Blendium Support, Author at Adobe Commerce Primer

Top-10 Ways to Increase Customer Conversion

10 Sep 202111 Sep 2021
by Blendium Support

We all love a good top-10 list! How about one that directly impacts possible customer conversions on your eCommerce site?

We’ve compiled a list of ten action items for you and your team to prioritize against your web site. We’re betting at least one of these would increase customer conversion!

For the sake of brevity, we’ve included a few extra pointers for each of our top-10 to push you along the path.

Make a great first impression
1. Quick site load
2. Relevant content
3. Quality content
Optimize on-site search
1. Human factors
2. Language differences (US / British), spelling errors, synonyms, etc.
3. Leverage analytics to hone on-site search
4. Search predictions
Offer trusted experiences
1. Boost confidence
2. Great Privacy policy
3. Product Reviews
4. Site Reviews
5. Quality looking Site with amazing content
Foster a supportive atmosphere
1. Quick response times from customer service reps
2. Web chat (live chat / chat bot)
3. Leverage an Alexa skill
Focus on a personalized approach
1. Provide a relevant experience to customers
2. Personalized Email marketing and remarketing
Elevate your checkout experience
1. Proper design and flow
2. Reduce any friction points
3. Utilize Heatmaps to better understand customer flows
Abandoned Cart strategy
1. Abandoned carts happen for a variety of reasons
2. Email Marketing rescue campaign is important
Retarget your prospective customers
Enable connected experiences
1. Optimize digital experience across devices and channels
2. Frictionless mobile experience
Streamline the social path to purchase
1. See, Click and Pay via social channels
2. Do not need full catalog on social media

So, there it is! Our challenge to you: over the next two weeks, put a keen eye to at least one of these suggestions and let us know how it has worked out.

Magento

Magento 2.4.3 is Now Available!

10 Aug 202127 Jun 2025
by Blendium Support

Magento v2.4.3 is now available (10 August 2021) for both Commerce and Open Source! This version brings a number of new features that will provide a better on-site shopping experience for customers and improved performance. Let us have a look at the list of features from the official release that enhance the security, performance and provide overall platform improvements.

KEY HIGHLIGHTS: MAGENTO 2.4.3

33 Security issues resolved
Expansion of reCAPTCHA
Built-in rate limiting
New composer plugin
Infrastructure updates
Support PayPal Pay Later
Upgraded core composer dependencies
Upgraded third-party libraries
Live Search
GraphQL API expansion
Magento B2B version 1.3.2

SECURITY AND QUALITY FIXES

All the known issues found in Magento version 2.4.2 have been fixed in this release. Additionally, 33 security fixes or improvements have been made to close Remote Code Execution (RCE) and cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerabilities.

In case you cannot upgrade to the latest version immediately, it is recommended to at least install one of the security patch versions:

Adobe Commerce 2.4.2-p2
Adobe Commerce 2.3.7-p1

The Adobe commerce 2.4.2-p2 release fixes all the vulnerabilities found in 2.4.2.

RECAPTCHA EXPANSION

With the expansion of reCAPTCHA, your sites are much more secure from spam and bots. This protects stores from carding attacks through brute force mechanisms. reCAPTCHA will be disabled as default for the Place Order storefront page and payment-related web APIs. But, this can be enabled from the Admin panel.

BUILT-IN RATE LIMITING

Rate limiting is now inbuilt with Magento. Now you can limit network traffic by capping the repeat actions within a time frame. This reduces malicious bot activity and protects your site from DDoS attacks.

NEW COMPOSER PLUGIN

With the Magento 2.4.3 release, Adobe is including a new composer plugin that performs integrity checks during installation to reduce the vulnerability known as dependency confusion.

Adobe and extension developers use private and public composer package repositories to deliver code for updates or fixes to Adobe Commerce and Magento Open Source merchants.

The private composer package repository at repo.magento.com is audited by Adobe for malware and package upload validation. But an unused namespace at the public repository at packagist.org can be used to upload malicious packages, which in turn can be passed on to the merchant’s Commerce instances. To avoid dependency confusion it is best to

Use the plugin while testing any extension’s installation flow
Verify that the namespace on packagist.org is owned by you

INFRASTRUCTURE UPDATES

The release enhances the following functional areas and the quality of the framework

Customer Account
Catalog
CMS
OMS
Import/Export
Promotions and Targeting
Cart and Checkout
B2B
Staging and Preview

PAYPAL PAY LATER SUPPORT

The feature is now supported in deployments that include PayPal. It gives the shoppers the option of paying for items in a bi-weekly installment instead of paying the full value at the time of purchase.

