Moving to Magento 2

March 3, 2016 By Adam,

We are asked on a daily basis, from new clients and existing, if they should move to Magento 2.0. The short answer is yes, but it is important to do your homework and create a detailed plan. Below are the top things we consider when making recommendations on upgrading and replatforming to Magento 2.0.

3rd Party Integrations

Almost all magento projects have some kind of integration with 3rd parties for email marketing, order management, inventory, shipping, taxes, 3PL, etc. The good news is that many of those major service providers already have modules ready for Magento 2.0 including MailChimp, Bronto, ShipperHQ, ShipStation and Alavara. Contact your account manager to find out if there is a Magento 2 module and if not when they plan to release it. If there isn't a Magento 2.0 module in the works then it will need to be custom built.

Commercial Modules

Like 3rd party integrations, all projects have multiple modules. Some provide nice to have functionality that enhance UX while others are critical to the operation of your business. Whether you are evaluating moving to Magento or upgrading, we recommend taking the following approach:

Identify the business and technical requirements
Determine if there are existing modules that meet these requirements (Magento 1 or Magento 2).
If something does not fit 100%, try to find a module that does 80% of the requirements – we can customize and build the other 20%
If you need a Magento 1 module that doesn't offer a M2 version, contact the developer to find out the timeline for release
Compare the module release/development timeline relative to the overall project timeline to ensure they align

Custom Modules

If you are upgrading from Magento 1, moving over custom modules can be a much larger undertaking. We recommend going through a similar process of determining technical and functional requirements. Once you have all the details documented, investigate if the custom module can be replaced with either an existing module or check to see if it is now part of Magento 2. If not, the module will need to be either migrated or rebuilt.

Time and Energy

While managing a Magento 2 store is very similar to Magento 1, there still needs to be dedicated time and effort to learning the ins and outs and getting your team ramped up. Moving to Magento 2 is a replatform and requires a detailed migration plan, regardless if you are already on Magento 1. Review your current infrastructure and hosting as they will require adjustments to support new versions of technology. Coordinate with technology, operations, merchandising and marketing to review the new platform so that everyone knows how to effectively do their job moving forward. Make the move, Magento 2 is here and adds a lot of new features and benefits. Making the move can be a daunting task, but if you have a detailed plan that aligns with your business needs you can make the move as painless as possible. If you need help identifying, planning or executing the steps above, contact us to see how we can partner together for a successful Magento 2 launch.