If you’ve ever asked yourself or anyone in your organization any of the following questions, keep reading!

  • How can I find the right customer experience solution for my company?
  • What is SAP Commerce Cloud? What can it do for me?
  • How does SAP Commerce Cloud integrate with other solutions?
  • Are SAP Hybris and SAP Commerce Cloud connected?
  • Can I build intelligent pricing models in SAP Commerce Cloud?
  • How does SAP Commerce Cloud help manage numerous physical locations?

This article will discuss the core components and capabilities of the SAP Commerce Cloud solution, how it can increase customer engagement and profitability, and where our team of SAP consultants can come in to help. Read on to learn more!

What is SAP Commerce Cloud?

SAP S/4HANA, SAP’s comprehensive ERP solution for large enterprises, comprises five cloud solution platforms: SAP Commerce Cloud, SAP Service Cloud, SAP Marketing Cloud, SAP Customer Data Cloud, and SAP Sales Cloud. These solutions are connected by pre-built integrations in SAP Cloud Platform Integration and exist to provide more comprehensive CRM capabilities and better customer experiences.

Among these is SAP Commerce Cloud — an innovative cloud e-commerce platform designed to help companies define flexible pricing rules to secure their predefined margins, facilitate one-to-one customer engagement to meet customer needs, and future-proof their CX strategies to drive continuous growth in the future.

The SAP Commerce Cloud aims to resolve issues facing both B2B and B2C customers, promoting consistency across all systems and devices, ensuring a smooth buying process for customers, and driving greater profit with a lower total cost of ownership across teams.

Top 5 SAP Commerce Cloud Features

Let’s take a closer look at five of the main features of the Commerce Cloud in SAP:

1) Flexible Commerce Solutions for Accelerated Innovation

With a flexible, innovative commerce solution, SAP Commerce Cloud users can accelerate growth and withstand industry and company change as requirements and standards evolve.

Plug-and-play storefronts

Integrate with plug-and-play storefronts to leverage advanced payment services and tax management functions to deliver customers a flexible shopping and checkout experience.

Omni-commerce API connection

Leverage an advanced application programming interface (API) platform to extend commerce capabilities beyond traditional sales channels.

Microservices-based

Utilize pre-built integrations in SAP Business Technology Platform (BTP) to accelerate time-to-market and improve system extensibility across teams and systems.

Javascript connection

Improve innovation with a flexible and modular e-commerce platform.

2) Comprehensive Management Capabilities

With SAP Commerce Cloud, users are enabled to simplify business management operations on a unified platform that connects B2B, B2C, B2B2C, and B2D business models.

Product content management capabilities

Support global business tasks with multi-currency and multilingual catalogs and manage complex product content catalogs across systems.

Order management tools

Deliver quick and efficient operations through site-specific sourcing, speed returns, fulfillment rules, and other self-service tools and functions.

Experience management functions

Leverage inherited components and advanced support from multiple touchpoints to ensure a consistent brand experience across storefronts.

3) Smart Selling Services

By leveraging intelligent selling services, SAP Commerce Cloud users can improve personalization, facilitate more efficient merchandising, and offer valuable recommendations for customers and users.

Individual customer engagement

Leverage real-time insights to deliver a more personalized online buying journey and fulfill each customer’s wants and needs.

Maximized ROI

Utilize A/B testing and advanced algorithms to fulfill business targets and optimize processes to achieve business objectives and maximize return on investment (ROI).

Personalized customer experiences

Offer a relevant, engaging storefront experience for customers, deliver one-to-one support, and deliver personalized recommendations to improve real-time merchandising functions.

Improved customer conversion

Automatically maximize conversions with machine learning capabilities and customer behavior-based recommendations.

4) Seamless Integrations for Enterprise-Wide Insights

SAP Cloud Platform Integration allows SAP Commerce Cloud users to deliver smoother customer experiences and lower total cost of ownership across teams and systems.

Pre-built integrations

Utilize pre-built integrations with SAP S/4HANA, SAP ERP, and other third-party solutions to improve the speed and efficiency of customer demand management operations across your organization.

Better customer experience

Improve the accessibility of information, like hidden inventory and product availability, to improve transparency and drive better purchasing experiences for customers.