PLATFORM ENHANCEMENTS

Magento 2.4.3 is not compatible with PHP 8.x yet, but the platform updates will take it one step further to reaching that goal. With this in mind, the Core Composer dependencies and third-party libraries will be upgraded to make it compatible with PHP 8.x.

LIVE SEARCH

Powered by Adobe Sensei, Live Search provides an enhanced search experience by using Artificial Intelligence and Machine-learning algorithms. With Live Search you get:

Rich search experience – Help shoppers find what they want with as little effort as possible.
AI-powered tools – Increase conversion by leveraging Adobe Sensei and improve overtime with commerce data
Lower TCO – Reduce the cost of ownership that drives cost for development of site search solutions
Flexible framework – Full GraphQL coverage, API sandbox environments, Ultrafast SaaS

GRAPHQL API EXPANSION

GraphQL support has been added for the following features:

Shared catalogs
Wish lists – adds items from specified wishlist to cart
Gift registries –
1. Search by email, type, or ID
2. Create, delete or update gift registries
3. Update or remove items from a gift registry.
4. Move all items from the cart to the gift registry.
5. Add, update, or remove registrants from a gift registry.
6. Share a gift registry with invitees.
Negotiable quotes
Shared routes

MAGENTO B2B VERSION 1.3.2

The latest version of Magento B2B is released along with Magento 2.4.3 with the following features added

Successfully sends emails on soon-to-expire and expired negotiable quotes.
Company users can now edit and update customer custom attribute values.
Administrators with restricted accounts that include only website-level privileges can now create a company that uses a different currency than the website

PAGE BUILDER IS NOW AVAILABLE FOR OPEN SOURCE CONTRIBUTIONS

With version 2.4.3, PageBuilder is now available with the Open Source version. Some of the features; however, will require an Adobe Commerce license:

Dynamic Blocks
Staging and Preview
Native integration with commerce exclusive features

UPGRADE TO THE LATEST VERSION OF MAGENTO NOW

Release Notes: https://devdocs.magento.com/guides/v2.4/release-notes/commerce-2-4-3.html

Talk to us if you are looking for a certified Magento partner to upgrade your ecommerce store.

Magento

Magento NO More…

31 Jul 20211 Aug 2021
by Blendium Support

Magento, an Adobe Company is Now Adobe Commerce, powered by Magento

Magento has been a part of Adobe since Adobe acquired Magento on July 19th, 2018. On that day Magento Enterprise’s functionalities changed significantly and Magento Enterprise became Magento Commerce.

Now Adobe has rebranded Magento Commerce as Adobe Commerce and consolidated Magento Commerce and Adobe Commerce Cloud into a single brand, Adobe Commerce.

Adobe Commerce is powered by Magento that leverages B2C and B2B brands to scale their businesses seamlessly with Open Source flexibility and Adobe’s functionalities like Sensei, Page Builder, as well as Cloud running on either Azure or Amazon Web Services (AWS). Naturally, Adobe Commerce is still available as an On Prem option.

Magento Open Source (or Open Source) branding and support will remain unchanged.

E-commerce

Host on YouTube or Vimeo

10 Jul 202110 Jul 2021
by Blendium Support

Both video platforms are quite different.

YouTube is more open and for the masses, while Vimeo is more professionally focused with a lot more features, at a price. Ultimately, when you are deciding which to use, it is really dependent on what your goals are and what compromises you are willing to make. The biggest site of them all is YouTube of course, but Vimeo has some great features and a community that is something to admire.

Pros of YouTube

It’s the world’s most popular video-sharing platform (1 billion+ unique views a month and with 6 billion+ hours of video watched per month)
YouTube is owned by Google so many marketers claim that it has higher chances of getting ranked in search results. And despite any claims otherwise, you will notice that most search results feature at least one YouTube video snippet on the first page. Mike Aynsely from HootSuite had written that Google favors YouTube over Vimeo for video snippets
You can interact with your audience in the comments
You can grow a following with the follow buttons
Annotations can be added within videos to lead people to act (CTA)
YouTube is completely FREE (unlimited hosting, bandwidth)
The already huge community can take your video to new heights (viral?)

