Nebojsa Radakovic

When you're selling, you're not just moving products; you're offering a lifestyle, a solution, status, or a vision. You do this with all sorts of content that impacts everything from how well people recognize your brand to your bottom line. It's about content that's way more than just a basic product description.

Brands that successfully create and communicate a compelling narrative as a part of product storytelling or rich storytelling not only differentiate themselves but also build lasting emotional connections with their consumers.

This deep dive explores the integral role that content plays in driving traffic, engaging customers, and boosting conversions in e-commerce and introduces a comprehensive content writing checklist designed to maximize these outcomes.

In 2025’s AI-driven, mobile-first marketplace, a scattergun social strategy no longer guarantees traffic lift or customer loyalty. With zero-click results and AI Overviews trimming direct clicks by up to 60% (source), e-tailers must craft search-aligned, audience-centered social programs that drive qualified traffic, cultivate genuine human signals, and amplify deep, evergreen content alongside their ads and SEO efforts.

While I’m no social media guru, I’ve picked up a wealth of insights from chatting with clients and dissecting what’s actually worked for them. The following checklist will help you streamline your e-commerce social media management process, ensuring consistency and effectiveness in your efforts.

Consider it a first step in building your brand's comprehensive strategy.

In the speed-obsessed world of today, better performance translates directly into business gains. You only have about eight seconds (source link) – that’s the average human attention span – before users lose concentration. From that stat alone, it’s obvious why website performance matters. No?

Google found that 53% of mobile visitors abandon a site that takes longer than 3 seconds to load (source link).

And nearly 70% of consumers admit that page speed influences their likelihood to buy (source link).

Faster sites see more engagement and higher conversion rates – for example, Walmart observed up to a 2% increase in conversions for every 1 second of improvement in page load time (source link).

Performance also plays a crucial role in retaining users (fewer will bounce) and ensuring a pleasant user experience, which boosts customer loyalty. It even affects your search engine ranking (Google uses page speed/Core Web Vitals as a ranking signal) and impacts your Google Ads Quality Score (slow landing pages can raise ad costs). In short, web performance influences:

• Time on site (users stay longer on fast sites)
• Page views (users view more pages when each loads quickly)
• Bounce rate (slow pages cause users to leave)
• Conversions / Revenue (speed encourages purchases – milliseconds can be millions)
• User satisfaction and retention
• Organic search traffic (page experience is an SEO factor)
• Bandwidth/CDN costs (efficient sites use less data)
• Ad Quality Score (fast landing pages improve ad performance)

Having all these benefits in mind, it pays off to have a performant website, right? So, how do you achieve that?

If you do a search for keywords page load time and site speed, you’ll get a mix of tools and short, half-baked explanations pages. Even though slow websites are a major turn-off for users, nobody wanted to sink their teeth a bit deeper into the topic? Kind of like obvious as to why…because speed matters, right?

Right. If a site takes too long to load, more than half will just leave. This especially hurts online stores, where slow speeds mean lost customers. Basically, if you want happy customers and good sales, your website needs to be fast.

This guide will help you go beyond just the speed matters statement and understand how to make that happen, whether you're technical or not.

73% of all businesses are currently using headless website architecture, and among those not currently using headless, nearly 98% plan to evaluate headless solutions over the next 12 months (source: headless commerce stats).

Imagine your website as a puppet show. In traditional setups, the puppet (frontend) and the puppeteer (backend) are tethered together, moving in unison. But what if the puppet could perform independently, responding to various cues without being directly controlled?

That's the essence of headless architecture.

Headless architecture enables a decoupled approach to web and app development, allowing content and services to be mismatched and shared across different channels or heads while being perfectly interoperable. With a proper headless architecture, you can also build a centralized repository of reusable services within your organization.

Compared to a monolith approach (we'll talk some more about this later), decoupling everything will also sophisticate the architecture and force you to make more decisions. You will have to select different technologies and services, but that’s for the greater good, and the inherent challenges can be quickly resolved by being pragmatic, with reasonable anticipation and best practices.

More than ever, consumers demand rich and consistent product content across all channels. If information is missing or inaccurate, businesses suffer. For example, a recent global survey found that 83% of shoppers would abandon an e-commerce site if product information is insufficient​ [1].

In other words, if your product content doesn’t answer customers’ questions, they’ll take their wallets elsewhere. Data-driven product management isn’t just a tech buzzword – it’s necessary to meet customer expectations and drive sales.

Executives also recognize that data-driven product management can be a competitive differentiator. Companies that leverage it can move faster and make smarter decisions using accurate data. Still, over 70% of businesses face challenges with product data accuracy and consistency. The solution? The Product Information Management (PIM) platform.

PIM acts as the central hub for all product information, enabling seamless, consistent, and accurate data distribution across every touchpoint, from websites to marketplaces and beyond. However, shifting from manual processes or siloed data systems to a PIM solution isn’t always an easy sell (as you already know) + not all PIMs are built equally.

​Plantasjen / Plantagen aimed to overhaul its outdated online infrastructure to enhance the efficiency of managing product information and digital assets. By consolidating previously fragmented systems, the company sought to streamline workflows, reduce operational costs, and accelerate time-to-market for product updates:

• Improve product content and digital asset workflows
• Enhance efficiency in Product information management (PIM) and Digital Asset Management (DAM)
• Integrate AI-driven automation for product enrichment
• Ensure seamless customer experiences across multiple touchpoints
• Reduce complexity and operational costs

The company previously used Salesforce Commerce Cloud for commerce, InRiver for PIM, and Fotoware for DAM. These fragmented solutions created inefficiencies and operational bottlenecks, prompting the need for a unified approach.

