Magento and Salesforce Commerce Cloud are two of the most popular enterprise-grade eCommerce platforms in the market. Gartner, in its Magic Quadrant for Digital Commerce platforms, has included both platforms in the ‘Leader Quadrant’ for three years in a row.
If you’re ready to migrate to or build an eCommerce store on either of these platforms but are not sure which is right for your brand, this blog will help. Below is a comparison of Magento Commerce Cloud and Salesforce Commerce Cloud. We look at seven key factors that matter most for businesses choosing an enterprise-grade platform. Let’s dive in.
Magento vs Salesforce Commerce Cloud – Overview
- Magento Commerce (now Adobe Commerce) and Salesforce Commerce Cloud (formerly known as Demandware) are enterprise platforms that suit medium and large businesses.
- Magento is a PaaS (Platform as a Service) that offers flexibility and customizability. Magento offers market-segment-centric platforms for B2B and B2C brands.
- Magento is a one of the oldest and widely used eCommerce platform with over 300,000 stores, which means it is market-tested across all sectors and business models.
- Magento is highly customizable, providing maximum flexibility for brands to create bespoke experiences.
- Magento is open source and invites developers to download its code and innovate on it. As a result, it has the largest third-party developer community in the market. If Magento doesn’t offer a feature you need, it is likely a plug-in exists for it.
- Salesforce was a pioneer of the SaaS model. It was the first company to offer its software via that model exclusively. Not surprisingly, the company’s eCommerce platform is only offered as a cloud-based solution, which may be a consideration to some companies.
- Unlike Magento, Salesforce began in an ancillary business, CRM, but has since expanded to offer eCommerce solutions. According to Builtwith, around 10,851 websites are using Salesforce Commerce Cloud.
- While both companies base their fees on sales revenue, Salesforce B2B customers face a $4.00 – $8.00 per order fee that can add up if you service a large community of buyers that place smaller orders (e.g. the B2B2C or B2b business model).
- Both companies offer advanced AI capabilities, but Salesforce Einstein’s AI-powered search features offer more convenience for mobile users.
- Both companies focus on the customer experience, and enable the companies to create personalized experiences through integration to internal content management systems.
Magento vs Salesforce Commerce Cloud – Cost
Magento Pricing
Magento is available in three versions: Magento Open Source, Magento Commerce, and Magento Commerce Cloud.
Magento Open Source is free, but that doesn’t mean you won’t incur costs. It is likely you’ll need to customize Magento to meet your customers’ expectations, which means you’ll incur some development costs, which can be steep. Additionally, you’ll need to account for hosting costs ($10–50/month) and domain costs ($10–400/year) which can add up.
If you are choosing Magento Commerce or Magento Commerce Cloud, here are the license costs you could be paying.
| Companies with gross sales revenue | Magento 2 Commerce (Enterprise) | Magento 2 Commerce Cloud (Enterprise+AWS cloud) |
|---|---|---|
| $0 $1 million | $22,000.00 | $40,000.00 |
| $1 – $5 million | $32,000.00 | $55,000.00 |
| $5 – $10 million | $49,000.00 | $80,000.00 |
| $10 – $25 million | $75,000.00 | $120,000.00 |
| $25 $50 million | $125,000.00 | $190,000.00 |
Source: Magento 2 migration – How much does it cost to migrate your store to Magento 2?
The Magento Commerce Cloud version bundles in annual hosting fee as well. For the premium versions of Magento, the license fee is negotiable (contact a Magento sales team to obtain pricing based on your business requirements).
Magento is highly flexible, which means launching an eCommerce site will require you to do a bit of customization. You can save on development costs by engaging an official Magento Partner agency that has extensive knowledge of the platform (the average cost for a developer from such agencies range from $50 to $70 per hour).
