Imagine a world where businesses have the agility to adapt rapidly, the scalability to grow exponentially, and the foresight to adapt to real-time market trends. Enter composable commerce, the latest trend shaping digital commerce technology strategies. But what exactly is composable commerce, and why is every vendor claiming they can offer it?
Understanding composable commerce
Composable commerce represents a paradigm shift in ecommerce architectures, advocating a modular approach to how digital commerce infrastructure is built. Modularity is essential in today’s environment; monolithic technology has been bogging down large retailers, brand manufacturers, and distributors for decades and pigeon-holing them into static experiences. According to a recent study, 79% of consumers are more likely to engage with personalized offers tailored to their previous interactions with a brand (source: Coniq). This highlights the importance of delivering dynamic, tailored experiences, a feat made achievable by the flexibility of composable commerce.
With composable architectures, businesses can innovate, iterate, and optimize each component of their site independently, thanks to the decoupling of functionalities such as content management, inventory management, checkout processes, and order management.
Why Composable Commerce Matters
Flexibility and Agility
In today’s digital landscape, adaptability reigns supreme. Composable commerce liberates retailers, brand manufacturers, and distributors from the shackles of monolithic platforms, enabling swift responses to market trends, consumer preferences, and emerging technologies. As ecommerce sales are expected to reach $8 trillion by 2027 (source: Insider Intelligence), the ability to quickly adapt becomes a competitive necessity rather than a luxury.
Example: Samsung, a leading consumer electronics brand, seamlessly integrated live shopping functionality into its existing VTEX ecommerce ecosystem. Samsung tailored live shopping experiences to resonate with local preferences, boosting engagement and driving performance. Moreover, the adaptability of composable commerce allowed Samsung to swiftly iterate and optimize its live shopping initiatives based on real-time feedback and data insights.
Unique Customer Experiences
Consumers crave personalized shopping experiences instead of cookie-cutter, one-size-fits-all buyer journeys. Composable commerce empowers brands to deliver precisely that by integrating best-of-breed solutions for customer data management, personalization, and omnichannel engagement. As 86% of consumers say personalization plays a role in purchasing decisions (source: Infosys), businesses cannot overlook this aspect. A decoupled front-end allows retailers, brand manufacturers, and distributors to make the most of these tools by delivering a responsive, high-performing presentation layer to customers.
Example: Carrefour built truly headless mobile applications where the front-end customer experience and back-end commerce functions are decoupled and managed separately. This enables Carrefour to unify experiences, display promotions and prices, and leverage the same checkout for mobile and desktop interfaces.
Scalability and Cost Efficiency
As businesses grow, scalability becomes extremely important. Composable commerce that is architected properly offers more scalable solutions without the hefty maintenance costs associated with monolithic platforms. This empowers brands to expand their digital commerce operations and capture growth seamlessly. With global ecommerce sales expected to grow at a CAGR of 14.7% from 2021 to 2028 (source: LinkedIn), scalability is not just an option but a necessity.
Example: Black Friday 2023, VTEX customers registered 2.8 thousand orders per minute. VTEX enabled 2.8 million consumer orders globally from their preferred brands and retailers during Black Friday 2023, representing a year-over-year increase of 29%.
Future-Proofing Your Business
In an era of rapid technological evolution, future-proofing your ecommerce strategy is essential. Composable commerce enables brands to embrace emerging technologies, integrate third-party services, and easily adapt to evolving consumer behaviors. As 82% of consumers expect brands to use innovative technologies to improve their shopping experiences (source: Consumer Goods Technology), future-proofing becomes a strategic imperative.
Example: C&A was able to innovate by using artificial intelligence inside WhatsApp, with a chatbot equipped with the knowledge of a well-trained sales associate ready to sell. The company can now offer catalog navigation and various services beyond traditional customer service – all inside WhatsApp.
By embracing composable commerce, brands and retailers unlock boundless opportunities for innovation, differentiation, and growth. Whether adapting to new market trends, delivering personalized experiences, or future-proofing your business for tomorrow, composable commerce is the key to thriving in today’s fiercely competitive landscape.
The Reality Check: VTEX’s composable and complete commerce solution
While many ecommerce technology providers tout their ability to offer composable commerce capabilities, the reality is many hidden pitfalls of composable commerce point solutions create. VTEX stands out as the true composable and complete commerce solution, meaning customers get a fully microservices-based and API-first stack and one with a wide breadth of functionality to get up and running quickly.
VTEX’s composable and complete platform enables retailers, brand manufacturers, and distributors to adopt a pragmatic approach to composable commerce. Merchants can use VTEX’s native commerce services and customize or compose third-party best-of-breed solutions where it makes a difference for their business. Compared to alternative commerce applications and their approach to composing everything best-of-breed. While composable commerce is often positioned from a technology perspective, ultimately, the goal is to deliver measurable business benefits (profit).
Are you ready to unlock the full potential of composable commerce and revolutionize your digital commerce strategy? Let’s connect and explore how you can leverage the composable commerce advantage for your brand’s success.
For more on the topic of composable commerce, check out these resources:
Mastering headless and composable commerce (white paper) | Cartamundi goes headless (case study) | How Motorola Did The Math (video)
