This question is not easy to answer. As always with such an abstract question, it's "it depends." To answer this question, we need to look at what Smartstore editions are available.
Smartstore is available in the following editions: Community, Premium, Enterprise B2C, Enterprise B2B, Smartstore Commerce Cloud , and Enterprise Commerce Open Source. Each of these editions serves a specific purpose.
One thing right away - whichever Smartstore edition you choose, an "upgrade" to a higher edition is possible at any time, even while the store is running, since the basic code of the Smartstore editions does not differ from the open source variant (Community Edition or CE for short).
The Smartstore Community Edition is intended for beginners who want to see what can be done with e-commerce, but also to test if the technologies we provide are enough.
Now we come to the Smartstore Premium Edition. This differs only by the number of plugins Smartstore provides you with in addition to the Community Edition (free base). But more about that later.
The Smartstore Enterprise Edition is the premium class for internationally operating brands and retail companies and those who want to become one. It is flexible and can grow with your business. But more about that later.
But now a little more detailed.
Smartstore Community Edition (CE)
Let's start with the Smartstore Community Edition and for whom it is suitable. The Smartstore Community Edition is 100% Open Source, subject to version 5 the AGPLv3 and is of course free of charge. Again, the question, why are we doing this and who is going to benefit?
This question is actually answered relatively quickly. Before you decide on something, you naturally want to know if it's right for you, because after all, you're investing time and money. Exactly for this reason we make our work available to you free of charge without any ifs and buts.
To make a long story short. With the Smartstore Community Edition you get a flexible basis with the most important functionalities to develop and successfully operate a state-of-the-art webshop. You can find more information here.
Smartstore Premium
Slowly become more demanding. Again, the question arises as to why you should use the Smartstore Premium Edition and what added value it offers you. You only ask yourself this question when you have now established yourself on the market and now want to optimize your processes. With the Smartstore Premium Edition we offer you the best return on investment. Keywords here are ROI, e-commerce strategy, customer lifetime value, option pricing models, investment planning models. What does the Premium Edition offer you to achieve all this?
For example, there is the advanced search MegaSearch, which you need to operate in a multishop environment. With the facet search, your customers will quickly and intuitively find the products they are looking for. But that's not all. You can't avoid sharing data with different sources and destinations.
This version offers for example with BMEcat Import & Export capabilities in the common industry standard for the exchange of product catalogs. For the transmission of order data to merchandise management systems, another industry standard has been implemented in the form of OpenTrans, which enables the connection to almost all ERP systems.
The next challenge in this phase of the company is: Is my hoster still the right one? Can it accompany me internationally and effectively protect my online store from attacks? At the latest now you should think about Cloud Computing think about. The Premium version is just the right tool to meet this challenge. We have deliberately chosen Microsoft as the market leader in cloud computing and provide you with the plugin Azure BLOB Storage the right tool at your disposal. You can find more information on this topic in our blog post With Smartstore into the cloud.
Another issue in this phase that should not be underestimated is speed. Here we offer you with the plugin Output Cache the possibility to achieve the maximum speed. But what exactly does this output cache do? At this point it unfortunately gets a bit too technical, but we try to explain it as simple as possible.
"Output caching is a mechanism for optimizing performance by holding web pages that have been requested at an earlier time. With page caching, entire pages are kept in stock on the web server without dynamically generating them each time they are called. Normally, the web server discards the output immediately after forwarding it to the web client."
That was the technical explanation. If someone before you asked the same search query, the server saves it and outputs it the next time you ask the same question without having to search the database again. I hope this explanation is more understandable.
Of course there would be more to say at this point about the Smartstore Premium Edition to say, but we'll spare that. Simply make an appointment with one of our experienced employees and let us advise you.
Smartstore Enterprise B2C, Smartstore Enterprise B2B, Smartstore Commerce Cloud and Smartstore Enterprise Commerce Open Source (OS) Edition.
And now for the supreme discipline, the Smartstore Enterprise Editions. As you have noticed, some editions are called Enterprise and one Enterprise Commerce and not enterprise e-commerce. What is the difference if you leave out the E before Commerce? Well, that is quite simple to explain. The most common use of e-commerce is the online trading of goods through an online store. But more about that later.
E-Business, Digital Experience Platform (DXP), Headless or simply Commerce is initially a generic term for a number of business processes that are handled in companies via information technologies. In addition to the sale of articles, this may include, for example. the control and billing of machines (IoT) or even the rental of tools, bicycles or even electric scooters, Scan & Go and Grab & Go. in retail or also the content management system and much more. its.
