This is the third in a three-part blog series about the use of Magento.
Magento may have started out as a small-scale e-commerce solution. But the latest versions of the platform are empowering innovative customer experiences for the biggest — and most ambitious — digital commerce operations.
Released in November 2018, Magento 2.3 ushered in robust e-commerce capabilities that have been strengthened with each incremental upgrade. These tools help retailers apply technologies that suit their specific needs with laser precision. Moreover, Magento 2.3.x makes it easier to scale up or down with fluctuations in demand while delivering a more consistent buying experience. That makes it easier to thrive in an age of disruption.
One of the biggest sticking points with early e-commerce platforms was lack of flexibility. A platform might have a muscular backend and a weak frontend, or clumsy integration with applications for resource and customer management. With the tools in Magento 2.3.x, you can decouple your frontend from your backend and integrate with other critical software applications without major headaches.
These four capabilities make it possible:
- Adobe’s user experience tools. Adobe acquired Magento for $1.68 billion in 2018 because it needed a comprehensive commerce platform to accompany its market-leading suite of user experience design software. When paired with Magento 2.3.x, Adobe Experience Manager gives retailers best-in-class tools to design for the entire digital commerce experience on mobile, web and emerging digital platforms.
- Advanced API Integrations. APIs, or application programming interfaces, allow software packages to talk to each other. APIs let websites pull in data from tech giants like Microsoft and Google. They also let small SaaS companies link their applications to larger software platforms. Magento 2.3.x makes it much easier to integrate APIs into digital commerce operations, which empowers retailers to add features that please customers and streamline the shopping experience.
- Powerful PWA capabilities. PWAs, or progressive web applications, make features previously confined to mobile apps available to websites. Using the GraphQL language, Magento 2.3.x lets developers implement PWAs that converge the power of a mobile app with the advantages of cloud storage. Software can be updated universally in the cloud rather than individually on an app, ensuring every online buyer gets a consistent, seamless experience.
- Headless commerce. Legacy e-commerce platforms often had strengths in one domain but weaknesses in another. If your backend database worked wonders but your frontend system (the “head”) was a kludgy mess, you were pretty much stuck with both. In Magento 2.3.x, you can combine APIs, PWAs and Adobe Experience Manager to go headless — using only the best-of-breed applications that meet the precise requirements of your marketplace, customers and business goals. If you hope to use machine learning to personalize shopping experiences, headless commerce with Magento 2.3.x is the way to go.
Magento 2.3.x. Requires Deep e-Commerce Experience
Getting all these features to work to your advantage requires a partner who can serve the needs of retailers and customers while applying the best Magento features and avoiding the pitfalls that bedevil complex e-commerce operations. That’s the skill DMI delivers to our clients. We understand retail and we have the skills you need to combine Adobe tools with APIs, PWAs and headless commerce.
— Jon Wovchko, vice president of operations & strategy consultant, digital commerce