Cons of YouTube

Competitors content or even ads can be displayed near yours
YouTube is all about advertising. And to compound this issue, at least for business, it is possible that your competition is placing ads on your content by targeting keywords that you are also targeting. So while your future customers are viewing your content, your competition could also be advertising to them.
Public content and not as easily controlled or policed
Lack of customer service or support
YouTube comments are rarely well moderated and can detract from your content
The network is designed to keep people on-site, so people are less likely to visit your website

Pros of Vimeo

No advertising for viewers (no pre-roll ads)
Vimeo reaffirmed their no advertising stance. They are all about paying for video hosting and premium services, and not annoying your viewers.
Vimeo favors higher quality content (ie. displays what is great, not popular)
Higher quality contributors tend to post there
Customization of the video player (logo, colors, thumbnails, etc)
Analytics is more detailed
Beautifully designed layout for watching videos
Strong customer support

Cons of Vimeo

Significantly smaller audience, so less visibility
No Free accounts for business usage (minimum $12 per month)
Restrictions on storage based on plans

Video Communities

The community on YouTube is extremely broad compared to Vimeo.
The viewers on YouTube can be a lot less forgiving and are prone to nasty comments that border on trolling and flaming. So when posting on YouTube you have to deal with the barrage of comments that may come your way, many of which are not complimentary.
The plus side is that you can build up a large following through their massive audience and have millions of people supporting your brand around the world.
Vimeo is very much a more controlled community with strong guidelines

Development

Magento 2.4.2 now available!

9 Feb 20219 Feb 2021
by Blendium Support

Magento Commerce and Open Source 2.4.2, along with security-only patches 2.3.6-p1 and 2.4.1-p1, is now available to our entire Magento Community as of today. If you have not yet started the process of accessing these updates as part of pre-release, they can now be found on GitHub, Composer, and at account.magento.com. We encourage you to take advantage of the security and feature updates available in these new versions as a means of adopting the best experience and security posture possible.

Version Highlights
Magento Commerce 2.4.2 includes several enhancements, quality improvements and upgrades. Highlights of this release include:

B2B enhancements to the buyer and seller purchase approval experience
New GraphQL APIs add support for headless commerce B2B implementations
Deliver better storefront performance with Media Gallery image optimization
Realize Faster Time to Value with In-Product Guidance
PWA studio enhancements to support internationalization of stores

To learn more about all that is included in this release, visit Magento’s blog: Prepare for Continued Digital Commerce Growth with Magento 2.4.2.

For more information, check out the Magento 2.4.2 release notes , and don’t forget to visit our Security Bulletins to learn about security updates.

Development

Magento and php 7.3 EOS

20 Oct 202020 Oct 2020
by Blendium Support

Planning for PHP 7.3 End-of-Service and your Magento servers

In about a year (December 2021), PHP 7.3 will reach it’s end of support (EOS). To ensure compatibility and compliance for the 2.3 release line, Magento will be adding support for PHP 7.4 to the release of Magento Commerce 2.3.7 in May 2021. This update will bring backward incompatible changes into 2.3.7 that may affect your site and extensions. As noted, you will have a seven-month window between the launch of 2.3.7 and EOS for PHP 7.3 to either upgrade to 2.3.7 or 2.4.x.

PHP 7.4, the latest PHP 7 minor release, was released for General Availability (GA) in November 2019. A listing of new features for PHP 7.4:

Arrow functions for cleaner one-liner functions
Preloading to improve performance
Support for typed properties
Custom object serialization
Unpacking inside arrays
Weak references
Improved type variance

For more details, please see the Release Notes found here on github.

But, what does all of this really mean for your Magento instances? The real incentive for upgrading your PHP version is the promise of a performance boost. PHP 7.4 will introduce preloading to PHP core which is essentially accomplished via an extension to Opcache, the software that stores precompiled script bytecode in shared memory. This process helps eliminate the need for loading scripts on every request.

Opcache works by using opcodes; or, simplified versions of the code. Preloading works by compiling source files to opcodes, compiling the like bits together, and keeping the compiled code in memory. This code will be much easier and faster for PHP to pull than the alternative: files loaded and linked on every request. In the end, faster code execution translates to a faster loading website.

Blendium encourages all merchants to adopt the latest minor release 2.4.x, which supports PHP 7.4 in order to avoid any unnecessary interruptions. As a less desirable option to update to 2.3.7 once available.

You can learn more about PHP 7.4 support here

B2B

Magento 2.4.1 and B2B

5 Oct 202016 Oct 2020
by Blendium Support

We here at Blendium are always excited about Magento point releases… They tend to come with security patches, bug fixes, performance improvements and most excitedly, new features!

We’re particularly interested in a few B2B enhancements that have come along with Magento 2.4.1.

This release includes multiple enhancements to the B2B user experience and increase security. For example, buyers now benefit from personalized shipping methods, faster requisition list creation, and approval workflow usability enhancements.

