E-Commerce Answers

The purpose of this article is to provide e-commerce merchants that are new to Magento or migrating from Magento 1 to Magento 2 with 10 key lessons that will help to ease the migration to Magento 2 from a completely different platform or from Magento 1. Magento 2 – and now with the recent release of Magento 2.4 – is packed with features that will benefit both B2C and B2B merchants. Magento is the most flexible and customizable e-commerce platform. Both are important drivers in a merchant’s decision to go with Magento but they can come with pitfalls if the project team doesn’t take these important factors into account when moving to Magento.

1. Confirm Magento is the Right Choice

We highly recommend conducting an initial discovery exercise before beginning an e-commerce replatform. This work should include a complete review of the current business, any anticipated changes in strategy, and then (the most important part) the development of detailed business requirements that are prioritized. Only once you have those requirements can a fully informed platform recommendation/decision be made.

Magento is typically a choice for merchants that have:

1. Very large and complex catalog

2. Complex B2B purchasing requirements OR B2C requirements that are unique and rich

3. Complex integrations with ERP, ESP, PIM and other systems

4. Global, multi-store architecture

5. Both B2C and B2B requirements with an operation that will run best on ONE (versus multiple) platforms.

If your business is simpler and doesn’t have requirements within these areas, it’s possible you may not need Magento and you can look at SaaS platforms like BigCommerce or Shopify.

2. Experienced Team / SI

There are a lot of talented digital agencies and system integrators with great design portfolios and experience working on SaaS e-commerce. It may be tempting to pick a vendor to help with your project based on a design portfolio or some awesome branding work that your team or that has an agency has done. That team may say that Magento is not a problem given their overall experience with e-commerce but the truth is Magento is very powerful and complex. It’s important to either place experienced, certified Magento developers on your team or to choose to work with a Certified Magento Solution Partner. If you don’t, expect problems with your migration or replatform.

You don’t take your Porsche to a Lexus dealer right? No. Same goes here.

3. The Experience Has to Include Magento 2 – NOT just Magento 1

Magento 2 is very different from Magento 1. There have been major advances in both the architecture and the feature set. Integrating with Magento 2 is very different than Magento 1. If your team or vendor has Magento 1 experience and you think it’s just a “quick upgrade,” even for the CE version of Magento, think again. It’s different. Make sure engineers and developers that are certified in Magento 2 are key members of the team.

4. Generate a Project Plan with MVP that Fits Timing Requirements

Magento is complex and it helps to take those prioritized requirements from the initial Discovery and Definition work and develop a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) that fits the timing requirements for your business. In lay terms, don’t try to “hit it out of the park” and meet all your requirements in 3 months. You will set yourself and your team up for failure.

5. Don’t Build for Seldom-Used Use Cases

Consider leaving functionality that serves seldom-used use cases out of your MVP. Even if it serves one important B2B customer. Work with your engineering team to solve the problem without complexity. Moving onto a new e-commerce platform is a big change that has a learning curve and the simpler you keep the first release the better things will go for all interested parties.

6. Integrations and Data Conversions Can Be Tricky: Have a Plan!

With complex migrations to Magento 2, we spend the most time completing complex integrations and data conversions f...

I received an email this morning way after midnight that made me think of a quote by Otto Von Bismarck “Laws are like sausages. To retain respect for sausages and laws, one must not watch them in the making.” The implication is that ignorance is bliss. That may be true for sausages and laws, but it is definitely not true for e-commerce.

At Accorin, we are very transparent and collaborative in strategy, design, development and quality assurance processes, but usually don’t share too much about the development operations (DevOps) that goes on behind the scenes to ensure that engineers are productive and we have a controlled Development to Staging to Production deployment process for our clients. As part of our DevOps process we regularly update our development environments (Docker stacks) when Magento comes out with a new release. As with making sausage and laws, it can be a bit more difficult than expected.

Here is an email from a DevOps Manager explaining the behind the scenes process; something that most of our clients don’t see but definitely benefit from:

”I just finished the setup and demo for the latest M2 Demo Server. While setting it up I also setup the Docker Environments for all developers to work on Client. This setup will be used for all 2.4 updates.

