Expertise guide: PIM system

B2B webshop
Expertise guide

All the ins and outs of a B2B webshop.

Welcome to our B2B webshop page guide. In this guide, we bundle more than 10 years of experience in implementing and optimising b2b webshops. We take you through what is important if you want to start a B2B webshop but also how to further improve and grow a business webshop. We hope this knowledge will help wholesalers and manufacturers to offer an even better online service.

Why a B2B webshop?

The business market is changing and growing rapidly. According to research by Statista, the global B2B e-commerce market is $20.4 trillion which is five times the size of the B2C e-commerce market. As the new generation of buyers is renewed and used to ordering online, it is expected by this group that the same is true for business products. For instance, research shows that

For many wholesalers, manufacturers and distributors, it is therefore imperative to digitise in order to remain competitive and grow further. This trend has only intensified over the past year with the outbreak of the corona virus making online ordering more the rule than the exception in the business market as well.

What are the advantages of a B2B webshop?

We usually divide the benefits of a B2B webshop into 3 main advantages namely

Increasing turnover
A business webshop can help increase sales. This can be achieved in many ways, for example by:
- Making your products visible online will attract more customers and thus increase the visibility of your brand.
- Explore new markets by offering your products in different countries and languages.
- Making good use of the data in your webshop, you can help the customer even better and thus increase the average order value.
Reducing costs of order processing
By deploying a business webshop, you ensure that as many order processing processes as possible are automated. This, in turn, reduces the likelihood of errors and the time spent manually entering and checking orders.
Better service to customers
A B2B webshop contributes to better service to customers as customers can place an order 24/7 and view up-to-date stock information directly in their account themselves.

Differences between a B2C and B2B webshop

Although a good B2B webshop and B2C webshop have many similarities, there are also some very clear differences that make setting up a b2b webshop different from a consumer webshop. Here are some of the most important differences:

The reason why the customer buys: a consumer's motivation is often very different from that of a business buyer. Whereas the consumer enjoys "shopping" and the purchase is more often an impulse, for the business buyer it is his or her job and you therefore need to help the business buyer to do his or her job as quickly and easily as possible. This means that the structure and layout of a business webshop is often different from a B2C webshop.

Repeat purchases: In the business market, repeat purchases are much more common than in a b2b shop, so it is important that your b2b e-commerce platform supports this and makes it very easy for the customer.

Complex pricing structures: the pricing structures in business webshops are often much more complex than in a consumer webshop. With most wholesalers and manufacturers, you have to deal with graduated prices and price lists per customer group or customer.

Ring-fenced prices and prices excluding VAT: whereas with consumer webshops you see prices including VAT, the rule for most business webshops is that prices are displayed excluding VAT. You also have to deal with VAT numbers that have to be validated if companies outside the Netherlands order to offer a o% VAT rate.

Payment Terms and Credit Limits: where consumers pay for their products directly via Ideal or a post-payment method such as Afterpay, it is quite common in the B2B market to work with payment conditions and credit limits. Business customers therefore expect these payment conditions and limits to be supported online.

What determines the success of B2B e-commerce?

Whether a B2B webshop is successfully used as a sales channel for a wholesaler or manufacturer depends on several factors. We see that wholesalers and manufacturers who get the most results from their B2B e-commerce strategy often have the following factors well set up.

Customer
When implementing or improving the b2b webshop, the customer is at the centre. Adjustments and changes are made based on customer feedback and customer behaviour data.

Strategy/Plan
The B2B e-commerce strategy sets out the vision of how e-commerce is going to help serve customers even better. This is worked out in concrete objectives and KPIs that in turn can be managed.

People
Who in the organisation will realise the objectives and is there enough knowledge about e-commerce to actually do this.

E-commerce software
Which b2b e-commerce software is in place to meet the objectives and does the software meet the needs and requirements of the organisation and is it flexible enough to grow with them.

Product information
Product information is one of the most important parts that should be properly reflected on a business webshop. Is all the product information present that the customer wants to see and can it be updated in an easy way.

User experience
Does the user experience online match how customers are served on the other offline channels.

