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ecommercetech

Microservices architecture for an e-commerce platform

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Boris Stoyanov-Brignoli

3 min read

After a few years of working on technical issues related to e-commerce, I suggest here to explore what I believe to be a list of services that can make up an e-com platform. I deliberately chose to remain concise and to focus on UX. What impact for the customer? Normally, if you implement these various components, your business should run smoothly ;)

Table of contents

User service

  • UX: User registration, login, profile management, user preferences, order history, and saved items.
  • Responsibilities: Authenticate and authorize users, manage user data and preferences.

Catalogue service

  • UX: Display product categories, individual product pages, and fuel the search engine.
  • Responsibilities: Manage product listings, details, categories, and provide search functionality.

Stock service

  • UX: Display product availability and stock levels.
  • Responsibilities: Monitor and manage inventory levels.

Cart service

  • UX: Manage shopping cart.
  • Responsibilities: Handle cart sessions, calculate totals, taxes, and discounts.

Order service

  • UX: Handle checkout and order history.
  • Responsibilities: Process orders, handle payment integrations, manage order history and status updates.

Payment service

  • UX: Process and manage payments.
  • Responsibilities: Integrate with payment gateways, handle confirmations and failures.

Recommendation service

  • UX: Display product recommendations.
  • Responsibilities: Analyze user behavior, generate product suggestions.

Review and rating service

  • UX: Submit and view product reviews and ratings.
  • Responsibilities: Collect, store, and display user reviews and ratings.

Shipping service

  • UX: Manage shipping options and tracking.
  • Responsibilities: Integrate with shipping providers, manage rates and tracking updates.

Notification service

  • UX: Receive order confirmations, shipping updates, and promotional offers.
  • Responsibilities: Handle email, SMS, and push notifications.

Wishlist service

  • UX: Save and manage wishlisted products.
  • Responsibilities: Manage user wishlists and notifications.

Returns and refund service

  • UX: Initiate and manage product returns.
  • Responsibilities: Handle return requests, process refunds.

Loyalty and rewards service

  • UX: Earn and redeem loyalty points.
  • Responsibilities: Track user points, manage redemption.

Affiliate and partner service

  • UX: Access deals or products from affiliates or partners.
  • Responsibilities: Manage affiliate links, track referrals, handle commissions.

Marketplace service

  • UX: Browse products from various vendors.
  • Responsibilities: Manage vendor registrations, product listings, payments, and commissions.

Subscription service

  • UX: Manage product or service subscriptions.
  • Responsibilities: Handle subscription billing, renewals, product delivery schedules.

Analytics service

  • UX: Not directly user-facing but improves overall platform performance.
  • Responsibilities: Gather and analyze user behavior, sales trends, and platform performance data.

Customer support service

  • UX: Access and manage customer support.
  • Responsibilities: Integrate with support tools, manage support ticket lifecycle.

Note: While the above list is comprehensive, e-commerce platforms can have unique requirements that might necessitate additional or specialized microservices based on specific business models, target audiences, and geographical considerations.

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