Concepts referenced in this article, defined.
Run rigorous A/B tests and personalize every visit on Shopify or any storefront โ no engineers required.
Nosto is an ecommerce-first personalisation platform built specifically for Shopify, Magento, BigCommerce, and similar storefronts โ it's the faster, more accessible option for D2C brands that want product recommendations, dynamic content, and onsite personalisation without a major implementation project. Dynamic Yield is a broader, more technical personalisation platform (now owned by Mastercard after a McDonald's acquisition) built for enterprise-scale use across web, mobile, email, and kiosk โ better suited to large retail organisations with complex personalisation infrastructure needs. For most D2C brands, Nosto is the pragmatic choice; Dynamic Yield is genuinely an enterprise platform that requires significant technical investment to deploy.
Nosto is a Commerce Experience Platform founded in Finland in 2011, with strong traction in the Shopify ecosystem. It offers personalised product recommendations, dynamic popups, on-site content personalisation, segmented email content blocks, and A/B testing. Nosto integrates natively with Shopify, Magento, Salesforce Commerce Cloud, and BigCommerce. Pricing is based on a percentage of revenue influenced (performance-based) or a flat monthly fee at higher tiers โ entry-level plans for smaller stores start around $99โ$249/month; mid-market and enterprise pricing is custom.
Dynamic Yield is an enterprise personalisation and experience optimisation platform acquired by McDonald's in 2019 and sold to Mastercard in 2022. It offers web and mobile personalisation, product recommendations, A/B and multivariate testing, behavioural email personalisation, and server-side testing. Dynamic Yield is used by large retail, financial services, and media companies. Pricing is enterprise custom โ typically $60,000โ$300,000+/year โ making it accessible only to organisations with significant CRO budgets.
| Feature | Nosto | Dynamic Yield |
|---|---|---|
| Product recommendations | Yes (ecommerce-native) | Yes |
| Dynamic content personalisation | Yes | Yes |
| A/B testing | Yes | Yes |
| Behavioural segmentation | Yes | Advanced |
| Email personalisation | Yes (content blocks) | Yes |
| Server-side personalisation | Limited | Yes |
| Mobile app personalisation | Limited | Yes |
| No-code setup | Yes | Partial |
| Shopify native integration | Yes | Yes |
| AI recommendation algorithms | Yes | Yes (advanced) |
| Price transparency | Partial | No (custom) |
| Entry price | ~$99โ$249/month | ~$60,000+/year |
| Ecommerce focus | Core focus | One of many use cases |
| India market support | Yes | Limited |
The pricing gap between Nosto and Dynamic Yield is significant.
Nosto:
For an Indian D2C brand doing โน5โ20 crore/month in revenue, Nosto's mid-market pricing (approximately โน40,000โโน1,60,000/month) is a meaningful but potentially justifiable investment if personalisation drives measurable uplift.
Dynamic Yield:
Dynamic Yield is priced for enterprise retail at the scale of a Tata CLiQ, Myntra, or a global fashion retailer. For brands under โน200 crore in revenue, Dynamic Yield's pricing is prohibitive.
Nosto's product recommendations are its flagship feature, purpose-built for ecommerce. Out of the box, Nosto provides:
These recommendations are available via drag-and-drop placement in Shopify's theme editor, making them accessible to non-technical teams.
Dynamic Yield's recommendation engine is similarly powerful with more configuration options, including real-time behavioural weighting, multi-objective optimisation (balancing revenue vs discovery vs novelty), and real-time affinity learning. The additional sophistication comes with more implementation complexity โ Dynamic Yield's recommendation setup typically requires data engineering work to connect product catalogue feeds and train initial models.
For a D2C brand like a cosmetics store or a sportswear brand with a catalogue of 200โ2,000 SKUs, Nosto's recommendations will drive measurable revenue lift without extensive setup. Dynamic Yield's additional algorithmic sophistication becomes more valuable at larger catalogue sizes (10,000+ SKUs) and higher traffic volumes.
Dynamic Yield's core strength is the depth of its personalisation across channels. It can personalise:
This multi-channel depth is why McDonald's acquired it (to personalise its digital menu boards globally) and why Mastercard continues to invest in it.
Nosto is predominantly a web and email personalisation tool. Its channel coverage is focused on the on-site experience โ which is the highest-leverage channel for D2C ecommerce brands. App and kiosk personalisation are not core use cases.
Both Nosto and Dynamic Yield include A/B testing capabilities โ primarily for testing personalisation variants (which recommendation algorithm performs better, which content block drives more engagement). This is valuable but focused on personalisation testing specifically.
For broader A/B testing โ testing page layouts, CTA copy, pricing display, checkout steps, and promotional messaging โ a dedicated testing platform is more appropriate. Personalisation and A/B testing serve different but complementary goals: personalisation tailors the experience to user segments; A/B testing identifies which experience variants convert better for the general population.
If you're evaluating Nosto or Dynamic Yield for your D2C stack, you'll also want a dedicated A/B testing tool. CustomFit.ai integrates with Shopify and handles the A/B testing side โ testing specific page changes, conversion funnel optimisation, and pricing experiments โ while Nosto or Dynamic Yield handles product recommendation personalisation. Together, they cover both proving what works (A/B testing) and scaling it for each user segment (personalisation). Start a 14-day free trial and improve your store's conversion rate from day one.
Who owns Dynamic Yield now? Dynamic Yield was acquired by McDonald's in 2019 and sold to Mastercard in 2022. It operates as part of Mastercard's data and services division.
Does Nosto work with WooCommerce? Nosto's primary integrations are Shopify, Magento, BigCommerce, and Salesforce Commerce Cloud. WooCommerce integration is available but less feature-complete than the Shopify integration.
Can Nosto personalise email content? Yes. Nosto provides email content blocks that embed real-time personalised product recommendations into email campaigns sent through platforms like Klaviyo or Mailchimp.
What is "performance-based" pricing for Nosto? Some Nosto plans charge a percentage of GMV that Nosto attributes to its recommendations (influenced revenue), rather than a flat monthly fee. This aligns cost with value but can become expensive at high GMV.
Is Dynamic Yield available for Indian D2C brands? Dynamic Yield is available globally but primarily serves enterprise accounts. Its price point and implementation requirements make it impractical for most Indian D2C brands.