But even here there are no limits to the imagination, in the great combination between Smartstore and the Microsoft provided Azure Cloud Services you are able to implement almost any business process imaginable above. Since it would go beyond the scope here to explain all the possible combinations between Smartstore and Microsoft Azure, we will focus on a few key elements for internationally operating brands and retail companies. You can find more information here.
Smartstore Enterprise B2C Edition
As B2C-Unternehmen you are always in a customer relationship with private individuals, our Smartstore Enterprise B2C Edition is designed to help you interact with your end customers with ease. All plugins are provided to you by Smartstore for smooth operation. Alternative names are Business-2-Consumer (B2C) and, if you are a manufacturer, Direct-2-Consumer (D2C). What falls under B2C B2C and D2C D2C ? As already mentioned B2C/D2C to the business relationship between companies and private individuals. This means that distribution focuses on communication and the sale of services and goods to end customers. Such business relationships are found in every industry; B2C/D2C can therefore not be limited to a single industry. In addition, you benefit from our 24/7 Support.
Smartstore Enterprise B2B Edition
B2B is the English term for business-to-business and generally refers to business relationships between at least two companies. B2B-Unternehmen count other companies among their customers, so their activities are limited to business with corporate customers. The B2B-Bereich includes all industries and value chains, a clear demarcation is not possible. Currently, the volume of trade in business-to-business commerce in Germany amounts to more than one trillion euros. Here, too, we do not leave you as a customer in the lurch: All the plugins we provide you with are exclusively developed by Smartstore and are supported by our 24/7 Support.
Smartstore Enterprise Commerce Cloud
To survive in the highly competitive market, ambitious companies need a modern and flexible commerce solution that can meet the challenges of the digital age. Such a solution is offered by the Smartstore Commerce Cloud in cooperation with Microsoft. Designed specifically for the Azure Cloud to accelerate innovation and productivity. The Microsoft Azure Cloud offers numerous advantages to companies that want to run Smartstore in the cloud. Automated scaling, high availability, and seamless integration with existing IT environments allow applications and services to run quickly and easily in the cloud, enabling organizations to reap the benefits of a modern cloud environment. For more information about the Smartstore Enterprise Commerce Cloud, please visit. here.
Smartstore Enterprise Commerce Open Source Edition
Another edition for your growth offers you our Smartstore Enterprise Commerce Open Source Edition, which is our completely open source software for your enterprise use. Perhaps at this point it should be allowed to point out that, unlike competing applications, with Smartstore Enterprise Commerce Open Source Edition you do not have to budget hundreds of thousands of euros and more per year in licensing costs. Since a presentation of this version would go too far at this point, we have given the possibilities of this edition a separate Blog post dedicated.
General information about all editions
Managing millions of products is a task that we at Smartstore have never compromised on from the beginning. With huge amounts of information to manage in the industry, it is critical to fully meet this requirement. Our Enterprise Editions therefore include Lucene as a full-text search. Lucene works with indexes and is used by Wikipedia and Twitter, for example. In year 2010 the Apache Solr search server was integrated into Lucene as a subproject.
As an ambitious company, you may already be one of those who have worked extensively with Redis. If not, you should definitely take a look. But what exactly is Redis and who can benefit from it? Redis is a high-performance in-memory key-value data structure store. Here you can find more information about Redis and how Smartstore in Enterprise Edition handles it.
Another, but extremely important, topic are the so-called Extract Transform Load processes, short ETL. At this point, of course, the question arises: What is ETL and how can it benefit your business? ETL solutions enable companies to extract data from different applications and merge it in a central location. With the help of ETL tools, these processes can be fully automated, saving time and resources compared to manual data analysis in the data warehouse. This is exactly where Smartstore Enterprise Commerce Edition offers the optimal solution. You can find more information about this topic here.
One of the biggest challenges in Enterprise is the procurement process (PunchOut), and we have the solution for you. The PunchOut-technology allows you to use product offerings from different providers within your system landscape. Large companies already use this option on a large scale, for example for purchasing office supplies, furniture or spare parts. To coordinate and manage the purchases of many employees, companies use either in-house software or our plug-in PunchOut Connect with OCI and cXML for the e-procurement industry.
Another extremely important topic is statistics. In this area, too, we support you in gaining insights from data and translating them into concrete actions. Use Power BIto make your analytics available across your entire organization in a targeted way. In the Enterprise Commerce Edition, we have integrated the Microsoft Power BI Cloud service. With Microsoft's Power BI, you can target data from disparate source systems and gain insights into user behavior. The reports and graphics created can then be shared with other employees via their own company network or the Internet.
All these editions are listed under the generic term Smartstore DXP Enterprise Composable Commerce .
Ready. Sell. Grow.
Do you still have questions Which Smartstore Edition is right for you?
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