Our technology partner Alumio has identified four pillars that help organizations to achieve success with digital investments. Get to know more about these pillars, the importance of a connected infrastructure, iPaaS and the optimal integration strategy.
For businesses to be successful, we genuinely believe it is vital to have a connected IT ecosystem. Everything and everyone in your digital ecosystem should connect across channels, devices, and platforms. Companies with a connected infrastructure are far outpacing their competitors.
Four pillars of digital success
We have identified four main pillars that you need as an organization to help you achieve success with your digital investments: vision, data, process and technology, and people.
"Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in 10 years."
Bill Gates
Successful companies need to have a digital strategy
90% of the studies show specific and challenging big goals lead to organizations achieving higher performance than those setting no or easy goals. To be able to understand why you should have an integration strategy, there are four main pillars to help you achieve success with your digital investments.
Pillar I: Vision
How is the company going to be managed? What are the objectives and goals? What strategies do you need to consider to achieve digital success? A significant role of the management team is to have a clear picture of all four pillars. It's crucial to understand where you are today in each pillar, and this forms part of your strategy to progress forward. But without a vision, you won't know which direction to set off in. Use simple, clear language when writing your vision; everyone must understand it. Think big. It might seem more achievable and safer to set a smaller short-term goal, but everyone loves an organization that knows where they want to be and it's going to take a big, juicy, audacious plan to get there! A big goal inspires employees and stimulates progression and the urge to improve. SMART objectives are there to help you set achievable deliverables along the way, but the goal... needs to be big.
Pillar II: Data
Data is the key for most things today, and that stands true when looking at digital maturity. Successful organizations who are future- thinking and hyper-learning build themselves on robust, reliable data—hence the term data- driven. Too often, we see data stored in a siloed manner. It needs to be available in a smart way, where it can be accessible for all levels of the organization, creating a seamless experience across channels, devices, marketplaces and more. To be ready for machine learning (ML), artificial intelligence (AI), and truly become a digital-first company, data from all customer touch points, sources, software, channels, and departments needs to be easily accessible.
Pillar III: Process and Technology
Having the right tools for the job is true of any trade. Why should software be any different? It shouldn't! A clear view of how data and software are being used will avoid data being isolated in silo's, separated from each other, leading to more efficient processes. To be ready for the world of APIs, you will need this level of visibility. APIs will allow you to be exisible, scalable and secure. Smart algorithms, analytics and AI models will help your organization adopt more effective processes and will enable you to make intelligent decisions based on real-time data. Making the right choices about technology will mean you'll have an ecosystem that will grow with you and avoid costly implementations. Install for growth now, and it will save you time, money and a headache further down the line.
Pillar IV: People
Knowledge, experience and culture are what people bring. Data-driven organizations require partnerships and people who understand the digital world. The landscape is continually changing, and people need to be aware of the shift. They need to keep their skills and knowledge u up to date.
Why is an integration strategy key for digital success?
These 4 pillars really show that grip on your data, having a clear vision, a good IT solution and the right people on board is crucial to digital success. But how do I make sure that my data is available for all employees (and customers)? How do I make sure my data will not be stored into all different systems which results in having data silo’s? Starting a project with a decent integration strategy is key to create a solid fundament for the future of an eCommerce platform. Why?
- __Be ready for the future __choosing a middleware integration platform, like Alumio will untangle your data and create a rock-solid integrated landscape ready for the future.
- __No more data silo’s __easy to extend software and data integrations, add or change new software in a short time. It allows you to start in an agile way and remain flexible overtime. Pre-built integration templates are helping you to kickstart your integration. Choosing an iPaaS integration solution prevents you from a mixed-up IT landscape with too many custom code or plugin solutions.
- __Comply with privacy regulations such as GDPR, __by being able to report and act on an ever-expanding set of rules that businesses must comply with. An iPaaS solution organizes all integrations in one place and will help you with handling your data.
- Monitoring and logging capabilities support you to solve problems quickly, with an iPaaS in place, you can prevent huge business impact because of the capabilities to zoom in on issues and repair them via the user interface.
- __Futureproof: __With the Alumio iPaaS and the Shopware Connector Template, you'll be assured that your integration will be future-proof and that it supports newly released API versions. Providing flexibility and robustness without custom code or plugins within your Shopware platform.
5 reasons ‘why to choose for an iPaaS’, which are more practical?
1.) You can build integrations 4x faster! (and so cheaper!)
2.) What happens when your ‘hotshot’ developer with all your integration knowledge leaves? Are you flexible in maintaining your integration
3.) You can build integrations yourself, without deep technical knowledge. Alumio’s iPaaS delivers a visual interface to connect to REST or SOAP!
4.) Standardisation (don’t recreate the wheel); There are a lot of prebuilt ‘marketplace’ integrations templates available!
5.) Alumio’s middleware is Cloud-native, so customer does not need to worry about hosting/infrastructure.
Alumio and Shopware are close friends
A Shopware integration template is available within Alumio’s iPaaS for kickstarting your project. Alumio has created a so-called Connector Template that connects to the API of Shopware. This API-led integration strategy makes sure that our customers benefit from a standardized and optimized connection, that evolves alongside the Shopware platform. The only thing you have to do is map the data from your other endpoint (the software you want to connect).
About Alumio
Our technology partner Alumio offers 'best in class' integration solutions, iPaaS and Native Connectors, for digital commerce to seamlessly integrate systems. Interested in Alumio’s Shopware integration solution? Alumio is happy to assist you by sharing their knowledge. Make your next ecommerce project a successful and future-proof business, with a short time to market and a low total cost of ownership.
