BigCommerce Meet Marketing
BigCommerce filed their S1. Perhaps they should rename to "SmallCommerce." I read through it and thought I would pass along some tidbits.
Bottom line: I think they need to get acquired. The question is by whom? It seems to be between Microsoft on one hand, and one of the top payment companies on the other.
For some time now, BigCommerce's number 1, 2, and 3 problems are all marketing. No one knows who they are. Their approach still needs a dramatic upgrade.
Most telling stat: 79% ARR (Annual Revenue Rate) is > $2k Annual Contract Value. Generally it means BigCommerce is still SMB. Period. They would increase that reported $2k number even a tiny bit if they could.
I think their positioning and go to market Strategy remain extremely muddled. "Enterprise" enough to avoid Magento? More open than Shopify+? BigCommerce's biggest problem is that Shopify+ started after them and took all the oxygen out of the room.
Their Head of Product is ex-Magento, so they push heavily on Adobe Magento as their competition. They aren't in most of these deals and have only a small fraction of Magento's ecosystem.
Annual Revenue Rate (ARR) is up to $128M, growing 22% YoY, $280M capital paid in already. Many mouths to feed.
Half of ARR is on their "Enterprise" plan, which oddly also covers both mid-market ($1M-$50M) and Enterprise ($50M+).
BigCommerce is a strong platform and there are a number of agencies that prefer it. In my opinion, they still need more differentiation, better messaging, and to get invited to more RFPs. Over 80% of the eCommerce platform conversations I am in do not mention them. That is telling.
Some highlights from the comments section:
Corey Krafte brings up some great points here “It seems to me that when BC shows up in an evaluation it is almost always as a 3rd or 4th option. I agree it's indisputably got strengths as a platform and in the last few years they seem to have really done an admirable job stretching the capabilities. They also have hired and continue to hire some extraordinarily talented people. That said, something is missing when your product is almost without exception defined and discussed in terms of its competition, rather than on its own merits.”
Stephen Carl notes that “BC is decent to work with. B2B/Wholesale is a competitive advantage of theirs right now (until Shopify swoops in). Their developer pool isn't too large and the building on the platform isn't as easy as other platforms. With Shopify, building strong UX is never in question. With BC, there are times where the merchant team can't fix things themselves easily, which bumps up cost and lowers design standards. One positive thing about BC is checkout and conversion rates. Saw a really good result firsthand on a client's platform migration.”
Rohit Gossain brought up a great point - that “Shopify has more developer community support than BigCommerce,” which could be fueling Shopify’s further growth. Another take on what might be behind Shopify’s growth comes from Avery Amaya, who said “The vast majority of the time its not the day-to-day eCommerce team that brings Shopify into the mix, its the CEO or Board who happily own Shopify stock and who see them on CNBC or CNN Money every single day.” So maybe an IPO would be helpful in breaking up some of this suspected pocket-lining.
Andy Vanags shared some really interesting thoughts - “The issue I see in the squeezed mid market of eCommerce platforms is that as everyone moves headless it becomes less relevant which platform you are on. Instead, the level of out of the box/included integrations to 3rd party systems (ERP, OMS, PIM, payments) may drive your decision making. As such, assuming the chosen eComm platform is performant and scaleable for growth, then in order to 'win' the deal against the competition the monthly fees need to be significantly lower... BC are well placed to win a significant number of deals on price as their tech is solid, but is it attractive enough for a Microsoft, I'm not sure. I think headless tech is analogous to electric cars, all the manufacturers are releasing them now, and we all know it's the future... but for many/majority of consumers petrol and diesel options still offer simplicity, value and minimal change barriers. There will be a tipping point for headless and electric cars alike and I suspect it'll be sooner than we think.”
I think "As everyone moves headless" is a false premise. I do think there is a headless echo chamber, but the reality is that most people just want the solution to work and want simple tools that are built-in. Headless sacrifices simplicity for flexibility. Simplicity is still winning from where I sit, though I really liked Andy’s electric car analogy and am curious to see how it plays out.