This took longer than expected. In the end about 8 hours total (most are around 2 hours). The good news is that for any new projects on 2.4, I have all of the code/scripts/etc. all committed in this project for reuse. We can simply use the scripts to kick them off very quickly.

Here are the issues that took the extra time:

1. rabbitmq is now required for all Commerce deployments, this was fairly quick. Using 3.8 since 3.7 is EOL end of 9/2020.

2. elasticsearch is now required, and 6.5 is EOL, so we are now using 6.8 on anything new and will need to move to 6.8 on other projects in the near future. This is a good update but was more difficult. It was fairly easy to setup the local stack with this, but there isn’t a configuration for elasticsearch available in env.php. So this has to be done with database value overrides in env.php. This was quick for the local stack but took some time for deployments, all done now.

3. The Elasticsearch connection must be present (just like redis with 2.3) during build and setup for deployments. So this means that I have to setup temporary ES instances during build like I do with redis during CI deployment, this is much easier with redis since redis is so lightweight, but ES uses over 1.5 GB of memory just to launch. It also required several linux sysctl changes in linux on the docker stack and gitlab which is a known issue with ES and its large requirements just to run. ( Once these tweaks were done, that worked fine.

4. Magento 2.4 is no longer compatible with Amazon RDS Aurora 5.6 (1.22.2) and so I had to upgrade our Development RDS server to 5.7 (2.0.8). This was trivial to do but to do this major upgrade I had to actually delete the old database and make a snapshot and then build a new one using the snapshot and took some time.

5. One of the most time consuming issues was a new plugin Magento is using for composer setup of new projects called the Magento/composer-root-update-plugin. It can be found here:

This plug caused some issues but I read all of the docs and found that this plugin is really only needed upon upgrading, so it can be removed.

All of that said, all is working now and seems to be working well. I didn’t expect it to take this long but I don’t recall that last Magento release that had this many changes to system requirements. Let me know if you have any questions.”

The Bottom Line

As with so much in e-commerce, a lot of work happens behind the scenes and, like making sausages, sometimes you just want the sausage and don’t need to know what goes into it, but sometimes it is good to know the ingredients and work that the Accorin team puts in to make our customers’ sites run smoothly.

And ...

Some e-commerce merchants have their own complete in-house teams. Some outsource everything. Others use a hybrid model. Many are successful and happy running all of the moving parts of an e-commerce operation by using a combination of resources, freelancers, and employees. But there are some signals that your operation may be sending you that might warrant looking at a change. This year at Accorin we have taken over Maintenance and Support for 6 e-commerce merchants – more than ever before.

Here are some of the common signals which caused these merchants to make a change:

1. A Key Team Member Employee Left

The merchant didn’t want to wait ~6 months to find and train the right replacement: interview, negotiate salary and benefits package, get them up to speed with technology and processes, etc. They decided it can be far more efficient to partner with and outsource the “job” that particular person was doing to us.

2. A Vendor Struggled with Service & Responsiveness

Surprisingly there are a number of agencies / system integrators that are very skilled and qualified to help merchants manage and support the complexity of an e-commerce operation, but they don’t have a culture of service and responsiveness. At least half of the merchants we “took over” support for this year mentioned poor service and responsiveness as a reason for making a switch.

3. Ability to Coordinate with Other Skill Sets and Vendors

E-commerce operations require careful collaboration with a number of other employees, vendors, 3rd party apps, service firms, platforms and more. It’s vitally important for a member of the team or a vendor to

1. Identify and understand the role they play, and then

2. Coordinate with others while being the master of that role

Having a thorough understanding of the other key members of the team and functionally supporting the collaboration is key to success. If your current team struggles with this, it might be time to consider making a change.

4. Backlog of Enhancements is Growing

If your backlog of e-commerce feature enhancements is growing and you are not making progress towards the goals you set for the year – it’s time to consider bringing in a fresh team. There’s still time to get those extensions or enhancements you need in place in time for Holiday Season 2020!

5. Your Team Doesn’t Measure How They are Doing

If there aren’t clear measurements in place for the following, then you might want to consider making a change.