Salesforce Commerce Cloud Pricing
Salesforce Commerce Cloud is the more expensive of the two. Though the company negotiates license costs based on the size of the enterprise and its revenue, there is a starting price tag. Here’s the pricing plan for Salesforce Commerce Cloud:
| Market Segments | Plans | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | Growth | Plus | |
| B2B Commerce | $4 Price Per Order (billed annually) | $6 Price Per Order (billed annually) | $8 Price Per Order (billed annually) |
| B2C Commerce | 1% Gross Merchandise Value (billed annually) | 2% Gross Merchandise Value (billed annually) | 3% Gross Merchandise Value (billed annually) |
| B2B2C Commerce | 1% Gross Merchandise Value (billed annually) | – | – |
The platform offers three plans. For B2B the plans are billed annually based on a commission fee per order while for B2C the plans are billed annually based on gross merchandise value (GMV). While the starter packs have all the essential features that allow you to go to market quickly, other customer-experience-related features, multiple channel support, capability to have multiple storefronts in a single instance are available as you move up the ladder.
If you include add-ons and choose additional support from Salesforce, it will add up to your overall cost. For more information on Salesforce Commerce Cloud cost for different market segments, explore the links given below:
Magento vs SFCC – AI Capabilities
Magento AI Features
Adobe introduced Adobe Sensei, an artificial intelligence and machine learning platform, in 2016 and has integrated into most of its SaaS-based tools, including Experience Cloud, Creative Cloud, Document Cloud and Magento Commerce Cloud.
Magento leverages AI throughout the commerce experiences, enabling visitors to find what they need via personalized product recommendations. Here are some of the advantages that Adobe Sensei provides for Adobe Commerce users:
Shopper-based – Using account information and behavior, Adobe Sensei can provide a list of “Recommended for you” products in order to increase conversions and average order value.
Item-based – Based on a visitors purchase history, or items in a wishlist or cart, Adobe Sensei recommends “Similar products viewed or bought.” This feature helps repeat customers find what they need quickly and easily.
Content-based – Based on the product content, Adobe Sensei can provide a list of recommendations called the “Similar products,” which provides multiple yet relevant shopping options for customers.
Popularity-based – This recommendation is based on popular selling and trending products in your store on the whole. Adobe Sensei lists such recommendations under “Trending,” “Most Viewed,” “Most Bought,” or “Most Added to Cart.”
Salesforce Commerce Cloud – AI Features
Salesforce uses its AI, ‘Salesforce Einstein’ in its commerce offering Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Here are some of the advantages that merchants can experience through Salesforce Einstein:
Product Recommendations – Salesforce Einstein personalizes the product recommendation by analyzing the digital interactions (checkout, wish lists, abandoned carts, etc.) made by a customer with your website.
Commerce insights – Einstein provides insight into your merchandizing strategy by presenting the products customers purchase together most frequently. You can see product bundles by Customer, Order, and Product data.” You can use this information to strategize your marketing and promotional plans.
Predictive sort – The Predictive sort feature pivots on customers’ purchase and search history. The product they have bought or searched the most will be prioritized and will be moved up the order. For users accessing your store via mobile, this feature will help them find their preferred products quickly, as the mobile UI doesn’t allow more product listings per page compared to the web.
Search directories – If users are not able to find a relevant result for a search term they’ve keyed in, they tend to move out of your store. Einstein helps in overcoming this challenge. For example, if a user searches for “dark blue color running shoes” and finds no results, Einstein AI groups different aspects of the term searched (e.g. ‘dark blue’) with blue and displays a close to accurate result for the customer. By doing so, the AI expands the list of search terms generated by users and, to some extent, prevents users from bouncing off your store instantly. By doing so, the AI expands the list of search terms generated by users and, to some extent, prevents users from bouncing off your store instantly.
Search recommendations – Salesforce Einstein can improve your site’s search experience by providing suggestions for completing the search terms or showing the most popular or trending keywords. Einstein AI does that by analyzing customers’ search history and long, phrase-like search terms.