In modern web development, you're bound to hear the term headless thrown around more often than not, especially in the growing landscape of content-driven applications and e-commerce platforms.

How do you write a web development guide for eCommerce websites? You don’t! What you write about instead are best practices you often see implemented.

This post is precisely that: a collection of practices our devs advocate, practices we’ve seen our clients do, and practices we’ve picked while networking with speakers and attendees at React Norway over a beer or two. BTW, React Norway 2025 is happening - submit a talk or get your tickets on time.

The rapid advancement of web technologies has transfigured the eCommerce landscape, enhancing online storefronts' development and user experience. And frankly nowadays, employing modern web frameworks is pivotal to achieving an exemplary, performant, and user-friendly eCommerce site.

As sustainability becomes critical in global markets, businesses must rethink how they track, share, and optimize product information. Enter the Digital Product Passport (DPP)—a groundbreaking tool designed to enhance transparency, traceability, and sustainability across product lifecycles.

This represents a massive opportunity for businesses to align operations with environmental goals, meet regulatory requirements, and gain consumer trust in a competitive, eco-conscious economy.

We’ve already covered what a Digital Product Passport (DPP) is, so today, we will go in-depth explaining key features, benefits, and challenges in DPP implementation and how to do it in Crystallize.

Buckle up.

In today’s cutthroat eCommerce world, being buried on page two of search results might as well be the same as being invisible. Shoppers rarely click past the first few results, so if your product information isn’t optimized for search engines, you’re losing out - big time.

The good news? There are smart strategies to make your product data work harder for you, and that’s where SEO, product info, marketing content, and Crystallize headless commerce come into play.

Crystallize is more than just a headless commerce platform—it’s your SEO ally in disguise.

This post should serve as your guide to mastering product information optimization with Crystallize and show you how it helps you boost visibility and bring that coveted traffic straight to your digital doorstep.

Yes, I’ve made some bold claims here, but before we get to them …

In the bustling world of eCommerce, where every customer interaction counts, businesses are turning to subscription models to foster long-term relationships and ensure a steady revenue stream.

But with great potential comes the need for precise management.

Enter subscription management—the secret sauce to keeping your customers happy, your billing seamless, and your growth on an upward trajectory.

The shift towards sustainability in tech stacks, some even say towards building eco-friendly websites, is nothing new. It aligns with modern demands for responsible business practices. According to some estimates, the carbon footprint of our gadgets, the internet, and the systems supporting them accounts for about 3.7% of global greenhouse emissions (source), And these emissions are predicted to double by 2025.

Clearly, (besides hype), there is a need to embrace more energy-efficient and sustainable solutions and tech, and oddly enough, there are business gains that come with it.

The key to creating a sustainable, green, eco-friendly, energy-efficient, or (call it what you will) eCommerce tech stack and reducing your online carbon footprint is to focus on efficiency and scalability at every level, from infrastructure overbuild tools and practices to user interaction.

Product catalogs are rapidly expanding, and customer expectations for seamless, dynamic experiences are sky-high, making efficient Product Information Management (PIM) a necessity rather than a nice-to-have feature.

Let’s get one thing straight: subscriptions aren’t just a trend—they’re the future. But don’t just take my word for it—the numbers speak louder than any sales pitch.

In 2023, the global subscription eCommerce market was valued at a whopping $120 billion and is projected to skyrocket to over $900 billion by 2026 (source). That’s not a typo. We’re talking about a 68% year-over-year growth rate.

Still, even with growing adoption, many businesses are unaware of the full spectrum of benefits that a subscription model can offer. We’ve already discussed this in our What's a Subscription Business Model and How Does It Work? blog post. So, here, let’s quickly explain why subscriptions are taking over the eCommerce world.

For businesses, it isn’t just about convenience—it’s a strategic play that drives customer loyalty and boosts lifetime value.

• Predictable Revenue: Subscription models ensure a steady cash flow, aiding in better financial management and planning.
• Customer Loyalty: Continuous customer engagement fosters loyalty, reducing churn rates and increasing lifetime value.
• Operational Efficiency: Streamlined processes and automated billing reduce administrative burdens and costs.
• Market Differentiation: Unique subscription offerings can differentiate a business in a competitive market.

For customers, it is about cost saving and the appreciation they get from businesses as they matter.

• Convenience: Regular, automated deliveries or services eliminate the need for repeated purchases.
• Cost Savings: Subscriptions often provide better value than one-time purchases, especially with bundled offers or long-term commitments.
• Personalization: Ongoing services can be tailored to individual preferences, enhancing customer satisfaction.
• Exclusive Access: Subscribers often enjoy exclusive content, products, or services, adding to the perceived value.

It is not all bells and whistles. There are some challenges as well. The subscription market is becoming increasingly saturated, with numerous players vying for the same customers. Retaining customers is a significant challenge, and high churn rates can undermine the benefits of the subscription model, leading to revenue instability.

Finally, growing businesses are concerned about scalability issues, such as maintaining service quality with a growing subscriber base or the technical challenges of scaling a subscription platform.

Black Friday and Cyber Monday have always been about more than just boosting sales—they’re about creating lasting customer relationships. The best way to do this? Videos. Let me explain.

