Over the past 10 years, the web has changed dramatically. Website designs have gone from table layouts to responsive, multi-resolution, user-focused experiences. Development has moved from scripts and hacks to large, stable, and expansive frameworks. SEO has evolved from measuring pure keyword counts, back-links, and proper HTML usage to measurable engagement, content quality, and site speed. Social media also allowed for immediate dispersion of information to a vast and growing internet audience. The web is a far more complicated, inviting, and competitive place now.
Practically anyone can open a store, publish a blog, or report the news now. So now, instead of just publishing, the need to differentiate is also highly important. With the sheer amount of information and competition for pageviews, we’ve all been spectators and guinea pigs at one time or another as search engines try to make better decisions about what a quality site contains. We’ve probably (unknowingly) been part of a multivariate or A/B test which aimed to know which page layout or button placement was most effective. When it comes to your site, it’s not longer good enough to just be there — its content and experience must adapt and be tailored to your users and audience.
We’ve entered the age of content-driven commerce.
Given the amount of work required to build and maintain a sophisticated, content-rich, user-tuned experience, we should expect our tools to help us during this endeavor. Our framework should provide the tools to build what we want and the building blocks to leverage best-of-breed, proven technologies. It should get out of our way and make less assumptions about what we are doing. And when customization is required, it should make our life easier. Future evolutions of technology ought to be an investment in the future rather than a gamble.
As a store owner or an online commerce consultancy, you’ve got enough to do when you must also consider security, taxes, fulfillment, marketing, and logistics as part of a site build and the long-term strategy once you’ve tackled content. Once the requirements have been laid out, many opt to try to merge two technologies (or don’t bother at all). The result is an experience that can leave your customers and users feeling confused. Your brand should feel cohesive and whole. When customers browse between individual marketing and store sites, shifting between two different sites, they can (and many will) feel disjointed and confused. Perception is reality — can you afford not to give the best possible experience when your competition is a click away?
Now I want you to imagine that you’ve just decided to build a house. You’ve arranged to meet with your architect at their office. After months of planning and research and a clear vision of what you want, you walk in and begin to expound on your dreams. Suddenly, your architect interrupts you and proceeds to flip his screen around to show you your house. When you protest that it’s not at all what you imagined, they simply explain that it can be modified. Hours later, you’ve spent more time and mental energy looking at this pre-designed house, telling them what you don’t want, while having to fight for what you do want. Compromise means watering down your dream so you don’t sink. When you review the plans, the architect notes that some of the changes you want to make are pretty tough given the pre-designed model he started with. In many cases, this pre-designed model can cause far more consternation and pain than help it may have originally been intended to provide. This frustrating endeavor is embarked upon by many, many people every day who want to build a site that fits their needs.
This is why I joined Commerce Guys.
From its very core, Drupal Commerce makes as few assumptions as it can about you and your needs. It gives you the freedom to build instead of making you first tear down what you don’t want. It asks “how can we make this work?” instead of “how can we make this fit?” It allows for store owners to get world-renowned CMS functionality alongside a complete commerce toolkit without having to sacrifice functionality or user experience. Commerce Guys is committed to the open-source ideology that has made Drupal and Drupal Commerce great, available, and successful. And I am glad that I can be a member of the team that has made it – will continue to make it – successful.
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