level. Especially, Vinespring has optimized inventory management features to save time, allowing businesses to access production history details, including information on bottling times, prices, and shipping units.
Vinespring is an ideal solution for developing a business’s recurring revenue model in the eCommerce wine industry. The platform provides businesses with specialized features, such as wine allocation management and wine club member management.
In addition to the mentioned advantages, Vinespring also has a dedicated customer care team. As a Software as a Service (SaaS) eCommerce platform, VineSpring places a strong emphasis on customer service through 24/7 online chat with experts and telephone support anywhere, anytime. Therefore, businesses will receive the best and fastest support to resolve technical issues, as well as applications, features, and the most convenient and suitable solutions.
VineSpring is a Software as a Service (SaaS) platform, so businesses need to pay a fixed monthly fee ranging from $99 to $399, depending on the service package, and may be higher based on business needs:
The VineSpring platform (SaaS) is suitable for wine businesses with limited experience in building eCommerce systems. However, the usage fees for this platform are relatively high for small and medium-sized businesses.
WineDirect is a Software as a Service (SaaS) platform designed for wine businesses with no experience in eCommerce platforms, helping manage every aspect of online sales and simplifying the business process.
The WineDirect platform provides an intuitive, user-friendly interface tailored for businesses. Additionally, WineDirect offers a diverse range of free interface templates and features, facilitating easy development of the eCommerce system with just basic website development knowledge and skills.
WineDirect provides fundamental features such as website analytics, sales tools, and options for business event registrations to boost customer engagement. This allows businesses to save time and unnecessary costs associated with other software.
Businesses can possess essential information for creating customized offers and discounts tailored to each customer category, based on statistics gathered through integrated tools. Consequently, businesses can develop personalized shopping experiences and drive higher sales volumes, achieving outstanding results and meeting development needs.
The platform has leveraged and optimized the WineDirect application, specially designed for mobile devices and is highly flexible for the wine industry. Through the application, businesses can manage products, eCommerce systems, advertising campaigns on the website, and customer information.
WineDirect provides integrated payment solutions on the platform, enabling businesses to have a seamless experience across two payment software, such as WineDirect Payments for businesses in the US and Canada, and eWay Payments for businesses in Australia.
With payment software, businesses are supported in processing orders through the website or in-store. Regarding shipping, the WineDirect platform can integrate with various shipping services (UPS, FedEx, Gliding Eagle, etc.), assisting businesses with detailed shipping information for each order and enhancing automation in the shipping process.
The WineDirect platform can integrate with ERP software, as well as the POS of the business (WineDirect POS, Napa Valley, Oztera, etc.), aiming to synchronize data between the POS system and the eCommerce system, including orders, inventory, wine club members, customer information, helping businesses increase automation in the operational process and manage information effectively.
WineDirect has integrated available marketing tools on the platform to help businesses save time in system development. This includes providing businesses with access to real-time sales reports, allowing them to send emails based on customer groups depending on marketing campaigns.
The WineDirect platform is a SaaS (Software as a Service) eCommerce platform with three main pricing plans as follows:
Similar to VineSpring, the WineDirect platform (SaaS) is suitable for businesses of various models and sizes that lack extensive experience in building eCommerce systems and technology. However, one platform limitation is its high usage cost, which increases with the business’s monthly sales volume.
Beyond the high usage cost, operational tools on the platform may be unstable, occasionally displaying errors on the system, such as payment statuses showing as ‘pending processing’ on the business side but appearing as ‘paid’ on the customer side. Despite this, WineDirect has a dedicated customer support team that efficiently addresses business issues, making it a preferred choice for many businesses.
Shopify is a well-known giant in the field of building eCommerce systems as a Software as a Service (SaaS). The Shopify platform is favoured in the market for its user-friendly nature, quick system-building time, and low initial costs, making it suitable for a wide range of businesses.
In terms of interface, Shopify provides many beautiful themes that are well-compatible across various devices. Businesses in the wine industry can choose from several specialized templates designed and offered specifically for online wine businesses by the Shopify platform. Additionally, businesses have the freedom to customize the interface by accessing HTML and CSS code to enhance the brand’s uniqueness. Therefore, businesses can deliver a seamless experience across different devices without affecting the user’s shopping process.
Basic and Advanced Features:
In addition to basic features related to orders, products, categories, and product management, the Shopify eCommerce platform allows businesses in the wine industry to access profiles and purchase histories to gather customer information. This enables businesses to personalize the shopping experience, from personalized content and product displays to the entire eCommerce journey.
This key aspect helps businesses make a positive impression on consumers and fosters a stronger relationship between both parties. Furthermore, with the mobile application developed by Shopify, businesses can control every aspect of the online store anytime, anywhere, including effective sales management, order fulfilment, and inventory management.
In addition to supporting direct payment features from the platform itself (Shopify Payment), Shopify also assists businesses in integrating other payment software such as Paypal, Stripe, SagePay, AliPay Global, etc. Regarding shipping software, Shopify collaborates directly with various major shipping service providers like USPS, UPS, and DHL to streamline the process and ensure more convenient shipping for businesses.
