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The B2B Marketer’s Guide To Selecting The Best eCommerce Platform

by shanice

1. Make it simple for many buyers from within a company to purchase from you.

There are numerous vendors who claim to specialise in B2B eCommerce, but many of them lack the necessary B2B-specific core functionality. True B2B eCommerce platforms feature built-in functionality that allows many purchasers to use the same account to purchase from you. You’ll also want to be able to provide different roles and permissions to those purchasers, such as who may make purchases, seek bids, and make changes to the company account. And the B2B eCommerce platform must support an order-approval procedure based on the permissions that restrict how much they can spend, what they can buy, what “ship to” addresses they have, and what payment alternatives they have.

2. Personalization is essential.

In addition to facilitating basic orders, your eCommerce provider should be able to provide price quoting so you may create personalised offers for large or made-to-order requests. The entire quotation process should be computerised, including the ability to negotiate with customers, convert quotes to orders if an agreement is reached, and check out online. Because B2B buyers usually have negotiated contracts that must be honoured across all channels, including online, the ability to display specific catalogues and pricing to different customers is particularly critical. To guarantee that each buyer has the proper experience and pricing, solutions should allow you to support these contract conditions or interface with your ERP system in real-time.

3. You must be able to order quickly

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B2B buyers regularly reorder the same set of products, which necessitates the availability of speedy ordering options. A printer, for example, would want to allow its B2B customers to reorder the same paper and ink products on a monthly basis without having to start again. Buyers must be able to place such types of orders fast and easily by entering in or uploading SKUs, making an order from a prior order, or building standard shopping lists that can be swiftly put to the cart on the commerce platform. Taking the friction out of these day-to-day buying experiences saves time and encourages customers to buy more.

4. In order to increase B2B sales, strong content development is necessary.

In today’s B2B environment, strong content development is an essential. Complex and high-consideration products are common in B2B eCommerce, and there are frequently several stakeholders involved in the acquisition. You must be able to provide comprehensive content to those many stakeholders in order for them to efficiently investigate and evaluate your products. Providing extensive information such as product specifications, computer-aided design (CAD) drawings, usage and configuration manuals, comparison charts, volume pricing, user reviews, and more allows you to quickly answer consumers’ inquiries and complete the sale.

To produce and update all of these resources on a regular basis, you’ll need management solutions that allow your business users to create, schedule, and publish everything without relying on IT. You should also be able to customise and target different content and product recommendations to different clients or buying roles. This will allow you to provide your consumers with a more relevant and efficient experience, allowing them to access the information they require more quickly.
In the B2C industry, rich merchandising of your products is expected, including the ability to show off many different viewpoints through photos and provide consumers the chance to zoom, read customer reviews, and check product specifications.

5. Given how quickly things change, flexibility is essential.

With all of the changes happening in business today, both in terms of technology and in terms of buyer expectations, your B2B eCommerce platform must be able to meet your present business needs as well as future business models and plans. Consider an eCommerce platform that can support both businesses and consumers, for example. B2B organisations are increasingly required to engage with both their channel partners and end consumers online as direct-to-consumer (D2C) tactics gain traction. Having a single platform that can service both groups enables for better resource management and utilisation, as well as a quicker time to market.

In the B2B space, numerous models are now being tested. Some businesses, for example, are aiming to provide services in addition to products in order to boost income and strengthen client relationships. These businesses want an eCommerce solution that can handle both items and services simultaneously. Many companies are considering selling subscription services with automatic renewals to make purchasing easier for clients and foster loyalty.

These businesses require a subscription management, scheduling, and recurring billing eCommerce solution. Finally, B2B marketplaces are gaining traction as a one-stop shop for B2B buyers as well as a new approach to help channel partners. With all of this change and experimentation, you need a platform that is adaptable and capable of supporting you regardless of how your go-to-market strategy evolves.

Source: ecommerce platforms , online selling platform

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