Issue #33 - The Christmas issue
In This Christmas Issue: Vile Rumour & Gossip | 2024 Awards | Product Market Fit
Think tinsel, pigs in blankets, and a pug by the fire…here we go
Vile Rumour & Gossip
Everyone (or nobody) is for sale next year
The rumour mill keeps turning. Which SaaS will exit in 2025? The commerce tools IPO is coming (not), and every ESP around is still up for sale. But no buyers.
Still, some sectors have ripened. The AI bots must surely be acquired – we’d expect Digital Genius to go, and we hope they earn a tonne of cash. Job well done!
Transparent pricing is coming
It’s renewal season for many, and boy, is it clear now that pricing is unfair. The challenge now is that merchants have plenty of ways to share and test what they’re paying. We could write a list of the top 10 “oops” vendors who are getting rinsed in the CF community for sharp practice regarding pricing. It won’t end well, so congrats to those who are ahead of the game and are maintaining transparency.
Does everyone now have a Shopify practice?
In the mid-market (or upper), we can only think of a single SI that does not have one. The MACH SI’s all have (apart from one). Granted, none of this news in itself, but it is a sign of dollar hunger, momentum, and necessity.
What will it mean for project size and revenue? Tough to say. What we do know is that there are nerves about the Nordic Shopify behemoths arriving and eating up market share. But there’s much more going on here than just that, isn’t there?
Community in action
There is a definite move towards the digital stack being given a budget by the CFO…and then those in charge of the stack being tasked with reducing its component parts until they hit that budget. One customer I met last week had 124 vendors and needed to cut that down to about 80 to meet the budget line they were given. A big ask! And challenging enough that we’re hearing about sneaky little practices being enacted, like “secretly” switching off some things by deauthorising user accounts to see who complains.
2024 Awards
We thought it might be interesting to look at who has really gained momentum in 2024. As most of you know, we have a unique position speaking to customers, vendors, and agencies all year – so we know who is selling and buying tech and services.
Some of them deserve a small pat on the back. So that’s what this section is all about.
CDP/ESP
The standout vendor is Bloomreach (take a bow). Exponea remains the best-regarded CDP out there, and their “AI” is better than the rest. Customers think so, and so does the ecosystem.
eCom
Shopify. We won’t bore you any more.
Customer Service
Digital genius. All. Day. Long. Transparent pricing, positive reviews and good service levels. There are some issues in the perception of pricing, but that’s not unusual.
SIs
Fuse Fabric, the Shopify enterprise team, are our standouts. They’ve come out of nowhere. They’re mature. They’re cogent. And they’re great at delivery. Well, as long as Boden goes live in January, that is.
CMS
They’ve all had a good year, having been slightly less affected by the slowdown than most sectors. This one is tough. Has Sanity kept its momentum? Or is the new kid on the block, Framer, worthy of a title? There’s no clear winner from our point of view.
Oh, and lest we forget – a lovely little cameo from Builder.io. Reinventing themselves at every opportunity. Nicely done.
Integration
Loads of noise about Patchworks (and that’s not just because Jim’s a great friend of ours). Can the power of Jim and Patchwork’s relentless focus on partnerships really deliver the momentum it takes to bring that sector into the mainstream? SI’s do love to build integrations of their own, don’t they?
Loyalty
Yotpo pips it. Sure, it’s not the sexiest or the newest. But that team does what few others manage: they’re not letting clients down, they’re not overselling, and they are doing what they say they will. Plus, they’re well-liked! Sometimes, it’s that simple.
Personalisation
No winners. DY still have the whip hand in enterprise, but it’s too pricey for most. We’re left wondering – has this space lost its mojo?
Point of Sale
The biggest debate in town. You can ignore that horrific Forrester wave with the dinosaurs on it. Instead, here’s our view – the fight is now Shopify versus NewStore. The latter has good/great inventory management, which is important at 40+ stores (especially in the USA with such great distances). In short, Shopify POS is great…until you know what you’re missing.
Product Market Fit
We’re living in a dual-speed market. Brands with older stacks are operating on 2019 criteria, and they’ll still be buying Braze as a new platform in three years ’ time. Those on the truly modern stacks are impatient and demanding and constantly monitor their stack for value.
Which means that your PMF is short-lived.
We spend significant hours re-working value propositions and PMF decks for the ecosystem, and what comes up constantly is the lack of focus on “problems you solve”. We remember James Brooke from Amplience, Sweft, and now MAPP running extensive sessions on this, but he’s unusual (for his focus on problems, not generally). Get it right, though, and this can be a form of genius.
One month ago, we casually introduced a vendor via WhatsApp to a possible client. I (Jamie) explained the VP in less than 1 minute, and there is now a paid POC agreed. The Product Market Fit was not already known in this instance, but the value proposition was so strong that for a merchant with real traffic scale, this solution is (possibly) a no-brainer.
So, if you remember anything coming out the other side of the festive fugue state, let it be this: no strong value prop, no outcome.
And now the 2nd of our Stig articles - very different this month!
Buyingtime Dictionary
Frequently used (but never about you) phrases from Buyingtime Ltd.
E.T.
/"əT/
noun
1. just wants to go home
“NO! I’m next to Keith again for the party this year!”
“Give him 6 Chardonnays and a paper hat, and he’ll be in floods of tears by 9. Find me and whisper “ET” – we’ll make a break for it.”