1. Team satisfaction,

2. Progress against goals,

3. Metrics-based e-commerce success of the operation

There’s another important area where the merchant needs to measure – budget. If the operation is always over budget and the current team or vendor is not measuring and suggesting why things are happening that way then it could be time to make a change.

The Bottom Line

The e-commerce operation is complex and it takes a combination of skills and resources to keep it running smoothly. These signals, and others – including your gut feeling – may indicate that it’s time for a change. If you would like a complimentary evaluation of your e-commerce operation feel free to reach out to us at [email protected]

The back to school period of late Summer is always big for all retail and e-commerce shopping activity, but obviously this year is going to be different. We’re witnessing new market forces in an explosion of e-commerce activity as consumers and businesses engage in more online ordering than ever before. The purpose of this blog post is to provide some ideas on how B2B and B2C merchants can best take advantage of what’s happening, including changing behaviors during the back to school shopping period. We are also considering “back to school” “back to work” (or post-vacation period) for B2B industries as well. As the Summer ends, business typically heats back up, but things could be different this year.

Here are four key behaviors to observe and to keep in mind.

Furniture, Software, Home Furnishings will drive a lot of sales for B2C

Households with school age children will do their best to optimize their in-home and remote learning experiences. This will mean that families are going to be investing more on furniture, computers, software and associated devices in order to take advantage of remote learning better than they did in the Spring.

How will customer behavior change?

Household expenditures on furnishings, hardware, software to support remote learning. For budget constrained households this will be at the expense of apparel.

How can your e-commerce business capitalize?

We recommend that merchants in these sectors should modify their e-commerce experience algorithms to capitalize on the increased demand for these items.

Online Learning & Education Will Boom, Obviously

Okay, you don’t need to be an elite business strategist or the Nostradamus to predict that online learning is going to experience a big boom in the fall of 2020. The boom is going to come from two sources: Private institutions expanding their virtual classroom capabilities with tutoring and more one-on-one virtual experiences and then the continuing need from existing remote education.

Individuals that are looking for private instruction in a vast array of fields will find it with MasterClass and other online courses. People are getting used to Bluejeans, Zoom and online learning software and demand for these courses is going to go up both in formal education and ancillary education for children and adults alike.

Earlier in the year, Google and YouTube launched their Teach from Home platform to help with the coronavirus response to education.

How will customer behavior change?

People are taking up hobbies and teaching themselves versus depending upon in classrooms or in person. Platforms like LinkedIn Learning have seen pretty major usage surges as a result of the Pandemic – likely due to record unemployment levels and those impacted trying to upskill quickly.

How can your e-commerce business capitalize?

If you are a B2C or B2B merchant there is an opportunity to engage more users by using education modules or classes to teach the skills associated with your products. Set up a Youtube education channel that serves as a demo hub. Integrate online learning software to teach product usage and to market product features. For B2C products related to hobbies teach your customers how to be the best at those activities associated with your products. Think MasterClass for your own product offering.

In terms of marketing opportunities, if you don’t already, consider allocating some ad spend towards the platforms seeing the increased usage, such as YouTube and LinkedIn.

B2B is All About Self-Service

Since customers can’t get together with their reps, B2B-oriented businesses are ramping up their self-service e-commerce. Understanding that business is going to remain remote and “out of the office” for another six months to a year (or maybe even longer), many B2B companies understand the need to ramp up and improve self-service e-commerce experiences and they are doing so quickly.

What does “Self-Service” e-commerce mean for B2B?

I...

Whether you’re planning on upgrading to Magento 2.4 immediately or in a few months as a B2B merchant (or merchant with B2B plans) you will be excited about the new features that will allow your business customers to conduct self-service purchasing activity. We’re particularly excited about the new purchase order approval module, which will be integrated with company roles and permissions. This will allow b2b merchants to provide N number of people from a company customer to self-service purchase and will integrate the purchase order approval process right in the admin screens of the Magento storefront.

Here at Accorin, we’ve developed a few other extensions that we believe will make the Magento 2.4 upgrade even better for B2B implementations. We demo’d these extensions at this year’s Virtual Magento Imagine conference and you can see those in-depth demo’s on our YouTube channel.