Even if your business isn’t global, every language you add to your eCommerce platform increases the number of people who can use your services or products.

Nearly 73% of consumers said they would be more inclined to buy a product with information in their language. In comparison, 56.2% said that the ability to obtain information in their language is more important than price.

And it makes sense.

Imagine you’re in a foreign country where no one speaks your language. There is a certain level of anxiety when you purchase something, right? And it feels great when you finally find someone who speaks your language.

So it goes without saying that it is a great business move. At first glance, becoming a multilingual online store may seem complicated and impossible, but with the right tools, it’s trouble-free.

Sure enough, staying true to your brand’s identity matters, but it matters just as much as creating a seamless, engaging shopping experience that easily guides visitors from the homepage to checkout. It matters just as much as your website performance or having an omnichannel strategy in place.

Given that the design of your eCommerce store depends greatly on your product, product industry standards, and audience expectations, crafting a one-size-fits-all web design guide is not really feasible.

So, instead of creating a universal blueprint for eCommerce web design, here we’ll focus on articulating a set of best practices we see successful online stores (our clients) implement, be it for the sake of UX or SEO or they are simply cool to have 🙂

The headless approach is eating the web dev world… There is a good reason for it. Traditional monolith eCommerce platforms (like WordPress, Wix, Magento, Shopify, Drupal, etc.) often limit customization and agility due to their tightly coupled front and back systems.

Headless architecture, on the other hand, allows businesses to use different technologies for the front and back end, providing the freedom to create unique customer experiences without being constrained by the limitations of a monolithic architecture. Additionally, it allows for a best-of-breed approach to building your online store, where you can pick and choose the best solutions for your use case.

For many businesses, the decision to re-platform to a headless architecture is a technological upgrade and a strategic business move because it offers opportunities for enhanced agility, scalability, and a deeper engagement with customers through bespoke user experiences. This, more often than not, means a loyal audience and, ultimately, more sales.

How easy/hard it is to migrate to a new CMS/eCommerce/PIM platform depends heavily on your starting point, i.e., do you have a platform, and are you moving from a monolith or headless solution?

No platform/CMS? This should be easy because you are building a new digital experience for your audience and your team from scratch, which means there are no pre-defined restrictions your team should know.

Moving from monolith solution? Migration depends heavily on the solution you’ve used before. Migrating to a headless architecture involves significant technical challenges, including the re-architecture of the existing system, integration of APIs, and ensuring that all components work seamlessly together.

Changing headless platform? Again, it depends on the solution. Decupled front and back ends mean you can quickly adopt the exact content modeling in your new setting.

Transition requires meticulous and strategic planning, considering various factors, including technological limitations, integration complexities, future growth prospects, and budget constraints, making it much more difficult than anticipated.

However, there are general recommendations that will help you map out migration steps more easily.

By decoupling content management from the front-end storefront, a headless CMS allows businesses to present content anywhere and adapt quickly to new trends.

We’ve talked about the headless approach (be it in commerce, product information management, or rich content management) numerous times. Today, however, we’ll dive deep into what a headless CMS is and why it’s valuable for e-commerce and talk about some of the best headless CMSs available for e-commerce platforms.

We’ll examine the strengths and weaknesses of the leading options—Contentful, Storyblok, WordPress (used headlessly), Strapi, and Prismic—and then introduce how Crystallize offers a unique approach by blending content and commerce in one solution.

Our goal is to help developers and decision-makers understand which CMS might be the right fit for their e-commerce needs while highlighting the advantages of an integrated content-and-commerce platform.

The traditional eCommerce setup often entails substantial upfront investments in server infrastructure, complex management, and maintenance routines. Additionally, the rigidity of such setups can impede the scalability essential for handling traffic surges during sales events, thus affecting performance and user experience.

Serverless eCommerce emerges as a solution to these challenges, offering a new approach that significantly reduces operational overhead, enhances scalability, and optimizes cost-efficiency.

The State of Serverless 2023 report by Datadog underscores a rising trend in major cloud providers adopting serverless technologies​. The global serverless architecture market, valued at over USD 9 billion in 2022, is projected to burgeon at a CAGR of over 25% from 2023 to 2032​. Similarly, the global serverless computing market is estimated to grow at a CAGR of 20.8% from 2022 to 2028​.

The statistics we mentioned above testify to the significant strides the serverless approach is making. It's (kind of) evident that if you haven't done so already, now is the time to delve deeper and enumerate serverless benefits, check real-world use cases, discuss technical considerations, and understand best practices for businesses eyeing a transition to this modern eCommerce paradigm.

But before all that we've got some term explaining first.

The global eCommerce sales for 2023 surpassed $6.5 trillion for all online products (source). What can we expect this year? Well, can't be sure about the exact number, but I feel it will only go up.

While this rapid growth means more opportunities, it also means tougher competition where only the best make it. I've read somewhere you need to sell where everyone scrolls, searches, and shops. It's only partially true because you need to sell where YOUR audience is scrolling, searching, and shopping, not everyone.

How do you do that?

I'm glad you asked. With an effective marketing strategy that helps your businesses increase brand awareness, drive traffic, generate leads, and ultimately boost sales and revenue.

That's easier said than done🤔

While it is never good when you have to explain why you are doing something, this article (kind of) deserves it because it has been in the making for quite some time and comes as a sum of conversations with our clients and my personal meandering past and present experiences. The article is tailored for emerging eCommerce ventures and seasoned brands aiming to enhance their digital footprint. It's crucial to acknowledge the unique nature of each business, which means that not all strategies discussed may align with your specific business model and use case.

