Building Trust, Establishing ROI, and Proving Business Outcomes
Vendors need to create safe buying paths, and leverage ambassadors and reference buyers to guide the market.
Part 1 of this series explored the origins of MACH and composable commerce and its evolution into a mainstream option, driven by the need for businesses to stay competitive, reduce costs, and improve efficiency—areas where composable architecture excels.
However, the shift to composability can still feel overwhelming. A clear understanding of ROI and business outcomes is crucial for making the investment. Today, I'll explore how to support the decision-making process for adopting MACH.
Building the Business Case for Composability
Composable architecture's appeal is its adaptability and agility. Unlike rigid monolithic systems, it lets businesses integrate best-of-breed components, enabling faster innovation and quicker responses to market changes.The flexibility of a composable approach is something Mike Sharp, a seasoned expert in digital transformations, emphasized the importance of in our conversation.
“They're saying composable, but what they mean is flexibility, speed, scalability, interoperability— all of those things that we offer in spades,” said Sharp. “[T]he ability to self-serve, make my own decisions without being bound or limited by the choices of my technology provider. The ability to integrate with best of breed solutions in the way I want them, to drive the outcome and create that customer journey that I want. Those are things that a brand is really going to care about.”
Still, the decision to invest in a composable architecture can be met with hesitation. To help business leaders overcome that resistance it’s essential to demonstrate the tangible business benefits of composability. But equally important and often overlooked is identifying the ways they’ve already adopted composability (often without realizing it). Maybe they’re not calling it composable, but most businesses have started down this path. So the question isn’t should you invest in composable solutions, it’s how can you invest better?
The Role of Ambassadors and Proven Narratives
As customer and business profiles shift, the focus of storytelling shifts too. Moving beyond the tech-motivated audience means the ideal spokesperson is no longer the product expert but veteran customers who have proven experiences to share. They took that early chance and came out ahead, leading their competitors. Their stories are invaluable in guiding the market.
The MACH Alliance has played an instrumental role here, creating the MACH Ambassador program to put customer narratives front and center. Having ambassadors share their experiences and what they’ve learned while promoting the ethos behind composability has advanced the narrative for the entire ecosystem.
Chris Bach, the Co-Founder/CCO/CSO of Netlify, noted the importance of having referenceable customer stories to share, and the impact of hearing them directly from the customer.
“There are ambassador programs, like MACH Ambassadors, where the ambassadors work at many of the largest enterprises in the world. And they're not just facilitating the usage of MACH, but also preaching the benefits to everyone else in their companies and colleagues across their industries,” said Bach.
Peter Karpas, CEO of Bold Commerce, voiced similar sentiments: “Word of mouth is everything. I've known this since my very first job, right? But not everybody is amazing at creating a following and being on LinkedIn and that sort of thing. If you're a brand and you want to go learn about composable, you don't want to hear from people like me because there's an inherent feeling of ‘Okay, what's this person's angle?’ But if you go talk to another brand, that is vastly different. And so the brand ambassadors aspect of MACH, I think, has been immensely valuable.”
Ambassadors are crucial for promoting composability and providing reassurance to others who are considering making the switch. “The more mainstream buyers, they want to see and hear from Sephora, Lego. They want to see others who've gone first and see the benefits they need before they'll move,” Bach noted. Success stories help potential buyers see a proven path to success, demystifying composable architecture and making it more accessible to business leaders hesitant to make the shift.
Moving Beyond Jargon
Another big challenge vendors face is explaining the benefits of composable architecture in a way that everyone can understand. Technical jargon can be intimidating, especially for stakeholders who may not have a technical background.
“People are coming to us and they actually are talking about composable and headless and MACH, which is different than it was, I think, even 18 months ago. [But] it isn't just about the technology. It's about, okay, we think this technology can help us solve these problems,” said Karpas. Having built a career in the digital payments space, he knows better than most how important it is to tell the stories of success and opportunity in plain language.
“The MACH Alliance has been awesome in pulling all of the companies like Bold together to be able to tell our story,” noted Karpas. “They can get the awareness out of ‘This is what composable is. This is how it works, and this is how it can better your brand, and help you make more money.’ [That’s] immensely valuable.”
To effectively reach new customers, it's crucial to use plain language and to emphasize outcomes like improved efficiency, cost reduction, and growth, which makes it easier to gain support across all levels of the organization. But even with clear, benefits-focused language, there is another important tool to leverage: actual results.
Quantifying Success with Key Metrics and Business Outcomes
While customer stories are powerful tools for building confidence, they must be backed up by metrics that demonstrate real ROI. “It's super rational,” stated Sharp. “[They] want to invest in the things that have the highest business impact for them and their customers.”
Stakeholders want to see a clear ROI, and that means providing hard data. This could include metrics like reduced time-to-market, lower operational costs, and increased revenue. The more we can quantify the benefits, the stronger the case for composable architecture.
“The whole market has gotten better, and more compelling in offering more value to customers. And I think that's been a healthy dynamic,” added Sharp. “It’s pushed those of us that are on the composable part of the business to stay sharp and to make sure that we are continuing to move forward and add more and more value to our customers and our partners.”
Business leaders often justify the early steps towards composability based on the business of specific point improvements. Can a CMS enable better storytelling and improve conversions? Can we raise the AOV with better recommendations? Can the right personalization tools unlock a new customer segment? The conversation starts with a single, high-impact need.
From there, consideration turns to a bigger picture item: time-to-value. The ability to bring new products and services to market quickly can be a significant advantage, and composable architectures enable businesses to launch faster and integrate new solutions without completely overhauling their existing systems.
Cost efficiency is another important metric. Composable architecture can reduce costs in several ways, from lowering the total cost of ownership (TCO) to reducing the need for extensive development and maintenance with a monolithic solution. As Bach noted, “We need to add some layers of communication and talk more about the overall return on investment. And we need to do an even better job of explaining: What is the cost of lost opportunity? What is the cost of staying put?”
By adopting a modular approach, businesses can avoid the ongoing (and often expanding) expense of upgrading their all-in-one platform and instead invest in specific areas that deliver the most value.
Making the Business Case for Composable Architecture
Articulating the shift to composable architecture requires more than just technical explanations— it requires a compelling business case that resonates with stakeholders at all levels. By showcasing proven work through compelling narratives, businesses can build confidence in the decision to invest in composability. Ambassadors and referenceable buyers play a crucial role in this process, providing real-world examples that demonstrate the ROI and business outcomes that can be achieved.
Most businesses are already invested in some form of composability, but lack the long-range vision and executional know-how to see it through to its full potential. When we can demonstrate a proven path to success, backed by real-world examples and concrete data, the decision to adopt composable architecture becomes not just a possibility, but a necessity.
Jason Cottrell
Founder and CEO, Orium
Jason Cottrell is the CEO & Founder of Orium, the leading composable commerce consultancy and system integrator in the Americas. He works closely with clients and partners to ensure business goals and customer needs are being met, leading the Orium team through ambitious transformation programs at the intersection of commerce, composability, and customer data.