Here’s a quick summary of each:

Company Address Book

Since we are talking about complex buyers that order using different people within a company that work from different locations, we found it’s important to provide flexibility around the Magento 2 address book functionality. We have extended the “Address Book” functionality to cope with some key requirements that we found our clients consistently needed, while also making it more intuitive for complex B2B organizations to manage.

We have worked with a number of clients who needed to allow a company structure to interact with a company address book and who needed to share the address book across the organization. We have extended the address book to do just that. The Company Address Book extension can be used to ensure that a subordinate or any company user can only send orders to specific location(s). However it can also be used to allow a procurement manager the ability to send an order to ANY allowed location of the business.

Shared Requisition Lists

While the requisition list functionality that is part of Magento 2 core as of 2.2 is handy, it lacks some aspects that make it most useful for buyers that are a part of complex organizations.

The ability for buyers at one location within a company to use requisition lists that were created by another similar location within the company

The ability for managers to share their requisition lists with newly-authorised buyers

A way for senior managers to create a variety of requisition lists so individual retail outlet managers within the company could purchase the same list of inventory during critical periods of inventory management

Tighter control between inventory supply and demand within a complex organization and a tool that could help manage buying activity

So, we modified the functionality so that it is completely integrated with Roles and Permissions and company hierarchy of permissions. This way users can delegate requisition lists to subordinate users giving them access to requisition lists that control what they can order. These specific purchasing lists ensure control and reduce shrinkage – especially in retail settings.

Previously Purchased Products

Magento 2 has great flexibility for users to manage and also track orders and to provide quick order and reorder functionalities which are essential to complex B2B organizations. Traditionally magento has a very order-centric view. However, and somewhat surprisingly, out of the box Magento 2 does NOT provide a view of previously purchased PRODUCTS without digging into order details. We’ve seen merchant clients and their teams have a very product-centric view.

The Previously Purchased Products extension solves for use cases where customers are looking to find items that were previously ordered at the PRODUCT level (Vs. the order level).

The Bottom Line

2.4 is a big Magento upgrade, especially for B2B. There are plenty of new features as well as performance and security upgrades. Accorin clients get unlimited access to ALL of our extensions just for being our clie...

It’s been a tough year for e-commerce trade shows, meetings, and events. Those of us in the e-Commerce space love to get away from our screens and meet up in person and talk about new technology, marketing, new opportunities, partnerships and so much more – and many of us do it at trade shows or other types of live learning events. As we keep an eye out for virtual opportunities that would be helpful to e-commerce merchants, we’re thinking about new shows and meetings that might allow e-commerce merchants to break out from the typical path of attendance.

We’re considering some industry-specific and global events that we might not normally consider “attending” due to logistics or cost concerns. But with more and more “live” events going digital, there are some interesting opportunities out there. Here’s a lineup of events we believe merchants should be exploring; there are many others that have “gone digital” but we like these because we think they will provide unique, new points of view for e-commerce merchants.

And remember...If for some reason they don’t happen in 2020 make sure to follow them on twitter and attend in-person in 2021.

B2B NEXT

If you’re a B2B merchant this is one you should always be attending, even if it’s virtual this year. There will be top decision makers from some of the largest, most successful B2B e-Commerce merchants that don’t depend on Amazon. There’s a lot to learn from these companies, even if they are the biggest – they’ve tackled a lot of the problems in e-Commerce and remain at the forefront of cutting edge B2B online shopping experiences including:

Grainger

Graybar

Fisher Healthcare

Learn more about the event on the B2B Next website.

KLAVIYO:BOS (hopefully)

Klaviyo is a leading e-commerce-focused email service provider (ESP) with explosive growth. They have built and continue to develop an awesome e-commerce email service that completely integrates with many of the most popular e-commerce platforms. It’s a lot more than an ESP, it’s essentially an e-commerce CRM. And, their annual live event is a great place to learn from the best at converting e-commerce web site visitors and list members into shoppers using email, text, abandoned cart, abandoned browse and much more. Great case studies and content from all the top e-commerce platform providers always present real world solutions to challenges that many merchants face.

Although typically held as a live event at the end of August / early September, their virtual conference plans have not yet been announced. Stay up to date with the plans for this event on Klaviyo’s website.