Magento vs Salesforce – Comparison of AI features
Adobe Commerce vs SFCC – Hosting
One of the key differences between Magento and Salesforce Commerce Cloud is their hosting options. Magento is an on-premise platform, while Salesforce Commerce, a cloud-based SaaS platform, provides hosting as a built-in feature.
However, Magento has also added the hosting option with its Magento Commerce Cloud offering. Though Magento’s hosted version is cloud-based, it isn’t technically a SaaS solution. The hosted version is powered by Amazon Web Services (AWS) and provides access to advanced performance optimization tools and a dedicated support team.
You can choose Salesforce Commerce if you don’t want to own the responsibilities of configuring, upgrading, and maintaining your hosting infrastructure. Unlike platforms like Shopify, whose users might experience lag if another store in the shared hosting is experiencing a spike in traffic, Salesforce users need not worry about facing such scenarios.
If you opt for Magento, the best way to handle your server-related responsibilities is to hand it over to a skilled Cloud managed services provider. In the long run, it might also prove to be cost-effective.
Magento vs Salesforce Commerce Cloud – Extensions and plugins
Don’t worry if either one of these platforms don’t offer a feature you need out-of-the-box; both Magento and Salesforce Commerce Cloud provide clear technical documentation for developers, as well as ample extensions and plugins in their marketplace.
The extensions marketplaces have both free and premium add-ons. You can be assured of the quality of the extensions you find in the marketplaces as both platforms evaluate each extension submitted by third-party developers for compliance with their coding standards and development best practices.
However, Magento has the upper hand in terms of the number of extensions it provides. Because Magento holds a broad user base and more solution partners, the number of extensions developed for peculiar use cases is more. Magento provides over 5,800+ free and paid extensions in its marketplace for merchants to improve their marketing, checkout, fulfillment, inventory, and order management challenges, and so on.
Adobe Commerce vs SFCC – Customizability and third-party integration
As a SaaS platform, Salesforce Commerce Cloud offers comparatively less freedom in terms of customization. As such, your eCommerce site will depend on Salesforce to develop the features you need. In terms of integration with third-party systems, Salesforce Commerce Cloud falls behind Magento. Since Salesforce Commerce Cloud supports only a selected list of third-party systems, it provides only limited options for customers.
On the other hand, Magento has an open-source architecture that offers 360-degree customization. With the help of a skilled development team, you can build new features, tune the core code to suit your business requirements, and create great experiences. Magento can integrate with virtually third-party systems, which means you won’t need to change your CX stack. You can easily integrate ERP, CRM, payment gateways, fulfillment systems, and marketing automation tools.
Magento 2 vs Salesforce Commerce Cloud – Security
Salesforce Commerce has carved a niche for its security prowess in the market. Being a natively hosted solution (right from its CRM days), the platform offers a lot of security provisions for your eCommerce store. Using Salesforce Commerce, you need not worry about mandatory eCommerce compliance like PCI.
Magento also stands out in terms of security. The platform keeps improving its security features with every version upgrade and provides patches for stores operating on previous versions to stay secure. Magento is PHP 7 compliant, and the to-be-released version 2.4.4, slated for launch on March 11th, is powered by PHP 8.1.
Other security features of Magento include SHA-256 (Secure Hash Algorithm 256) for passwords to save your store from dictionary attacks, Signifyd (fraud protection system), and SSL Certification.
Magento’s Security Scan Tool lets you check the security status, fix issues, and track historical security reports. You can run over 21,000 security tests and get suggestions to improve failed tests.
Adobe Commerce vs SFCC – Support
Salesforce Commerce Cloud offers 24/7 support as a part of their hosted commerce offering. The issues that Salesforce’s support team resolve stretches far beyond just basic code issues, like assistance during peak sales. As a merchant, you get all the version upgrades, and security patch updates simply delivered to your store, which is a benefit of the SaaS model.
