Benefits of Building Merchandiser Platforms using Drupal Commerce
Online merchandising has experienced rapid growth over the past several years. This has lead to the emergence of several e-commerce systems that help merchants to sell their products and services. Both proprietary and open-source e-commerce systems come with a handful of features. There are times when we feel confused about choosing an e-commerce system that best matches our unique requirements. This article will help you to sort out your dilemmas.
It was back in 2011, that the first version of the Drupal Commerce platform was released. Since then it has been evolving according to the changing market structure and consumer requirements. Drupal Commerce is the only e-commerce system that is built on top of an enterprise content management system. Recently, Drupal commerce released its latest version Commerce 2.x, which helped it to enter into the new league of enterprise commerce that offers more customization, scalability, and robustness. Drupal Commerce 2.x is built for Drupal 8.
Marrying Drupal Commerce with Drupal is an ideal solution for organizations that wish to build a merchandiser platform that needs customizations at various levels. When using the Drupal commerce module with Drupal, we get a tightly integrated solution that elevates e-commerce and content marketing up a notch. As the data flow seamlessly between the two systems, it can be harnessed to deliver great customer experiences. Also, new feature additions will not affect the communication between Drupal and Drupal Commerce.
Given below are some of the use cases where Drupal Commerce can be used.
Product Customization
Gayle is a company that sells Gypsum boards to contractors and installers. Gayle delivers marketplace features like quote generation and mass order placements on their platform. This helps users to generate a quote for products and make online payments for the same. It is the flexibility of Drupal commerce that allows Gayle to deliver custom features in the portal and customize the order management process.
Yell Fish is a company that sells frozen fish. It delivers fish in various forms and quantities. For increasing the community engagement, they have created a community portal that showcases editor picked recipes. Along with recipes, Yell Fish also lists the ingredients that are needed for preparing that dish. This provides the customers the ease of ordering all ingredients as a bundle. Product bundling feature in Drupal Commerce has been utilized to make this happen.
Feature Customization
Klaro is a garments dealer. They do have both wholesale dealers(B2B) and consumers(B2C) in their customer base. To deliver an optimum digital experience to both of these customers, they decided to build a merchandiser platform that addresses the needs of both dealers(B2B) and consumers(B2C).
Dealers usually search for products based on their specifications and model numbers. Also, they purchase in large numbers. So it’s essential to have an order list feature that help dealers to organize their order. Dealers usually purchase using their credit.
On the other hand, consumers purchase directly from Klaro using online payments. Consumers also have options to try products virtually and confirm the order. Both dealers and consumers share a common inventory, but with a different pricing model and purchase mechanism.
Drupal Commerce works well for all the use cases mentioned above. Let’s check the general implementation approach that can be taken to build a merchandiser platform using Drupal and Drupal Commerce.
Implementation Model
As Drupal offers a great deal of digital marketing support, the product catalog can be displayed using Drupal. For the e-commerce system, Drupal Commerce can be used.
Advantages of using Drupal Commerce
Safe and Secure E-Commerce System
Drupal and Drupal Commerce delivers updates at a regular basis. This will help the system to be updated and secure against threats.
Customizable
Both Drupal and Drupal Commerce can be customized according to business needs. This is not possible in SaaS systems.
Digital Marketing Enabled System
Using Drupal for product catalog display will help to bring out the digital marketing capabilities of Drupal.
Scalability
Being built on Drupal and Drupal Commerce, the system facilitates scalability to next level. This includes feature additions and allows for integration with multiple systems.
License Free
Unlike SaaS or proprietary e-commerce systems, Drupal Commerce is open source and there is no licensing cost or usage limits. You can customize it as you wish.
Zyxware has helped several organizations in building merchandiser platforms to serve their customers in a better way. Our e-commerce experts work with the client to understand their business problems and implement a solution that best addresses it. Read a case study on how we helped a ticket-selling business set up a merchandiser platform that suits their custom requirements. To know more about how we can help you, get in touch with us!
