If you’ve yet to discover the power of selling online, or have so far been reluctant to take the plunge, then now is unquestionably the time for a re-think. Never has the B2B realm experienced such change when it comes to the expectations of buyers (which we recently spoke about in our blog article: ‘How your B2B customer base is changing, and what you need to evolve’). Here we take a look at the top five reasons why today is pivotal to your future business success – and why selling online is now non-negotiable.
(don’t be overtaken by your bolder and more brazen competitors)
The B2B ecommerce world is undergoing rapid evolution – so fast is this industry growing, that it’s set to outpace and outperform the growth of B2C ecommerce over the coming months and years.
Businesses are now coming to expect the ability to order online – however, herein lies a pretty surprising revelation. While around half of companies make purchases online, less than 22% of B2B companies offer an ecommerce option (Mintel).
For you, this ultimately represents a fantastic opportunity. The demand is there for your customers to be able to order online, and if you’re meeting this need when your competitors aren’t, there’s serious ground to be gained.
An ecommerce store never sleeps – even in the middle of the night or in the midst of Christmas celebrations, it’s acting as your ever-ready sales representative – 24/7/365 days a year. Of course, unlike human staff, it doesn’t demand holiday pay or overtime.
Providing a human connection in the form of customer services is unlikely to become any less important, even in the face of demands for online ordering. However, there’s a problem – and it’s existed for as long as humans have accepted orders via phone or fax. Managing orders in this way is simply too problematic. If you haven’t been tracking the cost of human error when going about your business so far, then you need to start thinking about more than just the cost of correcting orders, as there’s also the financial implications of lost goodwill and bad word of mouth to consider.
Then, we move on to the time consumption of these processes. Compared to online ordering, having your workforce manage orders is impacting on your bottom line.
Would your most invaluable assets – your employees – not be better working on tasks that contribute to growth, rather than administrating orders that achieve a business plateau?
10 Reasons Why Your B2B Website is Letting You Down
This FREE guide will show you how to build & grow your ecommerce presence.
Digital marketing has revolutionised the ways in which businesses gain customers. Today, B2B companies benefit from lowered overheads as their sales teams have moved from on-the-ground to in the office. Routes to market such as social media, blogs, emails, sales funnels and industry platforms are each vital to your business connecting with others in the modern age, as these statistics go to show:
81% of B2B purchase cycles start with web search, and 90% of buyers say when they are ready to buy, “they’ll find you”. Earnest Agency, 2014
57% of B2B marketers say SEO has the biggest impact on lead generationNews red, 2014
B2B marketers invest in social media to; increase brand exposure (83%), increase web traffic (69%), and gain marketing insights (65%) Marketing Tech Blog, 2014
If these stats go to show anything, it’s that digital marketing should now be considered as an invaluable investment to make, while traditional sales teams may well begin to look like an expensive liability in comparison.
Harnessing the online world demands the right online solution. Here at Shopcreator we’ve been helping our clients make the most of the ecommerce opportunity since 1998, ensuring they stay ahead of their competitors, time and again, and we can do the same for you.
If you want to increase your online sales or you’re just uncertain what your next few steps should be, then get in touch and we can run you through your options.
Qubit and PwC have recently released a report which analyses customer journeys. Based on a four-year study, evaluating two billion user journeys, the report focuses solely on the B2C environment.
Here at Shopcreator we’ve been interrogating the many pages of data to explore what this report means for companies operating in B2B industries.
As Qubit points out, improving customer journeys by using analytics and optimization technologies has been on the agenda of marketing and ecommerce professionals for some time. The focus is clearly trained on boosting persuasiveness, enhancing conversion rates and improving revenues.
Consumers now expect websites and mobile apps to go beyond the functional and provide a personalised experience, reflecting the individual’s needs, preferences and purchase history.
To an extent, for B2B, this is also a consideration. However, when dealing with a B2B customer you need to lead with the benefits of your product and demonstrate in practical terms why they need to buy from you.