Additionally, sellers can charge to company credit using payment on account when creating orders in the admin and Google reCAPTCHA is included on the new company request form to reduce creation of fraudulent or spam accounts.

Magento 2.4.1 introduces B2B v1.3.0 and includes improvements to order approvals, shipping methods, shopping cart, and logging of Admin actions.

Improvements to Order Approvals

B2B order approvals have been enhanced to improve usability and to allow for bulk actions on purchase orders. Improvements to order approval and rejection include the following:

New View Rule page for users without edit privileges. B2B buyers can now view rules that apply to their company on the new View Rule page when they do not have permission to edit them.
Count alert icon on the Requires My Approval tab. The Requires My Approval tab in the My Purchase Orders view now displays a counter that indicates the number of pending approval actions.
Bulk order approvals and rejections. B2B managers and Company Administrators can now perform bulk rejection and approval of purchase orders. These changes allow approvers to approve or reject multiple purchase orders in a single action.
Merchants can now search the Applies to and Requires approval from fields of the My Purchase Orders view and can select multiple user roles during rule creation.
Examples of how to configure Order Approval rules are provided on the Rule Configuration page.

See Approval rules

B2B shipping methods enhancements

B2B merchants can now control shipping methods that are offered to each Company. Merchants can configure the following from the Admin:

A specific set of shipping methods for B2B Company accounts
The use of All or B2B-specific shipping methods for each Company account
A specific list of B2B shipping methods for each Company account

Shopping cart improvements

Merchants can now allow users to clear the contents of their shopping cart in a single action and can configure this ability independently on each website.
B2B buyers can now add individual items or the entire contents of their shopping cart directly to a requisition list.

New Admin features

B2B merchants can create orders from the Admin on behalf of customers using Payment on Account as the payment method.
Merchants can now directly view all quotes associated with a user from the customer’s detail page.
Merchants can now filter the Customers Now Online grid by Company.
Admins can now filter customers in the Admin by Sales Rep.

Magento

Magento 2.4 and Two-Factor Authentication

23 Jul 202023 Jul 2020
by Blendium Support

On 28 July 2020, Magento2.4 will be released (both Commerce and Open Source) with General Availability. This release will obviously include important updates to security, quality, and platform technologies along with several new capabilities. The most interesting to us is the now required Two Factor Authentication (2FA)

Magento v2.4 release notes are here: magento.com.

TWO FACTOR AUTHENTICATION (2FA) THROUGHOUT MAGENTO COMMERCE

As an increasing number of businesses are forced to shift their operations to work-from-home digital solutions we expect that hacking threats are rising. One of the most common threats is from the account login page.

Magento is responding to the growing threat by supporting (and in some cases requiring) 2FA across multiple areas of the Magento Commerce ecosystem. Two Factor Authentication is a key industry standard to protect your digital storefront against attacks that target the account login. Using 2FA security will better protect you and your clients from malicious outsiders attempting to perform unauthorized logins at three different points of entry to Magento Commerce:

Services that use your Magento.com credentials such as My Account or the Magento Commerce Help Center. Available to configure now.
Accessing the cloud admin using SSH, and the Magento Commerce Admin. Available in conjunction with the release of 2.4.
Beginning with the release of 2.4, 2FA will be enabled by default for the Magento Commerce Admin and cannot be disabled. After upgrading, Admin users must configure 2FA before logging in.

We also strongly recommend that our clients change the default admin URL from admin to something more obfuscated (example is admin_string of characters). Additionally, we recommend that client IPs are whitelisted for access to that admin login page.

Between Blendium’s recommendations and Magento’s Two Factor Authentication, we’re seeing a considerable threat reduction around backend access.

Author: Blendium Support

KEY HIGHLIGHTS: MAGENTO 2.4.3

SECURITY AND QUALITY FIXES

RECAPTCHA EXPANSION

BUILT-IN RATE LIMITING

NEW COMPOSER PLUGIN

INFRASTRUCTURE UPDATES

PAYPAL PAY LATER SUPPORT

PLATFORM ENHANCEMENTS

LIVE SEARCH

GRAPHQL API EXPANSION

MAGENTO B2B VERSION 1.3.2

PAGE BUILDER IS NOW AVAILABLE FOR OPEN SOURCE CONTRIBUTIONS

Improvements to Order Approvals

B2B shipping methods enhancements

Shopping cart improvements

New Admin features

TWO FACTOR AUTHENTICATION (2FA) THROUGHOUT MAGENTO COMMERCE