Paris Retail Week

Paris Retail Week is currently “LIVE” but we anticipate a digital offering for USA merchants. Usually timed with Paris Fashion week, this event still looks like it will be an in-person event for mid September. Adding this to the list as Europe seems to be opening up a bit more than the US – rumour has it major EU trade shows are offering US participants “virtual” access. This is a great conference that is helpful for the most innovative retail companies that also have or plan to have e-commerce operations.

Linn Academy UK

Another in our more “global” view of conferences – this September event is very popular with global B2C e-commerce merchants for the last few years. This conference has a reputation for super lively sessions with merchants ranging from startups to big brands sharing war stories and interacting with each other in live panels, presentations, Q&As, and more. Healthy competitive debates abound and although not a B2B centric attendance, this is a new one for us and we recommend it to any e-commerce merchant.

The event has already confirmed it will be virtual this year with more details to come. Follow the website to make sure you don’t miss out on the plans for this event.

Semi Con West (On-Demand until September 20)

Semi Con West is a specialized, industry-specific trade show for global electronics manuf...

As Accorin grows, we continue to explore partnerships with software and platform companies that help our clients achieve success. The latest addition to our e-commerce platform capabilities is BigCommerce. We’ve recently been accepted into their Solution Partner program and soon weâ€TMll be offering it as an option to our clients for those we collaboratively believe it might be the right fit. In our experience, becoming an Official Solution Partner is always a strict, thorough process and the experience with BigCommerce has been no different – which is why weâ€TMre confident that gaining their approval is proof that weâ€TMll be able to create e-commerce experiences on BigCommerce that will be of the highest quality.

We only offer our clients e-commerce platform options where we believe we can truly be experts, where we can leverage our deep experience and skills in system integration, and where we believe the option is complimentary (not exclusive) to the others. With BigCommerce, our total offering would only include three platforms that we would propose to clients:

Magento

Shopify

and now, BigCommerce

Why Weâ€TMre Adding BigCommerce to Our Offering

Mid-Range SaaS Offering with B2B Capabilities

Accorin has a strong record of working with manufacturers, distributors, and other types of B2B businesses that rely on B2B e-commerce for a significant portion of their revenue. Many of these businesses have complex requirements, integrations, and customer profiles that make Magento the right fit. Magento has the deepest out-of-the-box B2B functionality and that will continue with the release of new B2B features in V2.4 August 1.

However, some organizations want the simplicity of SaaS at the sacrifice of flexibility and they need also need robust B2B capabilities. Manufacturers and B2B Catalog businesses are just two examples of business types that have mid-range complexity but they need an offering that is a small “step down” from Magento.

We have encountered a number of prospective clients like this and so it is an important reason why we believe Big Commerce will help us and companies in this niche.

If Youâ€TMre Looking for Headless e-Commerce, BigCommerce Allows Speed-to-Market

Because it is SaaS, BigCommerce will provide us with a faster-to-market headless option when compared to Magento. We sacrifice some customizability and flexibility, but weâ€TMre excited to work with some merchants that have creative ideas for new e-commerce user experiences and that create a lot of deep content around the actual catalog shopping experience.

We know with our experience weâ€TMll be able to give these clients the type of webiste experience they want, but we’ll also be able to supplement that with our strong capability in system integration.

And on that point...

SaaS that Supports Complex Integrations Efficiently with RocketFlowz

The Accorin team has deep experience integrating e-commerce platforms with a number of ERP, CRM, PIM, ESP, and other types of digital business systems and marketing automation systems. 95% of our maintenance and support clients task us with enhancing and monitoring complex integrations, so weâ€TMre excited to offer our capabilities to current and prospective BigCommerce merchants.

To offer greater efficiency to our clients, we developed our own Enterprise Application Intergration (EAI) tool, RocketFlowz, that gives us a head start since our API integrations are already complete. We believe that RocketFlowz (which is already being offered to Shopify merchants) will offer BigCommerce merchants a way to improve their shopping experiences and reduce the overhead associated with system integration issues.

Furthermore, BigCommerce merchants that have been contemplating complex integrations can now inquire about getting it done with Accorin and RocketFlowz – which gives us a significant head start into even the most complex integrations.

