Gartner Research

Critical Capabilities for Digital Commerce

Published: 15 August 2022

Summary

Digital commerce platforms support B2B and B2C use cases, sometimes via the same solution. Native support for other digital business models, such as subscriptions and enterprise marketplaces, is growing. Application leaders should use this research to identify suitable platforms for their business.

Included in Full Research

Overview

Key Findings
  • All vendors featured in this research support some form of managed service, vendor-managed hosting, or provide a SaaS version of their digital commerce platform.

  • Marketplace operations are becoming a standard part of digital commerce platform offerings, especially for business-to-business (B2B).

  • Several of the vendors evaluated in this research mention “composable commerce” or “composability” in go-to-market propositions that embrace a modular, API-first approach.

  • API-first (“headless”) platforms are investing in business user-facing no-code UI management tools to manage the new decoupled, JavaScript-based storefronts that are quickly becoming best practice.

Recommendations

As an application leader responsible for digital commerce technologies, you should:

  • Use this Critical Capabilities

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  • Adobe
  • BigCommerce
  • commercetools
  • Elastic Path
  • HCL Software
  • Infosys
  • Kibo
  • Optimizely
  • Oro
  • Salesforce (B2B Commerce on LE)
  • Salesforce (B2C Commerce)
  • Sana
  • SAP
  • SCAYLE
  • Shopware
  • Spryker
  • Unilog
  • VTEX
  • Agility
  • Platform Ecosystem
  • B2B Support
  • Complex Environments
  • Globalization
  • Unified Retail Commerce
  • Composability
  • Core Commerce
  • B2C Digital Commerce
  • B2B Digital Commerce
  • B2C and B2B Digital Commerce on Same Platform
  • Composable Commerce

Analysts:

Mike Lowndes Yanna Dharmasthira Sandy Shen Penny Gillespie Jason Daigler Aditya Vasudevan

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Critical Capabilities: A deeper look into provider offerings

How does a Critical Capabilities report work?

As a companion to the Magic Quadrant™, a Critical Capabilities report scores competing products and services against a set of meaningful differentiators. It reveals which options are the best fit in various use cases to help you focus on the vendors best suited to your needs.

A Critical Capabilities report is more than just a diagram. You also get:

Sharper focus

Narrow down the product and service criteria most important to you.

Individualized use cases

Use interactive features to customize usage scenarios based on your organization’s unique needs.

Faster decision making

Use data to speed up provider selection and accelerate the procurement process.

A Gartner Critical Capabilities report is just one of our many offerings.

We provide actionable, objective insight to help organizations make smarter, faster technology decisions to stay ahead of disruption and accelerate growth.

Pick the right provider with confidence

We use a Critical Capabilities report, the Magic Quadrant and more to ensure you select the best-fit provider to avoid the costly repercussions of a poor decision.

Align deal structures and optimize spend

We benchmark pricing against the market so you avoid unnecessary charges.

Reduce complexity and risk

We analyze contract terms and conditions to protect you against future price increases and unanticipated costs.

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