The key takeaway for you is to use this article as a starting point for developing a strategic framework that will help your business increase website traffic and elevate revenue.

In the ever-growing world of eCommerce, where consumers have endless choices, brands rule the world. Brands rule shopping habits. Brands rule shoppers' expectations. Well, we might not be there yet, but we’re pretty damn close, and that’s what makes building brand loyalty more important than ever.

It’s what can set you apart from competitors and ensure a constant stream of revenue.

And the industry realizes this. For example, 50% of marketers list brand loyalty as one of the top goals of their content marketing strategies.

How can you win the hearts and minds of customers so that they return to your business repeatedly? Why do people go from casually browsing for a product to fiercely advocating for a specific brand? How did the brand win them over?

A couple of months back, I talked about it with Bård Farstad, our CEO, and Ståle Eikeri, our sales guy and COO, and what you read are my notes turned into an article. It’s not like we share the best-kept secrets of turning shoppers into brand loyalists, it’s more like we share our experience and what worked for us.

Sweef.se, renowned for its unique, high-quality, on-demand furniture at reasonable prices, is doing it by offering not just furniture but Sweden's comfiest furniture, fostering a culture of comfort, quality, and individual expression. They needed solid tech to back their efforts to deliver that via their digital storefront.

The previous platform, PrestaShop, although functional, lacked the flexibility and speed essential for delivering a superior user experience and managing the complex product configurations offered by Sweef.

Betting on a monolithic approach in the age of omnichannel demand, composable commerce, and best-of-breed tech stacks is an arduous task doomed from the beginning. So, instead of going the beaten path of eCommerce, they took a leap of faith and opted for a headless approach.

In 2025, eCommerce revenue is expected to surpass $6.8 trillion (source). And 21% of all global sales (source) will be made online by an estimated 2.77 billion shoppers (source).

Do you want to capture some of that business? Of course, you do! But it’s tough out there: you’re competing with over 28 million eCommerce stores (source).

How do you get ahead? Simple. You go headless.

In the Crystallize headless commerce explained post, we discussed the term extensively. In case you haven’t encountered it, the simplest definition is an eCommerce solution in which the webshop's front and back end are decoupled. The connection between the front and back end eCommerce service is an eCommerce API. Underneath, all is based on headless architecture. Check both of our linked articles for more.

The surge of headless commerce is reshaping the eCommerce landscape, offering more flexibility, improved performance, and personalized customer experiences. Still, convincing everyone to switch from familiar monolithic solutions to headless architecture can be challenging.

To strengthen your pitch, we examined the current state and trends of headless adoption and compiled statistics revealing how quickly headless commerce is gaining ground. It's not cherry-picking. We’ll present the facts so you can analyze and interpret them yourself.

Ready? Let’s dive in!

In the rapid and ever-evolving world of commerce, managing product information efficiently is crucial for delivering consistent and engaging customer experiences.

Kids today (Millennials, Gen Zs, and even older ones like me) know what they want, whether they shop online or in a store, and expect a personalized experience and quick service. 90% of consumers expect consistent product information across all channels – browsing online, on a mobile app, or in a physical store​ (source: PIM stats 2025).

To meet these expectations, you must maintain an accurate, consistent, up-to-date product information database, which is a complex task, especially for large companies that sell many products across various channels.

Product Information Management (PIM) platforms are at the forefront of this endeavor, offering companies unparalleled organization, efficiency, and scalability.

But not all PIMs are created equal.

In the dynamic world of eCommerce, satisfying customer demands while managing operations efficiently is a juggling act. Ever wonder how successful online retailers manage it all? The secret sauce is order orchestration.

Let's dive into GraphQL, especially how it rocks in e-commerce and why it might be better than REST. We'll see why online stores love it, check out Crystallize as a cool example, and even chat about how to make it work for you. We'll also keep it real about where GraphQL might fall short.

By the end, you'll get why everyone's hyped about GraphQL for today's headless commerce and if it's a fit for your business.

According to Semrush, 50% of brands are still not using structured content. This means that the content a half of businesses out there create isn't reaching relevant people or at least isn't doing it nearly as successfully as it could be.

The online world is more crowded and competitive than ever, making it difficult to stand out and get noticed. And don't get us started with AI stuff that is published/made at a staggering rate. On top of all that, your audience's expectations are higher than ever: they want personalized, relevant, and engaging content everywhere they go online.

All this is made possible with structured content.

Structured content enables you to do more with your content. Not only does it enhance the user experience by providing precise navigation and consistency, but it also improves search engine optimization (SEO) by increasing relevance and improving ranking.

Implementing structured content on your website is becoming a crucial step to drive traffic, engage users, and achieve online success.

But first …

The global eCommerce market reached a US $13 trillion value in 2021 and is forecasted to reach a whopping US $55.6 trillion by 2027.

With such growth of eCommerce year over year, it's essential for online retailers (and other businesses) to have the right technology to support their business and strategy. But with so many eCommerce platforms available, how can you tell which fits your business best?

How do you pick the one that suits your needs, keeps up with the development and market trends, and ensures your business's online success?

In part two of the five-part article series, we discuss choosing an eCommerce platform that's the right one for your use case.

Gartner Magic Quadrant view, business expectations, industry leaders' opinions, and most popular solutions… best of articles come in all shapes and sizes. This one of ours about eCommerce platforms in 2025 is a bit different, we hope.

