In 2024, B2B buyers are coming to your website with high expectations: for clear information, self-service online ordering, transparent shipping details, easy navigation, and a personalized experience. If your website can’t tick those boxes, it’s time to consider replatforming (changing) to a new B2B eCommerce platform.
This article will outline some of the most critical features to look for in a B2B eCommerce platform in 2024 to assist B2B (business-to-business) eCommerce decision makers in meeting their B2B website development needs and help address the top B2B challenges of the day: to drive efficiency, enhance customer experience, fuel growth and future-proof their business in an ever evolving market.
What Are the Top Must-have B2B eCommerce Platform Features?
While the benefits of B2B eCommerce platforms are clear, when it comes to choosing the top features to look for in an eCommerce platform, you want to be aware of all latest B2B trends impacting the B2B eCommerce market and choose a platform that has full-featured B2B capabilities (see more on the differences between B2B and B2C websites and why it matters).
When comparing platforms, consider the following key features, which can make or break your B2B eCommerce platform’s viability in the short and long-term:
1. Access controls, roles & permission
2. Corporate account management
3. Self-service portal
4. Personalization
5. Content management system
6. Search and navigation
7. Differentiated catalogs
8. Differentiated pricing models
9. Multiple shopping lists
10. Analytics and business intelligence
11. Streamlined buyer-seller interaction
12. Bulk ordering
13. Multiple payment & invoicing options
14. Automated workflows
15. Inventory management
16. Integration options
17. Multiple organizations, websites & stores
18. Mobile optimized
In addition to the B2B features in the list above, it’s also important to consider the architecture of the B2B platform. In general, B2B platforms that offer headless commerce or a modular / composable commerce approach are the most flexible, making it easier to optimize channels and release new features quickly as opportunities and trends change.
Let’s have a look at these essential features one-by-one:
1. Access controls, roles & permissions
There are multiple stakeholders involved in the B2B buying journey, an average of 6 for small-to-medium sized businesses (SMBs) and 8 for enterprises, with different teams or individuals having different needs in the buying journey.
While we normally think about access controls in terms of privacy and security (providing users with only the information they need for their role), it’s also an important feature to streamlining purchasing and subsequent management of the account for repeat purchasing, finance, and customer service. Access controls typically delineate an admin user who can grant access to different parts of the self-service portal to different users (e.g. accountants access orders and invoices while buyers access shopping lists and prices).
2. Corporate account management
Your B2B eCommerce platform should incorporate an account management system that supports the robust capabilities to support multiple buyers in an organization (as above), with additional features. Look for:
- Support for multiple buyers in an organization, with differing purchasing capabilities
- The ability to self-manage roles and permissions (add or remove users)
- Self-service capabilities based on roles and permissions
- The ability for sales teams to place orders on a customer account
- Approval workflows
- Shared shopping cart or list updates
- Access to support
3. Self-service portal
B2B sales professionals who offer self-service tools to their buyers are 47% more likely to perform better at meeting their goals than those who don’t. Furthermore, if a buyer is familiar with a product, 64% would prefer a 100% digital purchasing experience.
Self-service portals should be well-designed and easy to use, with features that let buyers take actions without the need to contact their sales rep. The portal should include:
- Individualized pricing & quotes
- Order management (easy reorder, bulk order, order history, modify order details, optional approvals)
- Fulfillment tracking
- Shopping lists
- Ability to change profile, addresses, or assign roles (in admin)
- Search capabilities
4. Personalization
Personalization is the new frontier in eCommerce marketing strategies to enhance the features of the browsing experience in the online store as well as the offers aimed at specific customer groups. Many eCommerce platforms are incorporating personalization features that are by industry, organization, role or stage in the buying journey. Many of these features rely on accurate customer segmentation and/or use artificial intelligence (AI) to offer:
- Customer-specific pricing
- Industry specific products & content filtering (website and catalog personalization)
- Product recommendations
- Search and product discovery
- Omnichannel orchestration
Some of these features can be quite advanced and only available on large-scale enterprise platforms or via third-party services such as DynamicYield, Bloomreach, Insider and Ninetailed.
5. Content management system
Most B2B sales are protracted based on the amount of research and consideration that goes into the purchase. Providing that information in the form of product information, sales sheets, videos, and thought leadership articles helps facilitate buyer consideration. Powering these capabilities is a content management system (CMS) or more modern headless CMS platforms such as Contentful and Sanity (see our Contentful vs Sanity comparison).