The UX remains vitally important, but elements such as product complexity, legislative frameworks, buying on account, tiered pricing structures, technical specifications and a whole host of other B2B necessities will eclipse some ecommerce elements which are considered core in the B2C environment.
Here are some elements from the Qubit report that need to be reshaped and reemphasised for the B2B environment.
In the B2C environment, techniques that seek to create a lack of supply in order to achieve the sale are by far the most effective. The techniques of adding low stock messages and other scarcity prompts can drive between 2 and 14 times more B2C revenue. However, the results can also backfire if customers suspect low stock messages aren’t genuine. Additionally, overuse will greatly reduce the effectiveness of this technique and trust can be quickly eroded.
In the B2B arena, the scarcity technique needs to be used very carefully, if at all. When compared with B2C, the relationships created in B2B industries tend to be stronger and longer-lasting. Low stock levels may trigger doubt in your company’s ability to supply over the long-term. Stable and sustained trading activities and profit margins could be lost in favour of a short-term revenue fix. Look at the bigger picture before implementing the scarcity technique in a B2B business.
10 Reasons Why Your B2B Website is Letting You Down
This FREE guide will show you how to build & grow your ecommerce presence.
For B2C companies, scarcity techniques are nearly three times more likely to work than urgency techniques, which use a time limit to apply pressure to complete an action before a deadline.
However, for the B2B environment, campaigns based on urgency are likely to be more appropriate and could produce better results, although it does depend on the nature of your products. If you’re selling consumables, then this could be an option, but for large plant items it’s worth forgetting and focusing on your unique selling proposition instead.
So, what were the techniques that didn’t work so well for B2C, but that we think will be of benefit to the B2B environment?
Using dynamic personalisation to change what’s on your pages and emphasising products that are relevant to the visitor was, surprisingly, seen as a poor performer in the B2C environment. However, for a B2B company which operates across a multitude of product lines and has many different industry sectors to service, dynamic personalisation will make a large impact. Creating a bespoke experience and ensuring a visitor can find what they want as quickly as possible will boost your revenues. B2B buyers are less likely to want to browse your products than B2C buyers, so show them what they need to see as soon as you can.
Implementing and improving a B2B ecommerce website requires an agency that understands the B2B arena, because although there are some similarities between B2B and B2C, there are many differences. If your company operates in a B2B sector and you’re examining your ecommerce options, then working with the right agency can increase your online revenues many times over. Give us a call, we’d love to hear from you and discuss your ecommerce needs.
Call us on 0345 12 11 400 or Fill In The Form and we'll get right on it
When it comes to ecommerce, there are many differences between the needs of B2B companies and their B2C counterparts. As a result, what works well for B2C may have little impact when it’s applied to the B2B arena.
In this article, we’re going to explore the B2B ecommerce trends that are working for B2B companies, but are still beneath the radar and unlikely to go mainstream until 2018. Implement any of these over the next six months and you’ll be ahead of the game and ahead on profits.
The challenge for B2B companies when implementing an ecommerce solution is that many of their customers just don’t need rich, immersive, brand-affirming features that are often associated with many mainstream brand-driven consumer environments. In many industries, B2B needs to be a little subtler and focused on your company’s unique selling proposition, whether that’s product benefits, high levels of customer service or your expertise within particular niches.
The challenge is that many of your customers may not be ready for high levels of interaction and a plethora of special offers served up via regular emails. They want to be able to do business with you as easily as possible, finding what they need, when they need it and at the volumes and on the terms that they require. It’s highly likely you’ll still need to take enquiries over the phone and continue to utilise your frontline sales force with face-to-face meetings, but ecommerce provides another route to market, and a highly lucrative one.
Do not underestimate the level of technical and creative requirement to successfully implement what seems like a simplification. It takes a lot of planning and configuration to ensure a seamless online journey for the B2B customer. With many B2B companies operating on a high-value-per-order and repeat business model, if you get it wrong it could cost you heavily. However, doing nothing could be far worse and leaves you wide open to attack from your competitors.
