Magento agency for large companies: What criteria should be used to select one?

According to Builtwish, this corresponds to 9 per cent of all e-commerce websites. No wonder that more and more online retailers are planning to move their webshops to Magento. However, due to the exploding demand, Magento agencies are a dime a dozen. This makes it difficult to decide on the right Magento agency. Our list of criteria helps large companies in their search for a competent Magento agency. What criteria are important?

Why Magento for large companies at all? The advantages of the shop system!

Magento 1 has been around since 2008 and Magento 2 since 2015. Following a change of ownership, the shop software is no longer owned by eBay, but by Adobe Inc. According to users, the Magento shop system, which is based on the Zend framework, manages the balancing act of offering users a ready-made framework that also offers smaller companies with little technical knowledge a reasonable working basis for sales and warehouse management. On the other hand, Magento's modular structure gives larger, ambitious companies plenty of scope for change.

Thanks to the open source code, business customers can also use Magento to create a customised software solution tailored to their own requirements and needs with the highest degree of complexity. Companies benefit from the dedicated community, which has already provided more than 500 modules for various applications on the in-house marketplace.

Extensions and features are almost inexhaustibly available and the software is optimised for today's extremely high requirements in terms of networking in the working world of Industry 4.0. There are interfaces for all possible management systems. The following list shows relevant examples of possible Magento interface applications:

• CRM
• ERP
• CMS
• REST API
• SOAP API
• ODATA API
• Bulk API
• Asynchronous API
• Market platforms such as Amazon, eBay and Hitmeister
• Merchandise management systems
• Payment systems
• Shipping companies
• Import and export versions

The most important criteria for determining the right Magento agency for larger companies

In order for Magento to utilise these advantages for as many potential shop customers as possible, it is important to work with a Magento agency that has the necessary experience in dealing with the Magento shop system.

It is imperative that they have the necessary expertise to implement the complex and specialised features and functions in the Magento web shop of the respective large company. To ensure this and other important factors, the following criteria should be taken into account when comparing the services and costs of Magento agencies.

The quality and experience of the Magento agency is extremely relevant for large companies

The track record and customer reviews provideinitial insights into the Magento agency's performance. Many Magento agencies like to refer to testimonials, which can be impressively formulated. However, the score on the relevant rating portals is at least as important in order to assess the experience of customers of the respective Magento agency across the board.

Further questions for categorising and determining the right Magento agency are the experience and track record of the service provider. Ideally, the Magento agency can refer to case studies and reference projects that have faced similar challenges to your own project.

Experience as a webshop agency, i.e. in the industry, is an advantage so that the Magento agency can better cater to the specific requirements. Magento itself supports good Magento agencies with a series of certificates, which such Magento agencies can use to prove their skills in dealing with the shop system.

Magento agencies have the opportunity to take corresponding online courses. The following certificates are therefore the most reliable indicator of the Magento agency's performance:

• Adobe Certified Expert: Adobe Commerce Business Practitioner
• Adobe Certified Professional: Adobe Commerce Developer
• Adobe Certified Expert: Adobe Commerce Front and End Developer
• Adobe Certified Expert: Adobe Commerce Developer
• Adobe Certified Expert: Adobe Commerce JavaScript Developer
• Adobe Certified Expert: Adobe Commerce Cloud Developer
• Adobe Certified Expert: Adobe Commerce Order Management Developer
• Adobe Certified Master: Adobe Commerce Architect

Optimal cooperation with the Magento agency through almost perfect customer service and harmonious chemistry

The collaboration with the Magento agency will be very intensive, especially at the beginning, due to the great importance of the shop system for the company. It is crucial that the chemistry between the partners is right. Here, managers of a larger company can initially go by intuition. The first impression is usually the right impression. A similarity in corporate culture creates sympathy and facilitates mutual understanding.

It is also important that the contact works quickly and smoothly. If companies have to wait several days for a response to their enquiry with a Magento agency, the collaboration could come to a standstill. In general, the service should communicate in German and be accessible via several communication channels. These include chat, telephone, video call, email and contact form.

To ensure that contact with the Magento agency's experts is pleasant, it is important that the agency's dialogue partners are friendly and communicate on an equal footing. Large companies benefit if there is a certain inclination towards Magento consulting so that they, as laypersons, are proactively made aware of interesting aspects and possibilities by the Magento experts.

Systematic processes should be a matter of course for a Magento agency:

• The Magento specialist should be capable of conveying their knowledge clearly, because this is the only way to involve the business customer in the communication. In terms of transparency, it must be standard practice for the business partner to be informed of all steps taken by the Magento specialist and for regular dialogue to take place.
  
  
• In general, it makes collaboration much easier if the project management process is efficient, the stakeholders are informed about the individual project goals and the status quo can be viewed in the system at any time. Flexibility in behaviour is desired in order to implement changes promptly.

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Large companies benefit from transparent pricing from the Magento agency

As we all know, friendship and sometimes even business relationships end when it comes to money. This should not happen. A clear cost structure without small print greatly contributes to minimising the risk of conflicts regarding the Magento agency's pricing.

In particular, costs that are easily overlooked, such as travelling expenses, training costs and meetings, must not be hidden, but must be clearly listed. A defined service level agreement (SLA) communicates clear expectations regarding response times, Magento support and the guaranteed performance of the Magento agency.

In general, all fees should be itemised in the contract and the range of services should be clarified, which can include services such as development, design, marketing, monitoring and support. A clear payment plan linked to specific milestones helps to control the budget for the Magento agency's services.

The most important thing when it comes to paying the agency is that the price-performance ratio is right. In many cases, customers must expect that payment will continue in part after the end of the project if the Magento agency continues to take on tasks such as the care and maintenance of the Magento online shop.

Performance and scalability of the Magento agency are of great importance for large companies

Large companies require considerable resources. Here it is important that the Magento agency can provide the required resources and is future-proof. Only then can the software and the level of support reliably keep pace with increased demand.

This scalability ensures that larger companies receive exactly the services they need, even under changing circumstances, and are not slowed down by a bottleneck effect.

Online retailers should check whether the Magento agency can cover the desired service portfolio, whereby the following tasks are particularly important for Magento online shops:

• Development and implementation
• Design (UI and UX)
• SEO and conversion rate optimisation (CRO)
• Online marketing
• Monitoring
• Care and maintenance
• Support and consulting
• Training courses
• Security management
• Magento shop support
• Hosting and migration

The Magento agency should be able to offer a large company optimum legal compliance and IT security

Before working with a Magento agency, it helps to be aware of the fact that the service provider will gain insight into the inner workings of the company and thus into sensitive issues and company secrets. Reliability and integrity must be ensured in order to avoid misuse of this knowledge.

The contract points must be checked for legal compliance and all legal aspects such as property rights, data protection and confidentiality must be clarified. For data protection and protection against hackers, the Magento agency should apply the most effective prevention systems. This includes the following security-relevant points in particular:

• SSL encryption
• Two-factor authentication
• strong passwords
• regular patches, updates and upgrades
• powerful firewalls and IDS
• Anti-virus programmes and anti-malware software
• Endpoint protection such as facial recognition or fingerprint sensor for BYOD
• Incident management
• Data protection and disaster recovery
• Risk management