The CMS (built into the eCommerce platform) provides content managers with the ability to control how product pages look on the website. Many eCommerce platforms are investing heavily in making content development easier, with reusable experiences, drag-and-drop tools, and AI-enhanced content workflows.
While most eCommerce platforms will have a CMS, the capabilities of the CMS may be too basic for enterprise needs. It is common to consider integrating with a more powerful standalone CMS. For example, it is common for Adobe Commerce customers to also use Adobe Experience Manager (Learn more about Adobe Commerce).
6. Search and navigation
Substantial or complex product catalogs can be overwhelming online, even when personalized. In order to support customers in their purchasing, ensure your B2B platform includes basic or enhanced search capabilities (on platform or through integrations) including:
- Broad search term support (SKU, category, product name, part, etc)
- AI-assisted search for large-volume SKUs
- Personalized search results based on user behavior, location, preferences or order history
- Mobile-friendly search and navigation
- Clear site organization
- Search filtering and sorting
- Dynamic search ranking (e.g. based on popularity, promoted products, etc)
- Embedded cross-sell and up-sell opportunities (related products, frequent combinations)
Many of these capabilities can also be added with third-party software such as Algolia, Elastic, Klevu or Coveo.
7. Differentiated catalogs
While personalization across the board is increasing, one of the areas we see this implemented first is in the availability of tailored catalogs to increase conversion and include personalized promotion, upsell, and cross-sell opportunities.
Typically, B2B sellers would have a core catalog that all users see when they land on the website, but then have differentiated catalogs for verticals (industries), organizations, business units or even specific buyers that reference the products they are likely to buy and the scale at which they are purchased (e.g. quantity based price options, order minimums, or other tailored pricing).
8. Differentiated pricing models
Offering differentiated price lists is an important factor to meet B2B customer needs. There are many factors that can influence the different prices in a B2B sale, including:
- Organization size
- Order quantity
- Frequency of purchase
- Discounts or promotions
- Tiered pricing for software (features, usage, service level)
- Dynamic inputs (market demand, competitive pricing, cost plus pricing, location, time of year)
Look for a platform that allows the level of price differentiation you require (some are unlimited) and which can integrate with any other systems that support your business (e.g. enterprise resource planning / ERP systems).
9. Multiple shopping lists
Shopping lists are a feature that can be added to self-service portals to support the buying process. Although similar to a “wish list,” a shopping list is set up to reduce time to order, specifically for repurchasing. Items on a shopping list can be individually purchased or purchased as an entire list. Based on this, many B2B customers like to set up different shopping lists for frequently purchased groups of items.
10. Analytics and business intelligence
On the administrative or “back-office” side of your B2B eCommerce solution, you need the capabilities to track your orders, support accounts, and gain business intelligence from customer behavior and purchasing. Look at the core analytics capabilities of your platform, specifically if it’s a B2B add-on product or integration, to be sure you can track the KPIs that are important to your business. Some platforms also support differentiated dashboards and custom reports.
11. Streamlined buyer-seller interaction
Service is critical to supporting the B2B sales cycle and reducing the likelihood of attrition of customers over time. Ensure your site is well-designed with obvious CTAs designed to connect with sales for information, for a request for quote (RFP), or to set up an account. Personalization around search and navigation can be critical to supporting this.
One onboarded, streamlining the buyer-seller interaction is as much about providing workflow automation tools to save time on reports, reordering and other management functions as it is about making it easy to connect buyers with their sales reps or customer support reps easily. For software, service levels are often dictated by price tier.
For more comprehensive capabilities, consider integrating your eCommerce platform with your customer relationship management (CRM) system.
12. Bulk ordering
While bulk orders can fall under shopping lists, bulk ordering is common for wholesalers (vs retailers) and can involve differentiated pricing based on volume and more complex fulfillment processes, if orders are coming from more than one warehouse. Making bulk ordering simple can help streamline the buying process and checkout process for customers.
If bulk ordering is common in your business, look for robust bulk order capabilities in line with your needs. This could include support for a high quantity of one product or the ability to easily order variations of the same product (e.g. colors, different brands of the same item).
13. Multiple payment & invoicing options
B2B payment processes are vastly different than for B2C, with B2B sellers offering flexible payment options including credit cards, check, bank transfers, electronic fund transfers or other platforms.
In many cases, B2B purchases are made on credit (purchase orders) and then invoiced after purchase or fulfillment, although this trend is shifting now as online orders increase. Today, there are payment gateways that include support for a variety of B2B payment options across locations and currencies—check which gateways your platform supports.