If your business operates across many product lines, has a large catalogue, and serves many different sectors, then dynamic personalisation can significantly increase your online revenues.
Dynamic personalisation allows you to serve up website content that changes based on each visitor’s requirements. For example, you may want to show a customer a different homepage to what you’d show an existing lead, which would also be different to what you’d show a first-time visitor. Dynamic personalisation means you can deliver the right content to the right people, at the right time.
In addition, once people log in, you can serve up a completely different ecommerce experience for each target sector based on their details. Not all visitors who arrive at your site are ready to make a purchase, but those who navigate to your product pages are getting closer to making a decision. Dynamic personalisation can nudge your visitors in the direction that you want them to go, delivering content based on previous actions.
A changing, personalised website experience not only promotes a great user experience, but can create more conversions by transforming your site from a source of static information and a hard sell into a two-way conversation with your audiences.
Dynamic personalisation allows you to deliver timely, relevant content, build trust and tailor your calls to action without overwhelming your audiences with multiple messages. Although it may seem like a daunting challenge, the underlying technology is relatively easy to implement and can make a considerable difference to the revenues your website delivers.
As mentioned earlier in this article, ecommerce will not replace your sales team, but it will allow them to function more effectively and close more sales for your business. As people become freed up from repetitive administrative tasks, which are more suited to the automated nature of ecommerce, your sales people are better placed to have a greater financial impact on your company.
In the B2B decision-making chain it’s possible your potential customers will need a number of interactions with your company before they reach an agreement to purchase from you. It’s likely there may be several people involved in the purchase decision. This is where your sales team can help to steer the conversations, counter any objections and focus on the key benefits for each individual customer. Depending on the complexity of your product, an ecommerce solution will be able to handle much of the journey. However, workflowing and finding the right place in your customer journey for the sales team is crucial to maximising the positive impact of your ecommerce system.
Integrating your ecommerce function into your sales mix also means that your sales team can refer existing clients into the system. It’s likely that many will welcome the flexibility and convenience of repeat ordering from your website. In addition, if you build a commission element into your ecommerce system for sales team referrals, you’re likely to find the website being promoted more often, pushing it to the forefront of your marketing and sales campaigns, freeing your sales team to pursue incremental new business even more.
10 Reasons Why Your B2B Website is Letting You Down
This FREE guide will show you how to build & grow your ecommerce presence.
When it comes to mobile ecommerce, or m-commerce, B2B has always lagged behind the B2C sectors. However, things are beginning to change. Many B2B operators are now focusing on m-commerce as a lucrative route to market, making their services as convenient as possible for their customers.
Research shows that, in some core B2B sectors, a growing percentage of buyers are investigating new products and suppliers from a mobile device. This means that your website has got to be responsive and easily navigable from a mobile phone or tablet. Furthermore, if your customers are likely to make purchases while on the road or if they move from site to site as a requirement of their job, then you need to consider implementing an m-commerce element to your website, before your competitors do. For the right industries, integrating mobile into your sales process can provide a valuable additional revenue stream, delivering additive sales rather than cannibalising from elsewhere.
Whether you’re selling rubber gloves or complex electronic measuring equipment, you need to treat your B2B customers as individuals with their own specific needs. We’ve covered off some of this under the banner of dynamic personalisation, but as well as providing technical specifications, product benefits and value comparisons, it’s likely you’ll need to offer your customers the option of buying on account, managing a variety of pricing structures and offering a range of shipping options.
The challenges of B2B product complexity can so easily create customer confusion. However, it’s also very easy to get it right at the beginning. You just need to make sure you’re dealing with a specialist B2B ecommerce agency, which will ensure everything on your website is delivered in a format that is accessible and intuitive for your customers.
These are just a few of the ways that you can improve the online experience for your customers and ensure they continue to buy from you. If implemented and maintained correctly, your ecommerce solution will boost your sales dramatically, reduce costs, tie your existing customers into your product offerings for the long-term and attract more new business away from your competitors.