Data
In successful business webshops, data is continuously used to improve the existing webshop and give customers an even better user experience.

Operation
How is the e-commerce process set up in the organisation. In successful webshops, we see that most processes are automated and there are relatively few manual activities.

How do you determine the business case for a B2B webshop?

Before starting the implementation of a new business webshop or the replacement of an existing b2b shop, it is good to look at the business case of the project. The business case looks at how total cost of investment of the b2b e-commerce software compares with what the b2b website will eventually deliver.

When looking at the investment, it is good to have at least the following things in mind when making the e-commerce business case:

Implementation costs of the B2B webshop
Any licensing costs of the B2B e-commerce platform
Hosting and maintenance costs
Cost of implementing changes and adaptations to the system
The cost of internal training for the internal e-commerce team

When mapping out what the implementation of a new e-commerce system delivers, the following can be included:

Additional sales increase by attracting new customers
Increasing average order value per customer by offering better product information
Lower customer turnover by being able to offer a better service including 24/7 ordering, instant stock and delivery information.
Lower costs due to less burden on the inside sales force
Lower costs due to a more automated process and fewer errors due to manual activities.

Implementation of a B2B webshop

Now that the why and the advantages of a b2b webshop are clear, we can look at what it takes to successfully start a webshop in the b2b market. Here, we start with the selection of the b2b webshop software.

How do I select the right B2B webshop software?

To select the right b2b webshop software, it is good to first look at the type of software. We distinguish between three types

1. Open source webshop software vs closed source software

With open source webshop software, the source code is open and can be adapted by anyone. This often leads to the fact that with the better-known open source web shop packages, there are many developers who develop functionalities and extensions, so that not everything has to be custom-developed. In addition, there is always the possibility of making a customisation adjustment if needed. Well-known examples of open source webshop software for the B2B market are Magento and Shopware. With closed source software, the code is managed by the supplier and extensions can often be linked to it via the API. The advantage of this is that there is one supplier who adapts and expands the code and this is also the immediate disadvantage, as with closed-source software, you are hugely tied to one supplier.

2. Customised e-commerce software vs. Standard software

When selecting your b2b shop software, you can choose custom software, standard software or a combination of both. With Custom software, everything is custom-built. As a result, the budget required is often larger than when working with standard software. Customisation is therefore often also less suitable for SMEs because it often involves higher maintenance costs. Of course, there are also combinations. Packages such as Shopware and Magento offer all important basic functionalities for B2B e-commerce out of the box and, if necessary, customisation can be added.

3. Proprietary hosting vs. SAAS solution

With a SAAS (software as a service) ecommerce solution, the software is offered as a service. For a fixed monthly fee, this usually includes hosting and maintenance and version updates. With in-house hosting, you are responsible for the hosting yourself via a hosting party. The choice here often revolves around convenience vs flexibility. With a SAAS solution, you have everything settled in one fixed amount, but the options are often also more limited because a SAAS solution is usually a standard package.

Implementation of a B2B webshop

When selecting b2b e-commerce software, it is good to consider at least the following factors:

Standard features present:
When sectioning ecommerce software, you want as much functionality as possible to be offered out of the box. Unless, of course, you go for a fully custom-developed software but that won't be the case for many SMEs.

Flexibility and ongoing development:
to what extent is the B2B web shop platform flexible and expandable. the e-commerce market is a dynamic market and it is therefore necessary that a package can grow with it.

Links to other systems:
the e-commerce software is easy to link with other business systems and standard links are available. Especially in the B2B market, a link to the ERP system is often one of the factors determining the success of a B2B shop as much of the core data comes from this system.

User-friendliness e-commerce platform:
How user-friendly is the e-commerce platform and are the employees from the e-commerce team well able to make adjustments in the system themselves.

B2B e-commerce functionalities

Tenders

Offer new customers the opportunity to request a quote for a selection of products first.

Order lists

Customers can quickly place their orders through own order lists of products they have bought more often.

Payment conditions

Every customer can use the webshop
of his or her own payment terms or credit limits are used.