Open-Source, SaaS (software-as-a-service), monolith, or headless platform for your online store? Choosing the right e-commerce platform is a daunting task and can make or break your online business. In today’s fast-paced market, both ease of use and technical flexibility are key.

Imagine trying to build a house on a shaky foundation. It’s a disaster waiting to happen, right? Similarly, choosing the wrong e-commerce platform is like setting up your online store on a shaky foundation.

Whether you’re a developer seeking a customizable solution or a business decision-maker looking for quick setup and scalability, you need a platform that fits your needs - one that ensures your store runs smoothly, is secure, and provides an excellent shopping experience.

Before we dive into summarizing each platform’s overview, highlighting its key strengths, and suggesting ideal use cases, a quick TL; DR should help you skim the possible solutions.

By the end of the article, you’ll have a clear picture.

Driving customer acquisition, optimizing the eCommerce experience, fostering loyalty, and scaling operations are the reason why brands opt out for Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) approach in business and marketing. But is it for everyone, and how do you start with it?

More than a buzzword, decupled eCommerce is the future of online shopping that is already here. Let’s talk about it.

eCommerce is wildly different than it was ten years ago. With the rise of omnichannel and globalization, managing your store has become increasingly complex.

Webhooks are popular in web development, especially in headless and strongly decoupled architectures.

On-Premise and Cloud PIM, the benefits, the differences, and drawbacks of each, with examples of PIM platforms for both.

72% increased conversion rate and 3 seconds faster load times on average just by moving from Magento to Crystallize. Not bad.

When it comes to managing product information, two terms often used interchangeably are PIM and PCM. While they may sound similar, these two concepts are quite different and serve different purposes in the world of e-commerce and product management.

ERP helps to manage core business processes (manufacturing, supply chain, services, procurement, finance, HR, etc.) in an integrated system efficiently.

Welcome to another battle of acronyms! Who will come out on top: PIM or PLM?! Spoiler alert, ideally, they’d work together.

Businesses and organizations that need to manage and organize massive amounts of product-related data effectively should use PDM.

Nasdaq’s prediction that 95% of all purchases will be made online through eCommerce by 2040 should not be surprising. Even today, you either have an eCommerce store or don’t exist. What’s surprisingly challenging is keeping the technology at the core of your online store up to date with the modern trends and frameworks that emerge regularly.

The rapid evolution of technology is generally good news for developers and clients, as it improves the experience of building and using websites and online stores.

However, this rapid pace of change raises a crucial question for today's e-commerce businesses: which tools should I use for my online store?

The technical side of building your online store, e-commerce website development, involves selecting or creating a solution that displays products appealingly and guarantees flawless operation, safe payment processing, and a user-friendly experience. Designing user-friendly interfaces, integrating dependable payment gateways, and implementing responsive behaviors to user actions are all part of this process while maintaining an aesthetically pleasing design.

With Crystallize at the forefront of modern tech, we know we can help you navigate the murky waters of e-commerce web development and achieve the best possible outcome/technology for your use case.

When it comes to managing digital content, there are two main types of systems that professional businesses use (oftentimes together): Product Information Management (PIM) systems and Content Management Systems (CMS).

Personalized experiences increase the likelihood of purchase by 80% for consumers. And with that, experience management platforms (XM) entered the scene.

ZipFit needed a modern website that performed well to help them continue to grow. Next JS + Crystallize delivered everything they needed.

MDM manages all types of company data, including those managed in PIM, making PIM a subset of MDM. Wait, what?

Several forces are shaping the future of e-commerce, pushing brands to rethink their digital strategies.

AI is no longer an experimental feature—it’s driving everything from dynamic pricing, fraud detection, and hyper-personalized shopping recommendations to automated content generation and real-time customer support.

Supply chain disruptions in 2024 forced brands to rethink fulfillment strategies. New legislation, such as the Digital Product Passport (DPP), is changing how Europe and the world make, buy, and sell products, forcing brands to explore blockchain.

TikTok Shop, Instagram Checkout, and live-stream shopping are emerging revenue channels, especially for Gen Z and Millennial consumers. Brands no longer just advertise on social media—they sell directly within the platforms.

Businesses that once relied on traditional online storefronts have adopted a headless, composable, and API-first approach.

One-time purchases are being replaced by loyalty-driven subscription models, with more brands experimenting with exclusive membership programs, gated content, and community-driven commerce.

Consumers' expectations have changed. Instant checkout, AI-powered recommendations, and seamless device transactions are necessary. Brands that offer slow shipping, outdated UX, or lack automation struggle to compete.

Not a dog-eat-dog world yet, but we're damn close. So, what are the latest developments and design trends shaping the future of eCommerce that businesses need to do to stay ahead in 2025?

Various business models exist in e-commerce, each with unique advantages, challenges, and requirements. It can be difficult to identify which one is the best fit for your use case. 

The following article combines research, dry definitions, suggestions gathered from our clients, and our in-house and world-famous brand examples to help you make that decision a little easier.

Wondering if a multichannel approach could help you increase sales in 2023? Wonder no more, your hunch is correct: multichannel eCommerce will help you reach those goals.

In today's society of continuous technological innovation, consumers expect businesses to have a strong omnichannel strategy: they demand highly relevant and customized interactions across various platforms.

Scandinavian retailer Carling’s stunt with Digital Collection influencing people to think differently about clothes, in general, was backed by a headless commerce architecture.