Shopify’s Global ERP Program provides businesses with a system that connects multiple eCommerce platforms with critical business databases such as finance and inventory to optimize operations and business processes. This program includes partnerships with leading global ERP providers such as Microsoft Dynamics 365, Business Central, Oracle NetSuite, Infor, Acumatica, and Brightpearl.
Shopify supports businesses in marketing through integrated software within the system. Examples include email software (MailChimp), sales channels (Facebook, Instagram), advertising (Google Ads), etc. Through these integrated marketing tools, businesses have the opportunity to increase sales, automate email marketing, and develop marketing campaigns tailored to specific customer groups.
Shopify has developed various service plans suitable for businesses to choose from based on their capabilities and scale:
In addition, Shopify has introduced other service plans to cater to diverse business needs:
Originally an industry giant in the Software as a Service (SaaS) eCommerce sector with characteristics of rapid system development time, as well as a startup cost suitable for many businesses and easy usability, this platform is suitable for small and medium-sized enterprises with limited experience in information technology.
However, in addition to the monthly fees for using additional utilities, Shopify also has limitations in terms of advanced features, unique features, and customization. Businesses must accept that certain features may not be available on the current website and may need to switch platforms when aiming to build a specialized system that aligns with their specific needs and ensures sustainable development in the future.
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WooCommerce is an open-source Content Management System (CMS) known as a plugin for WordPress, introduced in 2011. It is completely free and allows businesses to turn their WordPress website into an online store. Therefore, in addition to being suitable for customizing the interface, WooCommerce is also an ideal platform for businesses to have a website with a flexible blog section, high interactivity, and a more user-friendly experience.
WooCommerce possesses and provides businesses with a rich library of forms designed for the wine industry, carefully crafted and user-friendly. Therefore, businesses can conveniently design and build an eCommerce system right from the beginning without needing in-depth technical knowledge
With the WooCommerce platform, businesses can integrate tools from management systems to features specific to the wine industry. For instance, the platform can integrate with Product Table, a tool that allows wine businesses to have an interface displaying product attributes and numerous high-quality product images, as well as filtering features.
WooCommerce allows and supports basic features such as inventory management, order processing, inventory optimization, SEO tools, discounts, price reductions, sales statistics reports, and easy integration with payment and shipping providers. In terms of advanced features, the WooCommerce platform supports businesses in the wine industry with opportunities for wholesale orders and discounts, boosting sales through the eCommerce system. However, the platform has some limitations in terms of specialized features for the wine industry, as making certain edits can potentially cause instability in the system.
For payments, businesses can use plugins to integrate payment gateways such as Stripe, PayPal, Apple Pay, and Square into the system, ensuring high security and safety.
Regarding shipping, businesses can integrate with various shipping providers that collaborate with WooCommerce, such as FedEx, UPS, and USPS, enabling efficient processing and optimization of the shipping process to provide the best shopping experience for consumers.
The WooCommerce platform allows and supports businesses with integrable business management software, typical examples being Odoo, Square POS, and WP ERP. This enables businesses to save time, and costs, improve business efficiency, and automate management processes.
Businesses can integrate marketing management software to support their operations, such as email marketing (MailChimp), advertising (Google Listings, Google Ads, Facebook), and analytics software (Google Analytics). This helps businesses increase traffic, promote repeat shopping, and optimize personalization for consumers.
The WooCommerce platform is an open-source platform, and thus, the platform itself is entirely free to use. However, businesses may incur development costs when utilizing the platform, such as domain registration fees ($15), hosting fees ($120/year), and system development costs (ranging from $3,000 to $10,000 depending on the complexity of the system).
WooCommerce is a suitable platform for wine businesses already familiar with WordPress and looking to expand their eCommerce systems, offering numerous basic features built with high availability from developers in the strong global community. However, WooCommerce is not perfect for businesses with a large number of products, as the system tends to be unstable with more than 2,000 SKUs.
The platform also has limitations in terms of customization and fine-tuning specific features because intervening adjustments can easily lead to system instability, and there is a high likelihood that the built-in features are not compatible with this platform. Additionally, to customize the system based on the available feature set, businesses may encounter significant difficulties and time-consuming efforts.
Magento is an open-source eCommerce platform known as one of the leading eCommerce platforms today, with many outstanding advantages such as high flexibility, a diverse ecosystem, and optimal security. Currently, Magento has two versions: Magento Open Source (free) and Magento Commerce (paid).
With the Magento open-source eCommerce platform, businesses may not have access to an extensive theme library as other eCommerce platforms do. However, businesses can fully customize the interface for a specialized eCommerce system, providing a comfortable user experience. To achieve this, businesses need an experienced technical team and careful investment.
The Magento eCommerce platform offers a highly diverse and advanced feature system, from basic to advanced, making it easy for wine industry businesses to quickly build and develop their systems in the short term and sustainably in the long term.
A variety of features ranging from Category Management, Content Management, Customer Management, Marketing Management, Order Management, Store Management, System Management, Cart and Checkout, to Reporting & Analytics.
