Lexmark invests in headless ecommerce for B2C and B2B with Adobe Commerce

Lexmark, a global imaging, laser printer, and IoT solutions leader based in Lexington, Kentucky, has taken a significant step forward in its goal to transform how companies find, purchase, and replenish its print solutions on Lexmark.com and other web properties.

Lexmark accomplished this by:

• Replacing its legacy solution with Adobe Commerce
• Entrusting Adobe as its cloud hosting provider for Adobe Commerce and Adobe Experience Manager rather than managing its hosting internally
• Unifying the .com customer experience using Adobe’s headless commerce capabilities within Adobe Experience Manager

As a result, Lexmark has achieved the following results:

• Significantly increased revenue from hardware sales
• Reduced infrastructure costs by 36%
• Increased average order value by 17%
• Increased new registered customers by 300%

Digital commerce at Lexmark

Mike Dattilo, director of marketing at Lexmark, shared how the company took a customer-first approach from the ground up with this digital transformation. “We don’t have a preference where our customers buy,” said Dattilo. “If people want to buy from our channel partners or another online retailer, they can. If they want to buy direct from us, they can. Ultimately, we’re trying to give our customers choice, convenience, and selection.”

Lexmark’s core business is selling print hardware, supplies, and services to medium and large companies worldwide. On its previous ecommerce solution, supplies accounted for over 90% of sales. With the new experience integrated directly into its core web domain, sales of printers and other hardware equipment increased significantly, which generates further supply consumption. “This strategy will help both top-line growth and margin expansion as more customers buy hardware from us online and return to purchase supplies and services later,” Dattilo said.

Another core part of Lexmark’s digital commerce business is Lexmark OnePrint, a subscription offering that resupplies customers with toner based on the number of pages customers print per month. By offering a flat monthly subscription to customers, Lexmark offers a predictable expense for print supplies rather than customers experiencing single, large expenses for replenishing their print solutions. Customers can save up to 30% on their cost of Lexmark supplies, and Lexmark retains a higher percentage of customers who participate in the program.

How Adobe Commerce and Adobe Experience Manager power Lexmark.com and other ecommerce channels

When Lexmark went searching for a new ecommerce solution, the team knew they needed an ecommerce platform that supported B2C and B2B globally from one platform.

The ability to power headless ecommerce within Adobe Experience Manager and deploy simple storefronts directly on Adobe Commerce was also a key decision for Dattilo. “We are using Adobe Commerce headless for Lexmark.com and OnePrint. But we also plan to launch B2B ecommerce directly on Adobe Commerce for our B2B business because of the rich, out-of-the-box features we can turn on quickly.”

The top reasons Lexmark chose Adobe Commerce include:

• Flexibility to power headless front ends or built-in storefronts
• Modern platform architecture
• Global multi-site support
• Outsourced hosting to Adobe to optimize internal resources, hosting costs, and security

Outsourcing hosting to Adobe

Lexmark also chose to outsource hosting of the Adobe Commerce and Adobe Experience Manager solution to Adobe directly using Adobe’s cloud platform. This will allow Lexmark’s internal IT teams to eliminate the expense of a self-hosted model on AWS and reallocate internal IT headcount to other applications. In addition, by consolidating contracts, licensing, and hosting to a trusted partner, Lexmark reduced its total cost of ownership for the technology stack.

Because Lexmark’s ecommerce solution is directly hosted and managed by Adobe, the team can also easily adopt new capabilities such as generative AI features including Adobe Firefly. In their upcoming B2B ecommerce project, Lexmark plans to leverage Adobe Sensei GenAI capabilities to power site search and product recommendations within Adobe Commerce.

What’s next for Lexmark

Lexmark was able to complete the Commerce migration to Adobe’s cloud solution within its expected timeline in Q1 of 2024. In addition to continuing to optimize Lexmark.com and OnePrint ecommerce channels, Dattilo plans to launch B2B ecommerce stores in 2024 to create custom catalogs with negotiated pricing for his larger B2B accounts. The Adobe Commerce B2B features will play a crucial role in engaging B2B buyers through ecommerce in addition to Lexmark’s other ordering channels, such as EDI and placing orders with sales reps.

Get started with Adobe Commerce

Adobe Commerce is a flexible and scalable commerce platform that lets you create uniquely personalized B2B and B2C experiences, no matter how many brands you have.

Visit Adobe Experience League to learn more about the Adobe Commerce features designed specifically for B2B brands.

Ed Kennedy is an ecommerce strategist at Adobe. Ed has spent over 12 years in ecommerce consulting and software. During his career he has overseen more than 200 implementations of ecommerce solutions. Prior to joining Adobe, Kennedy was a product strategy director at Optimizely and held previous executive positions at global ecommerce consulting firms and agencies.

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