Omnichannel Commerce vs. Unified Commerce, and the Types of Commerce in Between

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It's all about trade - B2B, B2C, B2B2C - sometimes also B2E and B2G. Today it's less about target groups and more about the characteristics of trade. And here too: We talk happily about terminology, but do we know what's behind it? Do we know what we need in our sales and marketing-oriented areas? In the meantime, does one exclude the other or do the aforementioned forms of trade still have their raison d'être? Let's put a magnifying glass on it and take a closer look...

Content Commerce
It is not just any content that is only about products and therefore close to the retailer. Rather, content-driven commerce is about seamless support of the entire digital customer journey, sometimes long before and often long after a (online) purchase has been made. "From awareness of the need to the idea of ​​product selection, to purchase and use of the product. Customers must be able to access the content they need at any time and at any digital touchpoint."

Whether Instagram, Facebook or TikTok, whether a Google part time data search, an experience blog, a comparison portal, a test report, a marketplace or a supplier website: information starts somewhere and then the purchase takes place for the consumer on one of the countless channels. And content commerce always accompanies content to consumers in a coordinated, channel-related, customer-specific and yet uniform and harmonious manner. Marketers know: This requires, on the one hand, a well-thought-out content commerce strategy and, on the other hand, the right technology for its implementation, such as a digital experience platform (DXP). adesso partner Crownpeak (formerly E-Spirit) sees five essential reasons for the success of a content-based strategy in its blog post:

1. Brand differentiation
2. Better location in search engines
3. Greater success in a new buyer journey
4. Better exploitation of the company's knowledge resources
5. Increase customer loyalty (turn them into true fans)

In short, content-based commerce is a powerful element to attract and retain customers through content-based targeting throughout the entire customer journey. And so, content-based commerce is undoubtedly very relevant in marketing areas.

Composable Commerce
The term was first coined by Gartner in 2020. My colleague Laura Schöning describes it in her blog post: “Composable Commerce” means an IT infrastructure in which not all business applications are covered by a single system. Instead, a selection of software components that are particularly suitable for digital commerce is made , which can be combined in any modular way to create a tailor-made application.” So the best approach? Yes, exactly. The marketing platform OMR also confirms this in its blog post. It describes Composable Commerce as follows: “At its core, it is about optimizing the architecture of the customer experience using numerous components, i.e. not using complete systems. Instead, several powerful individual solutions are brought together to tailor them to your company. So you build your customized system environment from the best solutions in the industry to meet the requirements you need to manage.”