(Image credit/Pixabay/MIH83)Digital River, an eCommerce enabler has re-organised its services to a “headless” approach, building a suite of APIs and microservices. This move enables brands to combine best-of-breed solutions from multiple providers to create a flexible eCommerce offering. The company says the service is designed to meet complex shopper demands globally. This shift to a more agile and modular-solution allows Digital River to meet the changing expectations of shoppers and retailers.

A brand can continue to use its existing web content management system (WCMS) or commerce provider. However, they can benefit from Digital River’s expertise in global payment acceptance, tax laws, compliance regulations and fraud protection. This allows brands to offer a truly localised approach to eCommerce in each individual market. Yet, without undertaking the complexity or cost of a complete commerce solution change.

Growing the brand globally

Digital River suggests its platform can help brands create comprehensive and customised solutions to grow internationally. It is focusing on its core offerings—including order management, global payments and risk protection. At the same time aligning with key strategic partners for digital experience and commerce solutions.

(Image credit/LinkedIn/Adam Coyle)
Adam Coyle, CEO of Digital River

The way brands buy eCommerce solutions has changed. Sophisticated brands are looking to integrate multiple best-of-breed products. They are looking to create a customised solution that creates seamless buying experience,” said Adam Coyle, CEO of Digital River. “To accomplish this, we made the strategic decision to further unbundle our solutions through APIs and microservices. We are building a partner ecosystem for seamless integrations. It’s exciting to see the possibilities created for clients, as we offer flexibility in how they consume our core offering.”

It was clear we needed to deconstruct our monolithic technology stack to meet market needs for more agile and modular commerce solutions,” commented James Gagliardi, chief product officer for Digital River. “To complement our strengths around order management, payments and risk protection services like tax, fraud and regulatory compliance. We rely on top-echelon partners with top-tier solutions in other areas to provide brands with value in one powerful solution.”

Stepping away from full-stack architecture

Digital River is expanding partnerships in unlikely places to offer clients service and agility required to meet ever-changing shopper preferences. Long-time commerce competitors are now collaborating in new ways. In June, Salesforce announced that Digital River is launching as a partner on its B2B Commerce AppExchange. This is the first of multiple partnerships and technology integrations Digital River will bring to market this year.

According to Michael French, Digital River’s Head of Global Partnerships, “We had to step-away from full-stack architecture to best-of-breed solutions. This allow brands to select from Digital River’s ecosystem, or plug in their own solutions, when building their own architecture. So far, the level of engagement we’ve seen from solution partners throughout Americas, Europe, and Asia/Pacific has exceeded our expectations. We look forward to working closely with our partners to fulfil the needs of their clients.”

Enterprise Times: What this means for business?

Increasingly traditional eCommerce approaches have been flipped upside-down as retailers require agility and control when it comes to their operations. This explains why a number of eCommerce service providers are embracing headless API-first and a partner-focused strategy. Hence why Digital River, is the latest eCommerce platform provider to announce its headless-first approach.

Retail is incredibly competitive and rapidly evolving, with consumer tastes changing in months, weeks or days. To survive, brands must stay focused on customer acquisition and retention by delivering unique and engaging buying experiences across touchpoints. Brands must do this while managing complexity in the back-end infrastructure. This is particularly true when selling on a global scale. Increasingly, retailers don’t want to put all their eggs in one basket. They are breaking apart monolithic commerce solutions and embracing a more agile and modular offering. Brands can then offload these back-end complexities to companies like Digital River while maintaining control over the front-end shopper experience.

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