14. Automated workflows
The area of automation is expanding significantly in the eCommerce space, both for supporting buyer purchasing process as well as seller workflows using pre-built workflow templates or allowing customizable workflows. Examples include:
- Pricing personalization (e.g. volume pricing, demand-based pricing)
- Price locks for mid-deal negotiations
- Marketing automations (in platform or via CRM integration): order or shipping confirmations, cart reminders, upsells, requests for review, re-engagement campaigns
- Content assists with AI (e.g. content summaries, SEO / search engine optimization tags, product description drafts, image optimization)
- Customer service (e.g. chatbots, AI knowledge bases)
- Payment processing and fraud detection
- Real-time inventory updates (see below)
15. Inventory management
Most B2B platforms will have some basic inventory management capabilities, but B2B inventory management can be complex, so many eCommerce platforms now market their “unified commerce” capabilities by integrating with third-party software (e.g. inventory management, ERP) and creating a single management dashboard for all the various software powering your eCommerce business.
Successful inventory management is real-time and automated, ensuring that all channels remain in sync (all online channels, phone, in-person) and overseeing the supply chain to maintain stock levels. Features may include demand forecasting, automated reordering, stock transparency for customers, customer alerts for restock.
16. Integration options
To run your B2B business efficiently, you want to reduce data silos by having your eCommerce platform become your central place to pull in and manage data from other systems. Ensure your system is integration-ready, with a robust marketplace that includes integrations for key systems you may use (CRM, ERP, CMS, procurement, PIM, warehouse, etc), as well as integrations to third-party software to enhance your platform and level of service. Look closely at platforms that support B2C and B2B as not all integrations may support B2B editions.
17. Multiple organizations, websites & stores
For large organizations, B2B sales may span multiple locations and languages or across multiple business models. Further, the organization may also support B2C sales. To streamline administration for these organizations, choose a platform that has multi-brand, multi-storefront (region, segment or brand) or multi-channel support (marketplaces, social).
18. Mobile optimized
B2B companies engage with your B2B eCommerce website in a variety of ways, including on mobile. It is critical to ensure that your website and portal work seamlessly on mobile devices. Depending on the eCommerce platform, this can be achieved through:
- Responsive web design (for a more traditional eCommerce stack)
- Progressive web app (PWA) or mobile app
- Headless commerce or composable commerce, where developers can work on front-ends specific to devices or channels.
What Makes a Great B2B eCommerce Platform?
When it comes to choosing a B2B platform, the consideration must include more than just features, but also consider a wide variety of factors including the price of the platform, whether it is secure or offers strong security features, performance history, inclusions based on price tier (gained through RFP), how easy it is to use (by non-technical users and developers) and the kind of customer service you can expect.
In general, our clients are most concerned with the following commerce platform features to support their business needs:
- Scalability: To scale your business, you need a platform that can scale with you, which includes support for anticipated business size, support for global expansion (localization features), and platform extensibility.
- Flexibility: When we consider flexibility, this may include looking at how easy it is to add integrations or whether the platform is headless or composable, to make it easier to add new features or capabilities over time.
- Good customer experience: Choosing a platform that lets you curate a strong eCommerce UX (user experience) is critical, so look for those advanced features in personalization, AI, search, reviews and self-service portals.
- Fast loading speed: Delivering content quickly is critical to any organization, but for B2B businesses that may support a complex catalog, it is critical to optimize for site speed. While this takes more than just a platform to accomplish, how the platform renders a storefront can make a difference. When researching, ask questions specific to hosting, bandwidth limits, site architecture, and what tools can be used to boost speed. Site speed is one of the driving factors toward headless and composable commerce, allowing components to scale as needed or be optimized for each channel.
- Security: Ensure your platform meets all your compliance requirements for the markets you serve and offers strong security protections (e.g. PCI DSS compliance, encryption, authentication) to help keep credit card and customer data safe
Want more advice? Read our in-depth guide on how to choose the right B2B eCommerce platform or our list of the top 12 B2B eCommerce platforms for 2024.
It’s Your Turn Now
Although we’ve outlined some of the top features you should be looking for in an eCommerce platform, we know sometimes there’s simply too much choice, too little time, or too few resources to launch or replatform a site that may be complex. At Net Solutions, we can help you choose the right B2B eCommerce platform and get you set up with amazing design, back-office optimization, and marketing optimization to help get you started on the right path to success.
Ready to get started? Net Solutions offers comprehensive eCommerce development services to support your B2B website.
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