Magento is known for its superiorly developed advanced features and extensions to meet the rapid development of the eCommerce market and the specialized requirements of each business. Thousands of advanced functions related to themes, products, marketing, optimal payment solutions, shipping, etc., have been built with flexibility and high availability, delivering outstanding results when integrated into the system, and meeting every operational and sustainable eCommerce development need of businesses.
Businesses can completely modify system functions, develop new specialized features to meet business needs, and quickly adapt to market changes. In addition, businesses can comfortably expand the scale of their business with the open-source Magento platform.
Regarding payments, wine industry businesses using the Magento eCommerce platform can integrate the most common payment methods such as card payments (ATM, Visa, Master…), e-wallets (Momo, Zalo Pay…), and payment gateways (OnePay, VNPay, PayPal, etc.), helping diversify the shopping payment experience.
For shipping, businesses can easily integrate with various shipping providers and popular shipment tracking applications on the market to optimize shipping and delivery processes. Additionally, wine industry businesses can develop shipping and delivery features tailored to their needs and customers to provide a convenient and fast delivery experience.
Magento is praised for its highly effective operation with most POS (Square…), CRM (Salesforce…), and ERP (SAP, Oracle, Odoo) systems. Through efficient integration of these software solutions, businesses can overcome manual operation limitations and increase automation for both back-office management and sales, ensuring high accuracy and operational efficiency for sustainable development.
For marketing management software, businesses can integrate various management software solutions, including email marketing (Mailchimp…), and advertising (Facebook, Google…), to support planning marketing programs, strategy setting, as well as handling and controlling data, seamless eCommerce business processes, and optimizing online business.
Additionally, Magento provides Magento BI tools or allows businesses to integrate with other Business Intelligence (BI) tools such as Power BI, Tableau, Looker, etc., to optimize business efficiency, easily consolidate and leverage data from the Magento system and other software for quick, efficient analysis and reporting, and to improve business strategy and growth optimization for the enterprise.
Inheriting the high scalability of the open-source platform, Magento can accompany businesses with every sustainable development business model, from newly established enterprises to expanded business systems, covering various business models such as B2B, B2C, D2C, and B2B2C.
Magento can support businesses to operate and expand into multiple websites, countries, and multiple currencies, and manage all within one system. Not only that, Magento also supports stable system operation even when the website experiences gradual or sudden increases in traffic over time or during peak periods in promotional campaigns, with the ability to handle up to 500,000 products and thousands of transactions per hour.
Magento is an ideal platform for any business venturing into the wine industry and implementing eCommerce. However, the cost issue is a significant obstacle, preventing most small and medium-sized wine businesses from choosing the Magento platform to build an eCommerce system.
According to estimates, a fully functional system developed on the Magento eCommerce platform typically incurs deployment and development costs ranging from $10,000 to $100,000 or more. In addition to the complex and advanced feature set, a crucial factor contributing to the higher deployment costs of Magento compared to other platforms is the requirement for an experienced and specialized team.
Magento is often the platform of choice for large businesses in the wine industry, whether B2B, B2C, or D2C, that already have an existing customer base and a long-term need for developing an eCommerce system. With this platform, businesses can continually develop components within the eCommerce system to ensure optimal operational efficiency and sustainable growth.
The high development costs, as well as the development timeline, which can range from 2-3 months to sometimes up to a year, are barriers that make it challenging for small and medium-sized businesses to comfortably choose Magento.
Choosing the right eCommerce platform is crucial in building an eCommerce system for businesses in the wine industry. This decision not only minimizes investment costs and shortens the time to build an eCommerce system but also helps businesses gain a competitive advantage in the industry and achieve sustainable growth.
On the other hand, an inappropriate platform choice can lead to significant time and cost investments for migration and platform conversion. Therefore, businesses need to consider their goals, and issues in the current model to choose the most suitable platform.
For small and medium-sized businesses, newcomers to the eCommerce market, or large businesses without the need to build a specialized eCommerce system, they can choose Software as a Service (SaaS) eCommerce platforms such as VineSpring, Winedirect, Shopify, or the open-source platform WooCommerce.
If businesses focus on industry-specific features such as developing a subscription revenue model and managing wine clubs, VineSpring and Wine Direct are suitable choices. WooCommerce is convenient for businesses that emphasize adjusting the interface. Shopify is suitable for businesses that want to quickly develop an eCommerce website with low initial costs.
For large businesses or those wanting to build a specialized eCommerce system tailored to the characteristics of their products, business model, or a platform that can accompany the sustainable development of the business, choosing comprehensive open-source platforms like Magento is necessary. With open-source platforms like Magento, businesses can develop special features, design interfaces freely, and not worry too much about the operating system.
SECOMM confidently accompanies wine businesses on the path of deploying and developing sustainable eCommerce, with successful implementation experience for many wine businesses in various countries such as Singapore, the United States, Australia, Japan, and Vietnam.
Contact SECOMM for detailed advice on the development journey of the eCommerce system for your wine business!
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