Customer portal

The customer portal provides the customer with an overview of all orders, invoices and shipments so the customer has an instant overview.

Onboarding your business customers

Now that your B2B webshop has been developed and is ready to go live, it is important to start thinking about the onboarding phase. In practice, we often see that too little time and attention is paid to this phase, while this phase largely ensures that your customers will actually order online and use your B2B platform.

What is onboarding and why is it so important?

Onboarding is the process of guiding customers to start using your business webshop. It includes all the activities that ensure that your customers can use the new ordering environment as quickly and well as possible. Research shows that 40-60% of web applications fail to successfully onboard customers. As a result, they fall back to the traditional way of ordering.

Magento

Magento 2 is one of the most widely used open source e-commerce platforms for B2C and B2B and part of Adobe. Magento offers 2 versions of which the Commerce version is equipped with all kinds of B2B functionalities such as quotes, order lists, contacts and credit limits by default.

Shopware

Shopware is an e-commerce platform which originated in Germany and is booming in the Netherlands. Shopware offers several versions, with the Enterprise version equipped with B2B functionalities as standard.

5 Tips on the onboarding process

The following 5 tips will help you successfully onboard your customers for your B2B webshop

1. Start with an onboarding plan

Set up a plan on how new customers will be helped with the onboarding process and make sure to track and measure what percentage of customers order online and in what frequency.

2. Make it easy for the business customer

One of the biggest differences between a business user and a consumer is that placing orders is part of the customer's job. So you can help your customer tremendously with this to make this process as easy as possible.

3. Don't introduce too many new features at once

Start with what the customer needs in the basics and start adding new functionalities based on concrete customer feedback. This will keep things clear for the customer and avoid adding all kinds of bells and whistles that the customer does not want anyway.

4. Work with a welcome programme

Set up a welcome programme for new customers using marketing automation software such as Mailchimp or Dotdigital to explain to them step by step the benefits for ordering online. This can be coupled with an incentive to order online so customers can experience the convenience.

5. Involve the sales team

Make sure the sales team is actively involved in promoting the webshop. They have direct contact with the end customer and therefore often receive valuable feedback on what could possibly be improved about the business webshop.

Optimisation and growth of your B2B webshop

The moment a large proportion of your business customers are using your b2b shop, you can start working on further optimisation and growth of your b2b shop.

What e-commerce data will you measure and how?
The first step for optimising and improving your b2b webshop is to properly map and measure your most important objectives. For this, we often use tools such as Google analytics and Google search console to measure the right data. This provides insight into how well the web shop is performing and how the customer experiences the web shop. We often combine this in an e-commerce dashboard which shows the customer the most important results on a monthly basis.

Maintenance of your business webshop?
The maintenance of your business webshop depends on the type of b2b webshop platform you work with. If you are using a SaaS platform, the maintenance is included in the monthly licence fees, but if you are using an open source platform, the webshop will have to be updated at set times so that it remains optimally secured and continues to function properly. If you want to know more about the maintenance and support of a Magento or Shopware environment, take a look at our specific pages on this subject.

Start your B2B webshop today

Increasing the turnover of your B2B webshop

To further grow your business webshop's sales, you can focus on 3 components:

Attracting more visitors and customers
By attracting more visitors to your webshop, you are able to convert more visitors into customers. Especially through good product data and landing pages, you can ensure that your b2b webshop attracts many organic visitors. So it is often important to already look at this when implementing your webshop by, for instance, conducting keyword research. Besides attracting more customers organically, there are of course many other ways such as using online ads, e-mail marketing and business platforms like linkedin.
Increasing customers' order value and order frequency
You can use this data to increase the customer's order value or, if possible, the order frequency. You do this by offering relevant and personal information that matches what the customer is looking for. Email marketing campaigns also work very well here to re-activate the customer for a purchase or to make targeted offers of product groups the customer is interested in.
Increasing online shop conversion
Conversion is the percentage of visitors who actually make a purchase or, for example, the number of visitors who request an account with you. By optimising this process, you can get more results with the existing marketing budget.