Unified view of sourcing and availability

Leverage intelligent sourcing decisions and fulfillment strategies to provide a consistent, unified view of product sourcing and availability throughout your entire organization.

Process optimization capabilities

Simplify and optimize customer return requests and employee return approvals through improved visibility into return and refund statuses.

5) B2B and B2B2C E-Commerce Models

With a unified platform for all business commerce models, SAP Commerce Cloud makes it easier to support B2B and B2B2C operations for customers, dealers, and distributors across the supply chain.

Self-service functionality

Give buyers more control over their purchasing experiences, including cost centers, spending limits, ordering roles, and more, by offering advanced B2B self-service tools.

Online quotes and negotiations

Expand the roles of your sales team members to deal closers and proactively engage with customers for more efficient quoting and negotiation processes across the board.

Advanced product support

Leverage support services that improve the functionality and management of complex products, variants, and configurations without needing advanced systems customization.

Service assistance

Offer a 360-degree view of customer service and purchase history to empower customer service agents and sales teams to provide valuable, personalized customer support, no matter what.

Understanding SAP Commerce Cloud Deployment

When deploying a build in the SAP Commerce Cloud, users must choose between Platform Update Mode, a deployment mode that determines how customers will update their database and migrate data with zero downtime, and Deployment Mode, a mode that determines how a new build will affect underlying applications and the impact on your site’s availability.

Once a mode for deployment is chosen, users will determine how data will be impacted, if systems downtime will be necessary, and which deployment option is the best fit for their SAP products.

Standard Deployments

Standard SAP Commerce Cloud deployments offer the most basic level of deployment functionality for users looking to deploy new builds quickly and efficiently without the need for large amounts of system downtime in the process.

Here are the main components and capabilities of standard deployment in the Commerce Cloud:

  • Deploying a build
  • Deployment rollback
  • Cancelling a deployment
  • Support for failed deployment
  • Deployment environment details
  • Deployment history
  • Read-only replica automation

Blue/Green Deployments

Blue/green deployments allow users to deploy a new build for testing before actually deploying it into a live production environment. This way, companies can ensure their new build meets their needs and safeguards the deployment by allowing users to preview it in production before releasing it to customers.

Here are the main differences between the Blue and Green deployment options:

  • Blue deployment: Refers to an active deployment on a live-traffic environment
  • Green deployment: Refers to a deployment that operates with the active deployment but does not cater to live traffic

Deployment APIs

With deployment APIs, SAP Commerce Cloud users can trigger deployments outside SAP’s Cloud solution platforms in the Cloud Portal. API documentation and authentication is handled by an API token — a tool that contains the specific user credentials required to access secure SAP Commerce Cloud APIs.

Using SAP Commerce Cloud Accelerators

SAP Commerce Cloud Accelerators are ready-to-use web implementation tools designed to help companies kickstart their implementations and build, manage, and maintain a flexible e-commerce solution with advanced customer experience capabilities.

Core Accelerators

With core accelerators, SAP Commerce Cloud allows any sizable omnichannel business generating large profits to add necessary functionality and leverage pre-built integrations to expand their cloud infrastructure to drive future growth. Here are the core accelerators included in SAP’s e-commerce platform:

  • Core Accelerator Module
  • B2B Accelerator Module
  • B2C Accelerator Module

Industry Accelerators

SAP Commerce Cloud offers industry accelerators that provide plug-and-play storefronts and widespread industry relevance to improve operations for diverse industry sectors.

  • Financial Services Accelerator
  • Travel Accelerator
  • Telecom and Utilities Accelerator
  • Citizen Engagement Accelerator

How Can We Help?

Whether you need help implementing SAP Cloud Platform solutions for the first time, additional support enriching customer experiences and average order value, or just an extra hand providing real-time customer support, Surety Systems is here to help.

Our team of senior-level, US-based SAP consultants has the skills and experience to handle all your SAP project needs, whether big or small, simple or complex.

Getting Started with Our Team

Interested in learning how SAP’s centralized content repository can improve your e-commerce platform operations or where our team of SAP consultants can fit in your organization?

Contact us today to learn more!