How to Choose the Best B2B eCommerce Platform

Are you able to provide services that help businesses grow, hire and manage teams? Do you provide products for companies? Are you able to sell wholesale items?

If you're in the B2B industry or want to be -- it's possible that you'll benefit from a B2B eCommerce platform. It could simplify the processes of your customers and team as well as help you expand quicker and with greater efficiency.

We'll take a look at how an eCommerce store could benefit the B2B industry in deciding the best store.

Why create a B2B eCommerce store?

The majority of online stores that you've come across are B2C (Business to Consumer) which can provide your dog's food, your son's birthday gifts, or even your favorite specialty groceries. Don't fall for thinking that eCommerce shops are only for consumer-facing companies. They can be an incredibly effective instrument to B2B companies as well.

A recent study found that 41 percent of buyers from B2B indicated that capabilities for self-service could make it easier for them to conducting business online. It's an impressive percentage! The ability of clients to manage their accounts as well as perform related tasks is a highlight of eCommerce functionality.

Instead of calling for an estimate the Sourcing Manager might send a request via the web and get the information promptly, regardless of time of day. They could also submit an order, or even enroll to have your items delivered each month. Also, if you supply landscaping services for retail stores, a business manager could login to their account to alter the frequency of their service and also check the next time you're scheduled to drop by.

B2B eCommerce stores also contribute to automation of processes. They are able to take the burden from customer service agents as well as sales team members with some of the self-service tasks we just discussed. They can transfer information across multiple distribution channels and ensure that all information is up-to date and correct. They can also eliminate all the hassle of mailing invoices or quotes manually and then contacting every prospective client.

Finally, an online store can be the brand's image and the hub of all your marketing strategies. You can link directly to the products and services you offer in your emails to customers and in marketing campaigns. It is possible to create information that can guide prospects through your sales funnel. It is also possible to track the success of your efforts to steer into the future.

The factors to consider when choosing B2B eCommerce platform

The platform that you select for your eCommerce is essentially the foundation of your online storefront. We'll look at some of the factors to think about when choosing one, and examine why is the most effective solution for B2B online stores.

The types of goods that you're offering

There are a huge variety of opportunities for B2B businesses. Below are some products you can sell and some of the examples you can use:

• Physical goods. Think of equipment, printed books, and cleaning supplies.  Storage and handling equipment , for example, provides eco-friendly shopping carts for the grocery and retail stores.
• Digital goods. Things like online classes ebooks that are downloaded, as well as software licences. TipoType, for instance, offers font licenses to businesses as well as freelancers.
• Services. Offerings such as graphics design, accounting and legal advice. Your Benefit Store is a service-provider offering healthcare insurance which companies may add to their plans for employees.
• Wholesale products. The company sells large amounts of its products to retailers, effectively serving as their supply. Porta Pro Chem For instance, offers portable toiletries to clients around the country.
• Members. Access to a collection of benefits and resources, such as a training video library and online forums. The Interactive Advertising Bureau, for example, offers a membership program with resources, courses, event invites and more, specifically for media and marketing companies.
• Subscriptions. Regularly scheduled products or services such as a year-long licence, weekly cleaning service and monthly boxes of coffee pods for your breakroom. Modo Design Modo sells subscriptions for design tools however subscriptions could also comprise physical items or even newsletters.

These all vary widely from one another, but there can also be overlap. It is possible to sell retail and wholesale products. You can sell both digital and physical books together. Perhaps you have a subscription that includes an office clean-up every week, as well as a set of cleaning products.

It's important to note that it is possible to conduct business using a range of different ways and make sure your chosen platform is compatible with all of them.

sells functionality on each of the items as well as services described above as well as other services! In fact, all websites mentioned are using . Offer one kind of item or multiple side by side. Let anyone purchase or limit access to certain wholesale or retail customers.

What ever you'd like to sell, makes it possible.

Design Flexibility

Like your products and services are distinctive Your brand, too. Naturally, you want your website to reflect the character and characteristics of that brand.

A reliable B2B eCommerce solution will offer users the complete freedom to design and build anything you can imagine and without the need to edit code or hire an expert developer, even if you don't wish to.

Since is an add-on to WordPress it is able to harness the power of the Block Editor to create all of your blog posts and pages. The Block Editor allows you to drag and drop components -including headings, paragraphs video, images, and columns to design your own custom layout. You can then toggle options to alter color, font style, as well as other characteristics of design to make your page completely your own.

Ownership of content

If you are a business online, having control of your website's content is vitally important. Your website is a source of revenue that you cannot risk losing it. There are many exclusive eCommerce platforms can remove your website without warning in the event that they decide that you've violated their terms and conditions. It could mean losing money along with time and work!

However, WordPress is a software instruments to assist you in achieving your objectives. Your website is hosted wherever you'd prefer it to be, and it is your complete control and control over the site. You'll never have to worry about removing your website. It's because it's- it's yours.