Did you know it takes users around 50 milliseconds (source) to form an opinion about your website? And if their first impression and experience are bad, 88% of consumers (source) are less likely to return to your website. How your products are organized and how easy it is for your customers to find what they are looking for play a massive part in that first impression.

That’s where product taxonomy comes in. A well-defined taxonomy helps manage large inventories and create a seamless and efficient shopping experience. It can make or break the user experience and seriously impact your bottom line.

Let’s start from the beginning.

Are you struggling to convert your website traffic into paying customers? Are you tired of spending hours and resources on driving traffic to your site with little to no return on investment? Then it's time to focus on Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO).

Headless commerce has been a concept for a while, but it’s gained momentum recently.

Why all the buzz?

Businesses crave the agility to differentiate their brand’s digital experience. By separating the presentation layer, the headless tech stack (be it in PIM, commerce or CMS space) lets you custom-build customer experiences—whether that means a blazing-fast mobile site, an interactive product configurator, integrating commerce into a game or AR/VR—without being handcuffed by the limitations of a templated all-in-one platform.

Of course, going headless isn’t a magic solution for everyone. It introduces complexity (you’re managing more moving parts), requires an API-centric mindset, and potentially requires serious dev time. We’ll dive into the pros, cons, and considerations in the sections ahead. But it is essential to start now by saying that going headless brings freedom: to craft unique shopping experiences, to pivot to new channels quickly, and freedom from the one-size-fits-all constraints of legacy commerce platforms.

If delivering a standout customer experience is a top priority for your brand, headless is a concept worth understanding.

Raw, uncontrollable power. That’s what word-of-mouth is. Word-of-mouth marketing is what you do to create that power.

Nuwo is a home office-as-a-service solution that provides companies with personalized online stores from which their remote employees can pick and choose furniture/equipment for their home office.

The B2B eCommerce sector is undeniably booming, marked by an exhilarating growth trajectory. As of 2021, different sources have reported the market size ranging from USD 2.3 billion to a staggering USD 7.35 trillion, with a projected Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) varying from 17.48% to 29.3% for the coming years​.

One notable driver of this growth is the swift ascendancy of manufacturers in the eCommerce arena, who amplified their online sales by 18.4% in 2021, reaching $543.25 billion from the previous $458.7 billion​.

The fervent expectations of B2B sellers further underscore this upward trend, as nearly 20% anticipate their eCommerce sales to burgeon by at least 25% in 2023​.

B2B eCommerce is not just a modern-day convenience; it's a strategic imperative for businesses aiming to secure a competitive edge in today's digital-first marketplace.

But is it an approach for your business?

Local SEO focuses on optimizing a website's online presence to attract more local customers and improve search engine rankings for location-based queries.

We just scratched the surface by explaining product information management (PIM) and digital asset management (DAM). Time to compare these two concepts and systems and describe the business benefits of using them.

How do you build a remote team? Why company retreat is the best way to do it? What happened and what lessons did we learn last week at Crystallize 2022 retreat?

Running a conference is no easy task but it is a rewarding one. While React Norway 2022 wasn't our first React conference it certainly was the best one yet.

A subscription business model is a revenue model in which customers pay a recurring fee, typically monthly or annually, to access a product or service. Unlike traditional sales models that focus on one-time transactions, subscription models emphasize ongoing relationships with customers, providing continuous value in exchange for recurring payments.

Subscriptions are already embedded in our culture, so much so that we do not think of them as something special. The average U.S. consumer subscribes to 3.7 services (source), ranging from electricity and apartment rent, streaming services like Netflix or Spotify over office furniture renting like Nuwo, and phone cloud storage iCloud to (why not?) commerce platforms like Crystallize and productivity apps such as Microsoft Office.

The above should not come as a surprise because the demand is there. As of 2023, the average monthly spending on subscription services per consumer in the U.S. was approximately $237 (source).

The subscription model has gained immense popularity due to its ability to create predictable revenue streams, enhance customer retention, and provide businesses with valuable insights into customer preferences and behaviors.

Wow… that’s great, but is it the right fit for your business? Let's explore that.

Google announced Universal Analytics (UA) would no longer process new data in standard properties beginning July 1, 2023, and that you should be moving to Google Analytics 4 (GA4). It’s not like the world is ending, right? But what does that mean for your business?

With just a couple of months before G sunsets Universal Analytics for GA4, I’ve wondered if there are any Google Analytics alternatives you might want to move to.

You've probably heard the terms APIs, and Microservices used when talking about web development. What are they? How do you use them, and what is the difference between them?

Omnichannel commerce is all about meeting your customers where they feel comfortable shopping - and with just the right information.

In eCommerce, it’s not uncommon to think that organic traffic mainly comes from the home page or (keyword-oriented) category pages. While this might be true for well-known brands (think of Nike, Channel, Longines, Porsche, etc.), this is not true in general.

As we became more search engine literate, Google (and Bing and others) became the starting point of buyers’ journeys, with the end destination being product pages. Over 23.6% of online searches for products begin on Google, while 43% of overall eCommerce traffic comes from organic Google search results (source link).

No in-between pages (like category) or online store browsing makes product page search engine optimization (SEO) hugely important. Many businesses already know that, so chances are your competitors are already investing heavily in product page optimization, and it’s about time you start doing it as well.

Many cool posts/guides/articles about product page optimization exist online. Still, many fail to point out that you should consider two aspects of product page optimization: SEO and clickthrough rate optimization (CTR).