Magento provides support but only for Commerce users. Magento Commerce users can benefit from a technical support team that addresses any queries related to implementation, configuration, and so on. Also, merchants will be assigned a dedicated account manager to respond to questions faster.
Magento Commerce Cloud users get access and assistance for Fastly CDN (content delivery network) that can be leveraged to perform performance-enhancing techniques like caching, file compressions, image optimization, etc. If you are choosing Magento Open Source, you’ll have to sign up with a dedicated Magento managed services provider.
Final Words
Now that we’ve compared Magento and Salesforce Commerce Cloud based on 7 key criteria that businesses look at, it’s clear that both platforms have their own set of advantages and distinctive features. While Salesforce beats Magento in areas such as hosting and support, Magento bests Salesforce in terms of customization, extensions, price, and ability to integrate into your existing CX stack.
If you are looking for an enterprise-grade platform that is the most cost effective, Magento is the better option. If built-in hosting and support matter the most, Salesforce Commerce is the better option. We’d like to leave it to you to decide based on the rest of the factors we’ve discussed.
Meanwhile, you can check out our other comparison guides like Magento vs Shopify, Magento vs BigCommerce, Magento vs WooCommerce, Magento vs OpenCart, Magento vs SAP Hybris, Magento Open Source vs Commerce and Magento Commerce vs Oracle Commerce.
Are you having an eCommerce project in mind? We can help you plan your roadmap.
Frequently asked questions
Salesforce Commerce Cloud is not an open-source platform. It is a native SaaS platform that provides a built-in hosting provision. Though the platform offers configurations and settings to personalize its in-built features, the customization capability is limited compared to Magento Commerce, an open-source platform.
Yes, Magento is one of the most sought-after platforms for mid-size and enterprise-grade businesses. For the past three years, the platform has made it to the ‘Leader Quadrant’ in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant for Digital Commerce platforms list.
Magento enjoys a global community of 300,000 Magento developers and 1,150+ solution and technology partners. The platform that’s evolving at a rapid pace offers built-in eCommerce features for search, order management, multiple warehouse management, product recommendations, analytics (Magento BI), and much more.
The platform is highly customizable, enabling merchants to build personalized digital experiences and tune the base code to suit unique business specifics. Magento is strong in SEO and marketing and provides eCommerce brands an edge over their competitors in reaching their target audience. The platform offers omnichannel support (web, mobile, marketplaces, POS) and integrates with popular marketplaces like Amazon and eBay.
Yes, Salesforce Commerce Cloud (SFCC) provides three plans for B2C, namely – ‘B2C Commerce Starter’ (1% Gross Merchandise Value), ‘B2C Commerce Growth’ (2% Gross Merchandise Value), and ‘B2C Commerce Plus’ (3% Gross Merchandise Value). All of these fees are billed annually.
While the ‘Starter’ plan has all the essential elements you need to launch your eCommerce store and start selling quickly, the ‘Growth’ plan provides additional features to improve customer experience. If you aim to take advantage of Salesforce Einstein AI in product recommendation, analytics, search, and so on, the ‘Plus’ plan is the go-to option.
Yes. Salesforce Commerce Cloud was earlier known as Demandware. When Salesforce, the world’s leading CRM software provider, wanted to provide eCommerce solutions, it acquired Demandware. After acquiring Demandware in 2016, the platform was rechristened as ‘Salesforce Commerce Cloud.’
Salesforce Commerce Cloud Pros:
- Zero hassle in hosting and server maintenance, automatic version upgrades
- High security and scalability
- Easy to manage multiple storefronts
- Omnichannel attributes to track marketing efforts across multiple sales channels
- AI-powered (Salesforce Einstein) analytics, product recommendation, and search
- Support for – multi-currency, multi-language, and multi-stores
Salesforce Commerce Cloud Cons:
- Limitation in customization
- Limited 3rd party integrations
- Limited extensions
- Variable total cost of ownership
- Expensive compared to Magento Commerce
