Choosing Between Salesforce Commerce Cloud and Adobe Commerce: Which Is Best?

Today’s businesses increasingly rely on e-commerce platforms to reach customers and grow their revenue. Two popular options in the market are Salesforce Commerce Cloud and Adobe Commerce. Both offer robust features and capabilities, but choosing the right one for your business can be daunting.

This blog addresses the Salesforce Commerce Cloud vs Adobe Commerce question and provides guidance on which platform best suits your business needs. We will look at factors such as scalability, customization, ease of use, cost, and the importance of Salesforce commerce cloud development to help you make an informed decision and select the right e-commerce platform for your business.

Knowing Your eCommerce Needs

Before you pick between Salesforce and Adobe, know your eCommerce needs. The main areas to explore include:

Assessing Business Requirements

A business-to-business (B2B) company has more complex requirements than a business-to-customer (B2C) company and picks its tools accordingly. You should know whether you’re working with traditional sales, marketplace, or subscription models. This will also help you comprehensively understand your target market (demographics, online behavior, pain points).

Knowing Key Features and Functionality 

• Know your product catalogs’ complexity and whether they have advanced features for managing variations and different forms of rich content. 

• Understand what tools you need for email campaigns, customer segmentation, and promotions as part of your marketing efforts. 

• Using an order management system, be clear on inventory, order fulfillment, and returns while considering supply chain complexities. 

Making Scalability Considerations 

• With proper research, you should have an approximate traffic volume in mind. This is how many people will visit your website, make orders, and leave reviews. Initial progress will be slow, but growth is inevitable, and your store should be prepared for when it does. Basic preparatory measures include:

• Adequate storage for product, customer, and order histories is essential. Ensure you always have a surplus of storage to accommodate a sudden rise. 

• Optimize your website for faster load times and intuitive navigation. This will contribute to a great first impression and positive customer experience. 

Knowing Your Budget

• Net income is revenue minus expenses; every eCommerce store owner should remind themselves of the costs of making money online. The most common eCommerce costs include:

• Platform costs depend on features and store transaction volume. 

• Implementation costs associated with store design, customizations, and integrations when building the store. 

• Maintenance costs related to store maintenance and future updates. 

• Before deciding between Salesforce Commerce Cloud and Adobe Commerce, ensure you’re clear on the costs associated with the platform. It would be best to balance costs with the value you get from them. 

Salesforce Commerce Cloud – Features and Benefits 

Formerly Demandware, Salesforce Commerce Cloud (SFCC) is an enterprise-grade, cloud-hosted eCommerce platform with several powerful features and scalability tools. Additionally, SCC integrates with other Salesforce 360 products (CRM, analytics tools, and market automation).

Salesforce Commerce Cloud Features 

The main SCC features include:

• B2B and B2C commerce tools include pricing rules, account management, and self-service tools. Working with Salesforce commerce cloud consultants can help you get the right features. 

• The Einstein AI model creates a personalized shopping experience. It helps with target promotions, product recommendations, and advanced search functionality. 

• Headless commerce functionality that lets you create custom storefronts that aren’t connected to a particular commerce engine. 

• SFCC has an order management system that manages orders, fulfillment, and returns. 

• Integration with the Salesforce marketing cloud automates email marketing and customer segmentation, creating a unified marketing experience for the best results. Additionally, Salesforce commerce cloud migration lets you bring legacy data into the fold.

• Multi-storefront management using SFCC’s built-in features, such as accommodating different languages and currencies, makes SCC great for global eCommerce.

Integration with Salesforce Products 

The commerce cloud benefits from Salesforce’s inter-product integration and lets you connect SFCC with CRM, marketing cloud, and customer service solutions. The result is real-time customer and sales data (purchase history, demographics) for store optimization and marketing efforts. 

Salesforce commerce cloud optimization and functionality make stores built on the platform scalable. The SCC will handle anything you throw at it, whether you have significant traffic volumes or complex product catalogs. The only caveat could be the development required to build the stores. However, working with B2C commerce developers makes this process incredibly simple. 

Adobe Commerce – Features and Benefits

Adobe Commerce (Magento) is an open-source eCommerce platform for B2B stores. Its diverse feature set and complex online stores target mid-market or enterprise-level stores.

Adobe Commerce Features 

The main features of Adobe Commerce include the following:

• Adobe Commerce is ideal for B2B eCommerce stores thanks to its customer segmentation, tiered pricing, quote management, and optimization functions. It can also be used with B2C stores, but its complex functionality could be excessive for a smaller business. 

• Magento stores can handle large traffic volumes by default. You can throw complex product catalogs at it, and your store will barely break a sweat. However, proper Magento store optimization requires technical expertise.

• Magento is open-source, meaning users can customize extensively using their extension marketplace and code modifications. 

• Combining Adobe Commerce and Adobe Experience Manager (CMS) allows store owners to develop rich content (landing pages, product pages, and marketing campaigns).

Adobe Commerce (Magento) Functionality: 

You get extensive customization options with Magento. Developers have access to the core code and extension marketplace. This lets businesses build a platform based on specific needs, creating a truly unique shopping experience.

 The main Magento functions include

• Marketing automation tools

• SEO optimization tools 

• Payment gateway integration, 

• Shipping tool integrations.

This is the tip of the Magento functionality iceberg. The only caveat is that Magento requires technical expertise to build these stores. Additionally, it can cost more than the Salesforce commerce cloud.

Magento’s integration with the Adobe Experience Cloud gives store owners access to Adobe Analytics and Target. These tools make it easier to create targeted marketing campaigns using real-time customer data. 

Comparing Salesforce Commerce Cloud and Adobe Commerce 

Salesforce Commerce Cloud and Adobe Commerce are both eCommerce platforms for B2C and B2B. However, as this table shows, there are differences between the two.

Conclusion

The choice in the Adobe Commerce Cloud vs Salesforce debate hinges on your business’s needs and goals. Salesforce Commerce Cloud implementation excels in providing robust CRM integration and scalability. Adobe Commerce stands out for its powerful content management capabilities and seamless integration with the Adobe ecosystem.

Both platforms cater to distinct audiences, with Salesforce Commerce Cloud appealing to businesses seeking a comprehensive CRM-driven approach and Adobe Commerce attracting those focused on rich content experiences and seamless design integration. The best platform for your business depends on your requirements, objectives, and the audience you aim to serve.