Over on our Portals blog, Michael Porter shared an announcement from Liferay. They have extended the value of their open source portal with e-commerce functionality for built-in transaction and payments processing. Liferay Marketplace is the worldwide distribution channel for Liferay-compatible apps designed to provide greater access to enterprise applications for Liferay users. Now with e-commerce features, developers have new opportunities to extend existing web solutions in a manner that saves time and costs associated with solution upgrades. Users in turn will benefit from an even richer offering of high-quality apps tailored to their business and technology needs. 
Mike provided a good summary for sellers and buyers. Read his full post here.
Evaluating Portals for E-Commerce?
Portal technology can serve many purposes to help an organization manage an e-commerce web site and content, serve as a collaboration tool, and provide the framework for integration and enhance social media platforms. A lot has changed when it comes to e-commerce platforms and there’s a lot that goes into making the decision to implement a portal solution. A built-in promotions engine, ability to up-sell and cross-sell, intuitive content management system, compatible with mobile, and real-time analytics. So what are some of the top considerations for evaluating e-commerce platforms?
Here are some things to think about for a next-generation e-commerce engine:
- Scalable design and application
- Flexibility for product catalog changes
- Ease-of-use for business-level users
- Personalization
- Rich analytics
- Integration capabilities
- Support new business models
Working with a technology partner to help define your vision, goals, value points and expectations, understand buyer personas, and develop a deployment plan will help you get the most value out of your portal technology. Using the Liferay portal, as well as many other portal technologies, Perficient helps clients build robust business solutions such as self-service portals, knowledge-sharing workspaces, dynamic Web 2.0 websites and social networks that deliver results.
Liferay was named a Leader in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Horizontal Portals in 2013. If you’re evaluating a portal solution and would like to know more about Liferay or our partnership, you can learn more here.