Integration of payment gateways

Payment gateways let you take money from your customers as well as clients in a secure manner, and then transfer that money into your account at the bank. There are pros and cons to each tool, and certain functions you'll need to have for your specific business. In particular, you could have to take recurring payments, accept multiple currencies, use express pay services such as Apple Pay, or offer finance options.

You'll want to make sure that the platform for eCommerce you choose works with the one you want to utilize, especially if your business already uses an existing payment system or billing.

integrates with a wide array of payment gateways, including:

Shipping

If you sell physical products, then shipping is going to be a crucial factor when it comes to selecting an eCommerce platform. Shipping can be complicated, therefore you'll need a software that lets you make your fees as you'd like, and integrates with any shipping carriers you deal with. This is particularly true when you need to deliver large amounts of products at once, or have special requirements like refrigeration.

User experience

The user experience is crucial in any organization, due to many reasons. If a prospective buyer or client comes to your website and finds it difficult to use, they'll likely give up and shop in a rival shop instead. The second reason is that search engines take into account the experience of users when ranking.

Your job, for now is to identify an application that can make creating an exceptional user experience. Here are some factors to think about:

• Content management. Find an eCommerce platform that lets to organize your menus to categorize your products and posts, and add features like breadcrumbs that aid in navigation. Since WordPress was created as a blogging platform from the beginning and its tools for creating content can't be beaten.
• Mobile-friendly design. Your site should look great on devices of all sizes -- desktops, tablets as well as mobile phones. WordPress is designed to be responsive, by default. there are lots of great themes for mobile that you can select from.

Marketing and customer service

Marketing is a must, as it can help you connect with new clients and increase sales from existing ones. Excellent customer service can help keep buyers around and drive them to spread the word about your brand. Both are essential to running a successful B2B eCommerce shop.

The system you're working with will make your customer service and marketing strategies feasible, whether it means integrating seamlessly with applications you're already using or making it easy to add tracking codes.

Here are some examples of marketing and customer service capabilities included with :

• Integration with CRMs. Connect to your CRM of choosing with extensions for Jetpack CRM HubSpot, Salesforce, and much more.
• Integration with ticketing and support forums platforms. Add live chat to your website, or create a support forum and integrate it with tools like Freshdesk and HelpScout
• Content creation capabilities. Make frequent beautiful, powerful blogs or landing pages others to help with the rest of your marketing strategies and help educate prospective customers.
• Integration with an extensive range of marketing tools. Track traffic using Google Analytics, connect to social media sites like Facebook and TikTok and publish Google advertisements directly from your dashboard, send email messages, monitor abandoned carts, and more.
• Simplicity for team members. Each member of your team their own account with access to the account based on the role they play. Approved accounts can respond to customer support inquiries, look up and manage orders, handle refunds, publish blog posts, and more.

Additional functionality

The features you require on the B2B eCommerce site are specifically tailored to your business. Therefore, think about any particular specifications you might need to consider. Here are some examples:

Scalability

It is important to choose a B2B eCommerce platform you select should not hold you back. Beware of platforms that base fees off of sales, number of clients, or the number of website visits. Your platform should also load quickly, whether you have 100 visitors at one time or 100,000.

can scale with you to whatever size you want. There's no limit to the number of products or variations you can have (in fact, this test site was one million!). It's built to handle large amounts of orders and increases. It's completely free however, you might want to pay for extensions as the price isn't dependent on customer sales or sales.

The most appealing part? You can choose the hosting service you'd want. So, even though you may have a shared hosting plan right in the moment, you could move to a virtual private server or dedicated server as your traffic increases without impacting your online store.

Ease of use and management

In business the concept of time is highly valued. It's not a good idea to spend time with a system which is difficult to navigate, difficult for new employees to learn, and that needs a programmer to create every single modification.

Although you could employ a web developer to handle your site if you'd like, you certainly don't have to do so in order to get the most of your store. We've mentioned before that the Block Editor enables you to rearrange, add, and delete elements by simply dragging and dropping. Are you looking to modify your product? This can be done simply by clicking on buttons and changing fields. No codes required!

Store managers are able to access everything from inventory numbers and site analytics to order information all in one place. When you're using tools such as Jetpack CRM, Shipping, and Payments, they can manage label printing, payment invoices, refunds, quotes and more directly via your dashboard.

And if you do want to engage a professional to develop, maintain the store, or even customize it take a look at our selection of WooExperts. They're vetted, high-quality agencies ready to help!

Create and expand your eCommerce B2B store using

No matter if you're an established B2B firm or just starting out, offers all of the tools and flexibility you need to develop. Additionally, it will enhance the experience of clients, and make your team more efficient.

Do you want to grow? Start with the best B2B eCommerce platform right now.