Looking for the best in class headless solutions?

Headless commerce architecture is the decoupling of the front-end presentation layer of a website from the back-end ecommerce functionality. Developers can utilize their front-end technology of choice to deliver high-quality content experiences and plug in an ecommerce solution on the backend that manages all commerce functionality.

Headless Commerce has a lot of advantages that help your website behind the scenes. Here are few of them:

1. Flexibility and familiarity for developers. Increased flexibility and development speed.

- By decoupling the frontend and the backend, headless eCommerce allows making whatever modifications you want, without the fear that your website will slow down.

- Since the frontend and the backend of the headless eCommerce site are independent of each other, the development team can apply new functionalities and integrations faster. Development speed is increasing because many changes of the user interface do not have to be done on the backend.

- Flexibility of development allows amazing UX / UI which have a positive influence on the conversion rate.

- Headless commerce enables brands to choose the ecommerce platform that works best as the engine for their online store while also working with the frontend of their choice, be it a CMS, a DXP, a PWA or a custom solution.

2. Advanced technologies to create visionary, fast websites.

- Headless allows for more flexibility in content delivery because you can connect a CMS, DXP, or Internet of Things device (IoT) that is specifically designed for creating content- or experience-led commerce. You can then swap out the front-end without affecting the backend operations.

This method allows for a much faster delivery than traditional ecommerce platforms and lends itself to a better customer experience.

3. Speed to market for international, omnichannel GTMs.

A headless solution is easily replicable across the board, optimized for international SEO and connected to the overall data orchestration infrastructure.

4. Better SEO performance

- SEO is the process of improving your rank in search engines to help potential customers find your marketplace. With headless Shopify you have full control over your SEO tactics. A high position in search engine has a major impact on the number of visitors.

- One of the most important things is your site speed. Google has indicated it as one of the factors used by their algorithm to rank pages. With a headless solution you can fix performance issues that cannot be solved while using standard Shopify storefront.

5. Conversion rates and lower customer acquisition costs.

Headless is an effective way of reducing these costs because your brand can use a content- or experience-led strategy to draw in organic traffic instead of relying on paid advertising. Dynamic and smooth customer experiences also help increase conversion rates.

1. Headless commerce can be expensive

- You may need to invest in developer or infrastructure costs that can add up quickly. If you aren’t looking for a large investment, headless commerce may not be for you.

2. It’s another tool that requires oversight

- Headless commerce isn’t just expensive to implement, it can also be costly and complicated to manage.

3. Headless commerce limits native functionality of the e-commerce platform

- Some key features, like how promotions are displayed, can be limited with a headless commerce configuration. Functionality is limited to whatever your CMS supports, so be sure to investigate. Confirm that your CMS allows for 3rd party tools, the ability to have federated search with content and product results and the ability to connect to an eCommerce solution for products, catalogs, pricing and promotions. Where there are gaps, custom development will be required to support.

other considerations

Shopify Plus uses a hybrid, or retrofitted, approach that allows retailers to attach its storefront API to a monolithic platform architecture. It provides only the frontend and transactional ecommerce data, so a retailer needs to attach a backend content management system (CMS). Many Shopify Plus retailers taking this approach opt to pair Shopify Plus with a Contentful CMS.