April 10, 2025
Imagine a world where your digital commerce platform evolves and scales as quickly as your business. Where you’re not held back by rigid systems, clunky legacy tech, or monolithic platforms that weren’t built for today’s pace. No, it’s not an impossible dream or a retail myth – it’s composable commerce, and it is the future of e-commerce.
Retailers today face more disruption than ever. Geopolitical tensions, uncertain economic conditions, workforce challenges and rising customer expectations are altering the commerce landscape at an unprecedented pace. Yet, businesses are still relying on traditional platforms that simply can’t keep up. These monolithic, inflexible platforms are falling flat and buckling under the pressure of modern e-commerce demands.
Navigating this complex and dynamic landscape requires agility, adaptability and forward-thinking solutions. It means investing in modern technologies like artificial intelligence, building a skilled workforce and creating resilient supply chains.
Many traditional e-commerce platforms were built for a simpler time. While they originally enabled businesses to rapidly go to market and launch e-commerce propositions, such as online storefronts, today’s complex consumer expectations and volatile market conditions are exposing their limitations.
With inflexible architectures, tightly interconnected components and rigid infrastructures, the monolithic nature of these systems is restricting retailers from scaling, innovating and responding quickly to changing market demands. Outdated legacy systems prevent seamless integration with cloud platforms and AI capabilities while demanding time and costly resources for maintenance. In fact, up to 80% of an organisation’s IT budget can be spent on keeping old services running, leaving little room for tech transformation.
From customer service and payments to operations and supply chain, technology now drives every aspect of modern commerce. Success depends on a business’s ability to apply this technology to move fast, adapt to change and deliver seamless customer experience across every touch point.
Composable commerce replaces the traditional monolith with modular, best-of-breed solutions in an architectural approach built for speed, innovation and customer-centricity. It breaks down the system into modular components which can be independently developed, deployed and upgraded without disrupting the entire ecosystem. Whether it’s a content management system (CMS), customer data platform (CDP), payment system or microfrontend – businesses can select and integrate the best available solutions for each function without being tied to a single vendor.
It’s also more cost-effective, with organisations only paying for the specific technologies that they need, avoiding the huge license fees that are typically associated with monoliths, especially when a business may only require and use a fraction of the available capabilities.
Modern consumers expect more than just a transactional experience. They want personalisation, convenience and exceptional user experiences. Composable commerce empowers businesses to deliver on all these promises in ways that traditional systems can only dream about.
By implementing a robust personalisation layer, powered by CDPs, CRM systems, and behavioral analytics, composable commerce enables businesses to deliver hyper‑targeted customer experiences. With 71% of customers expecting personalised experiences from retailers, this can result in improved engagement and higher conversion rates. Research shows that 62% of business leaders say that their personalisation efforts have led to improved customer retention, while 80% report increased consumer spending by an average of 38% thanks to personalisation.
Omnichannel experiences are also vital, with 73% of consumers using multiple channels during their shopping journey. Businesses that prioritise an integrated and customer experience are seeing real results, including retailers seeing up to 179% higher sales revenue compared to those without omnichannel strategies. The flexibility of composable commerce makes it easier for businesses to shift with emerging trends and meet their customers when they want to shop.
This approach doesn’t just support customer engagement, it can drive real, measurable value for business within operations. A decoupled approach reduces operational risk, and accelerates innovation by isolating performance bottlenecks, reducing downtime and enhancing overall user experience. Adopters of the composable commerce approach report reduced time-to-market for new features (27%), while retailers using unified inventory systems have seen up to a 30% reduction in fulfillment errors,
Composable commerce isn’t just about keeping up with the competition—it’s about staying ahead of it. By offering the flexibility to scale, innovate, and personalise, composable commerce provides businesses with the tools they need to meet today’s consumer demands and future-proof their operations.
To explore how composable commerce can transform your e-commerce strategy, sign up for early access to our new ebook “Composable commerce: The blueprint for modern e‑commerce”. It’s packed with expert insights from deep experience in composable commerce alongside practical steps and a clear technical roadmap.
If you’re ready to embrace a future-ready approach to digital commerce, contact our team today to start your digital transformation journey.
All business models have their pros and cons. But, when you consider the type of problems we help our clients to solve at Equal Experts, it’s worth thinking about the level of experience and the best consultancy approach to solve them.
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