How to power tomorrow: Magento Imagine 2017

We’ve all been taught that the preparation for winter starts early in summer. For those in eCommerce it seems that we are constantly under pressure of “Winter is coming!”. The digital world is changing rapidly and so are the needs of digital consumers. It is not big news anymore that digital shoppers have almost conquered the offline world, and for those brands, who haven’t yet jumped on the wave of providing omni-channel experience, it’s better to start catching up.

And what about powering tomorrow, how to be ahead of the market and provide real value to consumers, not only timely fulfilling their needs, but over-delivering their expectations? We believe, these questions were answered at Magento Imagine 2017 and here is our wrap-up.

Power your UX

There is no doubt that providing a seamless experience at all touch points is vital for making your shoppers happy. This is where you come to see great examples of providing omni-channel experience from companies like Devlyn optics, Helly Hansen, Sunglass Hut, who have successfully integrated Commerce Order Management.

At the same time you have to maintain high quality interactions with your customers no matter where they reach out to you. For example, it becomes more and more popular among shoppers to just ping a message on Facebook to a fan page expecting to get full customer support without visiting a website. Magento is on top of the trend launching a social package to ensure you are fully present on social channels where your users spend most of their time.

This leads us to mobile, when more and more users shop from their mobile devices, read reviews and hit “Add to cart”. Make sure your mobile checkout is frictionless and your conversion rates stay high no matter of the device. Check the presentation from the “Improving Mobile Conversion: The 50% You’re Missing” session.

In order to fulfill customer expectations and offer personalized products, stay on top of big data by using Magento Business Intelligence. Segment your customers by early behavior, look at long-term patterns and apply right strategies to make your audience happy. As Mark Lavelle said from stage, make sure to deliver the product to your client even before he realizes that he had ran out of it.

And don’t forget, that your best mentor in business is your customer, as told by Jessica Herrin.

Power your B2B

For many merchants out there in the market, it is not only vital to deliver value to the consumer. Many brands rely on a B2B model. For years building a huge sales team strictly to manage corporate accounts was a norm, with price lists and catalogs provided manually. Today more and more corporate buyers want to complete their purchases online, having a full clarity of inventory and price options. This is why brands need to be up-to-date and provide a B2C-like experience for their resellers.

According to Forrester Consulting, 80% of B2B buyers agree that they will buy again from the same supplier if they find they have an easy-to-use site. It previously meant that companies were facing the need to integrate many other solutions, build complex connectors to Magento, or customize the B2C-focused platform itself. This year is a big change. Magento is going to release many business features, eliminating the pain points of online interactions for both resellers and suppliers. Big goal is to make Magento the ultimate platform for eCommerce with many out-of-the box features ready for you to use without complex customizations.

Embrace the power of community

No doubt, that one of the strongest powers of Magento is its community. Magento Imagine itself is a big example of how the community constantly evolves, respectfully helping to develop the platform. The marketplace this year was a huge part of the event. Many new vendors as well as loyal partners coming to Magento Imagine every year. We ourselves were very delighted to sponsor such an amazing event and share ideas and insights with the attendees.

How can the community benefit you? First, be open to new ideas and information. Especially at the event like Magento Imagine, so many partners are eager to help you out with your site. No matter what problem you have – poor performance, low conversions, drops in organic traffic – you will find the needed help among more than 2000 participants. Maybe tomorrow this will be your partner, helping you do better in eCommerce. Remember, as Jason Woosley, SVP Product & Technology at Magento, said: “When you select a partner, you don’t just simply select a vendor, you are buying into their philosophy”.

Magento Imagine 2017 is behind. What is in front of us? Nobody knows exactly. But what we are sure of, is that today’s work can really power tomorrow. And we can power it together.

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