SaaS, But with Incredible Front End ...

Now four months into the Covid crisis, it’s clear that most industries that rely on e-commerce continue to do well despite all of the major disruptions in the economy. The first few weeks were very shaky. Many industries appeared as though they were going to have major setbacks, but it appears as though e-commerce overall is booming the longer the crisis lasts.

However there are some segments that are struggling. The purpose of this blog post is to share what we are hearing and what we are seeing with our clients, our colleagues, their customers, and others in the market places that we serve.

What e-Commerce Companies are Thriving During Covid-19?

Unsurprisingly, most industries that depend on e-commerce or where ec-ommerce is a major component of their operations have seen a big lift during the pandemic. But there are several noteworthy examples of industries that are doing exceptionally well, even better than one would anticipate given the current nature of the crisis.

After a Slow Start, Healthcare & Healthcare Supplies are Taking Off

All of the supplies that medical practitioners, physical therapists, dermatologists, dental practices and every type of non-emergency medical practice needs are booming. It’s no surprise that all of those supplies are in demand as people catch up on the services that those types of businesses provide.

Our clients and industry analysts in the space are telling us that business is up over 30% from the same period a year ago.

This growth will probably increase over the next few months as many businesses are playing catch-up. The good news is that it does look like supply chain issues are ending and the global flow of materials and supplies seems to be moving again – because if you are in the business of healthcare apparel, surgical supplies, physical therapy equipment and any equipment related to dental practices you are very busy.

Current Industry e-Commerce Grade: A

Outdoor Recreation Products, Including Camping and Boating are Exploding

The reason why is obvious. People have been cooped up in their homes for months and are looking for safe ways to enjoy what’s left of this summer, even though many states are facing an increase in Covid cases and on the verge of going back into lockdown.

Boat dealers have sold out of their inventory. Camping suppliers don’t have tents and backpacks left. Kayaks, paddleboards, and canoes are all in short supply. Heck it’s even hard to find a comfortable beach chair online!

Vacation homes have been rented and all of the stuff people buy for them has been sold out whether it be outdoor furniture umbrellas and other patio equipment.

One small boat manufacturer in Florida told us their sales of 17-24 foot boats is up 300% this year. That type of activity of course has a residual effect on distributors and retailers of boating-related equipment.

Bass Pro Shops, a leading retailer of outdoor, fishing and hunting equipment reports very strong sale and is currently hiring retail help for most of its stores – surprising as a number of major retail chains are truly suffering due to Covid. Ironically Bass Pro Shops also has benefited from being labeled an essential business’, many states have allowed to stay open because they (depending on the state) are firearms dealers.

Other outdoor gear companies that have more apparel vs equipment have not fared as well.

Current Industry E-commerce Grade: A-

Pet Food, Equipment & Supplies Continue to Boom

Chewy.com is one of the largest online suppliers of pet food and equipment:

“Chewy has more than doubled in value and is rolling in revenue from all of those people who thought adopting a pet in the middle of a pandemic was a good idea.”

Other pet suppliers and manufacturers are doing well but they tend to be niche brands that supply specific parts of the industry. Veterinary supply companies were hit hard by the pandemic as people stopped going to the Vet with their pets unless absolutely necessary. But overall this industry ...

Itâ€TMs here. Adobe Sensei-powered product recommendations is the first AI-powered product recommendations engine for Magento, and it looks awesome. Sensei uses artificial intelligence and machine-learning algorithms to perform a deep analysis of aggregated visitor data. It sharpens and targets the product recommendation experience so that they are incredibly relevant.

We believe this is going to be a huge booster for productivity and average order size for B2B merchants. Through our B2B e-commerce experience, designing and installing both the core B2B features and additional B2B modules that speed, we know that self-service and purchasing automation are critical to B2B merchants that want to provide their B2B company customers (and purchasing team members associated with each) with easy, fast, and efficient purchasing. Using Adobe Sensei with Magento Commerce now provides another solution for that.