The first is about the appearance of your product page in search engine results for desired keywords. The second is about your product's conversion or selling on those pages. The following tips/tricks/best practices are written with the two in mind. Luckily, the two are intertwined🤪

Imagine this scenario. Your marketing team is frantically digging through countless folders—both locally and in the cloud—just to find that one perfect product image. Deadlines are looming, brand guidelines are on the line, and you’re left wondering, “Why is this so hard?”

That’s exactly where Digital Asset Management (DAM) swoops in to save the day. It tackles problems like duplicative assets, confusing file versions, and inconsistent branding head-on.

Instead of wasting time sifting through outdated visuals, your teams can quickly locate, update, and distribute the correct files across every channel. From accelerating campaign timelines to ensuring each social media post is brand-accurate, a well-implemented DAM strategy keeps your marketing machine (and business) running smoothly—and your sanity intact.

Composable commerce is a modular approach to building your e-commerce platform using interchangeable, best-of-breed components. Instead of relying on one giant suite for everything, you compose your solution, plugging together specialized services for storefront, search, checkout, CMS, payments, etc.

This approach lets businesses and developers swap out parts, scale independently, and innovate faster to meet changing needs. It’s a strategy born from the need for greater flexibility in a rapidly evolving digital market, and it’s increasingly seen as the future of commerce.

Why does composable commerce matter? In short, it gives your team the agility to deliver better customer experiences across all channels without being handcuffed by a monolithic platform.

According to the MACH Alliance, 79% of tech leaders plan to increase composable elements in their tech stack within the next year – a huge shift signaling that companies crave the freedom to tailor their commerce systems.

Gartner even predicts that organizations adopting a composable approach will outpace competitors significantly in rolling out new features.

That's the TL; DR. Now, let’s dig deeper into what composable commerce means and how to leverage it for your business.

Sometimes I think I do these just for the sake of the intro. Go and check the previous intro here posted a year ago for context.

Where do I start? I regularly take notes in my Notepad and record key findings on various topics. For this post, a couple stood out:

• AI is transforming digital space. The way people search has changed. Conversational search. Multiple sources.
• Zero-click search is up. Attribution is tough. We’re back to branding.
• Tech, authority, and backlinks still matter.
• Selling products and the buyer's journey go beyond the website. Think TikTok, Instagram, Google Merchant Center, and search results for products.
• SEO vs. Answer Engine Optimization (AEO), Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), LLM, and AI optimization… same same, but different?
• SEO is not dead; it is changing.

Truth be told, most of us in marketing and SEO are in battle testing mode right now, more than ever before. We do some of the things we know still work, and test new ones in the hope that they will work just as well.

The rise of AI has changed the way people do things online (including search). Not long ago, keyword-based search was the way we all did it. You'd enter keywords like headless commerce, Nike Air Jordan V, coffee machines, or Amazon coupon, and out come the search results with ads, rich search result features depending on the search query, and links.

Then the younger crowd started using Instagram, TikTok, and Reddit while searching (or rather researching)—more like an additional search stop.

AI and the LLMs brought a different behavior altogether, conversational search. With AIs, you can ask questions like what is headless commerce, or is headless for my business, or what color of Nike Air Jordan V are there, or find me Amazon UK coupon code for books, etc., and get a direct response, an answer with links you can choose to explore additionally (or not) or just ask more questions till you get the answer you are looking for.

The value of LLMs for search has been instantly recognized by many, including Bing and Google (traditional search engines). Long story short, AI overviews in Google and Bing’s Copilot summaries have become an integral part of search results. In fact, AIOs now show for almost 55% of Google searches (source). Also, the number of no-click searches on Google (searches that resulted in no clicks to external sources) grew from 56% to 69% since the widespread rollout of AI overviews (source).

Then Google’s AI Mode moved the needle a bit more. G AI mode offers an immersive, summary-first experience, departing from the traditional SERP. Users access a full-screen answer, with organic results now discoverable by swiping. This shift redefines visibility; it's no longer solely about rankings but about being integral to the answer itself.

And so the great decoupling of Google Search began. We all now know that Google's AI Overviews + Mode are giving us more eyeballs but fewer clicks (the great decupling, or rather, the great divide at work).

We also have our alligator moment (gif from our search console)👇

Product Information Management (PIM) is the key to eCommerce success.

Trends in every industry tend to cycle, and web development is no different. What has made the biggest comeback in the past few years? Static websites! However, how we build them today has changed, as has how we host them. Numerous static website hosting platforms are available today, and every year, we review the most popular options to provide you with a quick overview of their advantages and disadvantages.

We no longer call them hosting companies; we call them PaaS or Platform-as-a-service because they allow developers to deploy sites quickly and easily (more on this later).

Why is this important? To put it bluntly, just about any server can host static pages. However, not all of them can meet the needs and expectations of modern web development. 

We’re getting ahead of ourselves. First, let’s define precisely what a static website means and what PaaS is.

Subscription ecommerce business models have seen fantastic growth in recent years. With Crystallize being at the forefront of it, now is the time to dive into the ins and outs of starting, running, and scaling an eCommerce subscription business.

Recent State of JS 2024 survey data shows that developers are increasingly performance-conscious and open to new tools in and out of the React ecosystem. Next.js still tops usage charts, but its interest and satisfaction scores have cooled slightly as it “follows a similar trajectory” to React (still widely used, but no longer the shiny new thing)​.