As B2B ecommerce continues to accelerate, you need to be thinking about the overall experience that you can provide to your audiences. What do you think are the most critical elements of B2B ecommerce, when compared with B2C? we’d love to hear your thoughts on this topic.
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In the world of B2B, the needs of customers can be both varied and highly complex. Long-term customer relationships are more usual and more crucial than in the B2C arena, so when it comes to planning and implementing a B2B ecommerce solution, you need to be sure your agency knows your requirements and is able to deliver a robust product.
As we’ve said before, the opportunities and revenues that can be achieved by a B2B company when it invests in ecommerce are vast, ranging from capturing new business from direct competitors, saving time for internal sales teams and reducing ordering errors, to bringing in international business. Every day, an increasing number of B2B customers are expecting to be able to interact with their suppliers whenever and wherever they need to. That’s where ecommerce becomes a key differentiator for your business.
However, when you head down the ecommerce path, make sure you’re asking the right questions of your ecommerce agency. Here’s our roundup of some of the key questions you need answers to.
You need to establish that your potential agency has worked with B2B companies. There is a world of difference between B2C and B2B ecommerce techniques and best practices. Additionally, the agency has to be able to demonstrate that they will understand your company and its environment. That doesn’t necessarily mean they should have worked in your specific B2B industry vertical, but they should have transferable knowledge gained in similar sectors or with similar builds.
All agencies lose clients. It happens. However, as a potential new client you need to dig into the circumstances around any recent client losses and find out why they occurred.
The agency probably won’t be expecting this question, so it’s a good idea to give them as little time as possible to give you an answer. Don’t send this one in an email, ask it in person or over the phone and you’re more likely to get an undiluted response.
There are complexities found in ecommerce that just don’t exist in more traditional website design and development projects. Once ecommerce is placed into the online mix, the customer journey becomes far more complicated. It’s not just about the coding and development requirements, or the back office functionality and the integration with other systems. It’s ensuring that everything is optimised up front as well. Are the calls to action compelling? Does the complexity of your product require rich product content and datasheets? Are you using dynamic personalisation, to serve up the right content and products to the right people at the right time? These are just a few of the considerations above and beyond a website build.
10 Reasons Why Your B2B Website is Letting You Down
This FREE guide will show you how to build & grow your ecommerce presence.
It may be self-evident, but If you know what platform you want your ecommerce site to be built on then you should partner with an agency that specialises in that platform and perhaps one or two others. That way, you know your site is going to be built by specialists rather than generalists. However, if your chosen agency has experience of one or two other platforms as well, they will be aware of any shortcomings of your chosen platform and may have developed plugins to improve the experience.
If you’re not sure which platform to use, then talk to ecommerce agencies that work across a range of platforms, but make sure that they’re not spreading themselves too thinly and losing focus. Remember that you’re not just looking for the best match in an agency, you’re also looking for the platform that is best placed to handle your current and future business needs.
When choosing an ecommerce agency and building your ecommerce footprint, you also need to be thinking about your omnichannel buyers. Your B2B customers won’t just be interacting with your website in isolation. They may transition through a range of communications with your business, from phone calls, emails, face-to-face sales visits and purchases from your website.
A good ecommerce agency will explore how your ecommerce presence slots into your overall customer journey. This bigger picture approach will ensure that your ecommerce website works hard and works right for you from the outset.
When it comes to your ecommerce presence, make sure you ask the right questions before taking the plunge. Working with the right agency can make a huge difference to the speed and magnitude of your successes. Indeed, using the wrong agency could cost you money rather than provide you with profits.
We’ve helped clients increase their online revenues by 220% and we can do the same for you. So, if you’re thinking of implementing ecommerce or improving on what you already have in place, just give us a call, we’d love to chat through the detail with you.
Call us on 0345 12 11 400 or Fill In The Form and we'll get right on it