Weâ€TMre excited about Adobe Sensei for Magento 2 B2B merchants for the following reasons:

1. Easy set up and the easiest way to get AI-powered product recommendations working in a B2B setting

2. We think B2B customers will be highly likely to benefit from the technology

3. With use of this AI-powered product recommendation engine we believe B2B average order values will increase significantly.

Easy to Set Up

Because Sensei is deployed as a SaaS service that is integrated with Magento, it’s relatively easy to set up and should not require any “coding” once the product recommendation modules are installed. Although, it does require knowledge of the Magento Admin panels and key configuration sequences.

On the Admin sidebar, go to Marketing > Promotions > Product Recommendations.

The Product Recommendations dashboard appears. From here, you can create a new recommendation or edit an existing recommendation.This dashboard displays a table of previously configured recommendations (if any) along with the metrics being tracked on those recommendations.

You can use the date filter to refine the recommendations by Last 24 hours, Last 7 days, and Last 30 days.

Now that youâ€TMre no longer scared by this process, we suggest reading the installation notes in the Magento User Guide.

Benefits for B2B Merchants

Obviously you still want to have a well-organized and intuitive catalog – especially for B2B buyers whose job is about finding and procuring the goods they need to conduct business. But having Sensei-powered product recommendations running will gradually over time help the B2B buyer move quickly through their experience and also help them select the items they need, even if they are not thinking about them.

The “Recommended for You” feature will initially use “most viewed” for the first time visitor but over time based upon behavior, the technology will learn to associate need products with the purchasing behavior. For a B2B purchaser this will feel like “assisted shopping” and reduce the need for manually searching. We’re already seeing that this will increase the average cart size.

It’s our belief that, if used correctly, all of the recommendation types provided by this module will benefit B2B shoppers and merchants just as much if not more than B2C.

Out of the box Sensei-powered product recommendations include:

Most viewed – Recommends items most viewed by shoppers within the last seven days

Most purchased – Recommends items most purchased by shoppers within the last seven days

Most added to cart – Recommends items most frequently added to carts by shoppers within the last seven days

Recommended for you – Recommends items based on each shopperâ€TMs current and previous on site behavior

Viewed this, viewed that – Recommends items most often viewed by shoppers who viewed the specified item

Viewed this, bought that – Recommends items most often purchased by shoppers who viewed the specified item

Bought this, bought that – Recommends items most often purchased by...

The Accorin team has been experts at e-commerce integration for some time and over the last few years has been developing products and customizations to help a variety of merchants. Leveraging this expertise and our recent experience helping clients executing e-commerce operations through SaaS platforms like Shopify and Big Commerce we’ve developed an enterprise application integration (EAI) tool which we believe will provide a ton of value to SaaS E-commerce merchants. We call it RocketFlowz.

What Does RocketFlowz Offer?

Simply put, Rocketflowz is a powerful new tool that will help Shopify merchants run their businesses more efficiently. Currently in BETA, RocketFlowz supports the following integrations:

Inventory

Orders

Shipments

Status Updates

Returns

Products

We’ve run across a number of organizations running both Magento and Shopify. Using our Integrator in Magento and Rocketflowz for Shopify, merchants will be able to use the same architecture to manage and monitor integrations into critical back end systems.

Bringing BigCommerce into the Mix

Accorin is dedicated to helping e-commerce merchants no matter what platform they select. We are truly expert at a few (don’t let any system integrator tell you they are “platform agnostic” because we don’t believe in that) but we also have run across many, many different integration scenarios. So, we are in the process of solidifying our knowledge of Big Commerce, adopting it as another SaaS option for our clients, and launching an interface between it and RocketFlowz.

Here’s our Thinking:

BigCommerce is a viable SaaS solution for mid-sized companies that need headless and or basic B2B functionality in a SaaS platform.

Chances are these types of merchants will also need (at a minimum) ERP Integrations. So we feel compelled to offer RocketFlowz to the tens of thousands of BigCommerce merchants that we believe could use it to make their integrations easier and improve their e-Commerce operations.

The Bottom Line

Our Product development team has completed initial API integrations between RocketFlowz and BigCommerce. We’re excited to be offering it to the BigCommerce community of merchants and if you are interested in signing up for our BETA program please send us an email at [email protected] and we’d be happy to chat about it.