There is no one-size-fits-all solution but a spectrum of tools optimized for different priorities. A content-heavy blog maintained by a small team might thrive with a simple static-oriented tool like Astro or even Gatsby (remember that one!?). At the same time, a large enterprise dashboard would favor Next.js for its flexibility.

Unlike previous iterations of this article, we’re casting a wider net today, covering a bit more than the title suggests. There are many reasons for this, but mainly, we want you to consider how “React-dependent” you want your stack to be while waging solutions.

If you love React and want to stick with it everywhere, Next.js or Gatsby or Docusaurus let you stay in that ecosystem. If you mainly want to deliver content fast and don’t mind a more framework-agnostic approach, Astro or Remix… sorry, we mean React Router v7 is likely your friend. And if you’re feeling adventurous about the future of web frameworks, you might experiment with Waku, Tanstack, or Qwik’s new paradigm to get that edge in performance. The good news is that the React ecosystem is broad – you can mix and match (for example, embed React components in Astro or use Qwik for parts of an Astro site.

All of these frameworks are converging toward better performance and developer experience, so one can feel confident picking the one that fits their workflow.

Image source: State of JS 2024 survey.

How content is consumed evolves every day. In a mere two decades, we’ve gone from computers and laptops to smartphones, smartwatches, smart fridges, and various other IoT devices. This quick shift has given rise to headless CMSs and a headless approach to web development in general.

Faced with the ever-changing content consumption landscape, companies and their marketing departments had to prioritize content platforms or spend considerable time optimizing and publishing content on each platform.

With a headless CMS, that dilemma is quickly becoming history. In the simplest possible terms, a headless CMS is a backend content management system (CMS) that exists independently of the front end - the presentation layer.

With 73% of all businesses currently using headless website architecture (source: headless commerce stats 2025), it seems that the right time to ride the headless wave is now.

New sales channels appear every day. Instagram now has a shopping tab, WhatsApp is getting one, TikTok is jumping onto the eCommerce wagon, and purchasing groceries from your smart fridge has become a reality. If your online store is your only sales platform and you are not on one of these… you’re seriously missing out.

Yes, we get it. 

First, it’s creating content for your website. Then, it’s creating mobile content. Then, it’s making stuff for social media sales channels, smartwatches, and other IoT devices, and the number of these will only increase. And who has a team that large? Not many!

But hey, that’s why you’re here because this is where headless commerce shines.

Headless commerce and headless architecture have gained considerable traction lately. The market size was valued at $1.32 billion in 2020 and is expected to reach $13.08 billion by 2028, reflecting a remarkable CAGR of 30.1% (source: essential headless commerce stats 2025).

Video is dominating the digital marketing landscape and contrary to what you may have heard there are a couple of ways you can easily add them to your Jamstack website.

We've talked lengths about site speed and performance affecting your search engine ranking and organic traffic but did you know site speed affects Adwords pricing and ranking as well?

With the rapid growth of tools and solutions available in the space now is probably the best time to move your online store to Jamstack eCommerce architecture.

Creating a seamless and engaging on-site customer experience is the ultimate goal for everyone running an online store. Besides your product/service, your store performance and product videos ensure you get the much-needed attention.

Check out the top reasons your ecommerce platform needs to be blazing fast if the satisfied customer is not a good enough explanation.

Not your average list but a comprehensive 19-point eCommerce SEO checklist with everything you need to know to optimize your store and successfully grow organic traffic and revenue.

Core Web Vitals, LCP, Cumulative Layout Shift, FID, Webpagetest.org, Google Lighthouse, Pagespeed Insight, CrUX, or the latest one, Interaction to Next Paint (INP) —we're sure you've stumbled upon one of these in your quest to improve front-end performance.

But how do you measure performance? And why do you need to be data-driven and continuously monitor, optimize, and build a performance testing and optimization culture?

Let's explore that. Let's go millisecond hunting.

​Selling products today is a lot more complex than it used to be. Customers interact with brands across numerous touchpoints, seeking information from various sources before purchasing; they look for product videos and reviews, consult TikTok and Instagram influencers, compare price and usage with other brands, and maybe even check them in-store, etc.

In addition to ensuring the quality of their products or services, businesses must ensure their technology infrastructure aligns with their business goals to stay competitive. A key challenge is combining essential product information with marketing and sales data to deliver enhanced product experiences across all channels and touchpoints, giving businesses a competitive edge.

How do you do that? Well, start by arming yourself with the right tool for product information management.

A headless Product Information Management (PIM) system represents an evolution in how businesses manage and distribute product data. Unlike traditional PIM systems, a headless PIM decouples product information management in the back end (the services layer) from the front end (the presentation layer). This allows businesses to manage product information centrally and distribute it seamlessly across various platforms, providing greater flexibility, scalability, and adaptability to rapidly changing market demands.​

It is no wonder headless PIM is a trend. In fact, 60% of retailers believe a headless PIM architecture (where the back-end data management is decoupled from the front-end presentation) offers greater flexibility and scalability for their business (source: PIM stats for 2025).

React and React-based frameworks are super popular for eCommerce these days. Due to their awesomeness, single-page applications are typically the starting point for many businesses. However, React SPA is far from awesome for SEO, search, and time to first meaningful render.

Let’s delve into effective strategies for optimizing React eCommerce SPAs for SEO, ensuring that your web application is not only user-friendly but also highly visible in search engine results.