The traditional brick-and-mortar model has long dominated B2B enterprises. However, as B2B companies have become more accustomed to eCommerce, they’ve realized many benefits to moving beyond their physical locations—beyond simply expanding the number of products they can offer customers.
For instance, a multichannel eCommerce solution allows B2B companies to analyze customer data better and drive sales through personalized marketing campaigns. It also will enable businesses to deliver customized recommendations at all times while providing them with more payment options than ever before.
What is Multichannel eCommerce?
Multichannel eCommerce is the use of multiple channels to sell products and services. In essence, it’s a way to reach customers on their preferred channel. For example, if you’re selling a product that requires assembly or installation, it may be more convenient for customers if they order through an app or website rather than over the phone or email.
Multichannel eCommerce solutions include:
- Online stores (such as Shopify)
- Mobile apps (such as Shopify POS)
- Social media sites like Facebook and Instagram
Why B2B Needs a Multichannel eCommerce Solution
In a B2B environment, customers always look for ways to make their lives easier. They’re also more likely to purchase from a company that offers multiple purchasing channels. A multichannel eCommerce solution helps your business reach customers where they are and makes it easy for them to buy from you when they want something from your store.
What Are the Benefits of a Multichannel eCommerce Solution?
When you think of eCommerce solutions, you may picture a website that allows customers to shop online. While this is one way to reach new customers and increase sales, there are other ways. A multichannel eCommerce solution will enable businesses to sell their products on multiple channels, such as social media platforms, mobile apps, and direct mail campaigns–allowing them to reach more people than ever.
This means businesses can have an online presence while reaching out directly through email marketing campaigns or even text messages. As a result:
- Your company will be able to reach new markets (those who have yet to hear about your brand).
- You’ll see increased sales because there are more ways for people to find out what you’re selling than just one channel, like Google Ads or Facebook Ads alone.
- You’ll improve customer satisfaction by giving clients access from anywhere they’d like: work computer during lunch break; home computer after dinner time; smartphone while waiting at traffic lights….you get our point.
How Does a Multichannel eCommerce Solution Work?
Multichannel eCommerce is an extension of your existing eCommerce site. It allows you to expand your reach and make it easier for customers to buy from you, which can also help increase sales conversions.
Multichannel eCommerce solutions also create a more consistent brand experience across all channels, including web stores and mobile apps. They can even integrate with other systems like ERPs or CRMs so that the data collected from these interactions are always accurate and up-to-date.
Integrated Warehouse Management
With integrated warehouse management, you can manage inventory across multiple warehouses. This feature lets you track shipments and receive order status updates through the system, including tracking numbers.
It also enables you to manage inventory levels and stock alerts so that your teams are always up-to-date on what’s available in each location. Warehouse locations can be organized by region or distribution center, which helps optimize shipping costs by minimizing the distance products need to travel between locations.
Catalog and Product Management
- Catalog management. This is the hub of your eCommerce business, where you can create new catalogs, add products to existing catalogs, and update pricing or descriptions as needed.
- Product management. The heart of every successful eCommerce store lies in creating an excellent experience for your customers by providing them with relevant product information at their fingertips–and that starts with managing all your products from start to finish within one central location.
- Product variants (e.g., size and color). With multichannel selling becoming more popular than ever before, it’s crucial that B2B merchants can manage multiple versions of each product they sell so they can offer customers exactly what they’re looking for without having any extra steps involved during the checkout process.
Order Fulfillment and Shipping Management
An integrated warehouse management system allows you to streamline operations, automate processes and boost efficiency. It also helps you manage your products across multiple channels by automating catalog updates or importing data from outside sources. This way, you can ensure that the correct information is available when needed by both customers and employees alike.
The critical feature of any B2B multichannel eCommerce solution is order fulfillment and shipping management capabilities that allow you to serve all customers invariably while reducing costs at every step along the way–from receiving orders through processing payments through delivery confirmation notifications on social media platforms like Facebook Messenger or WhatsApp Messenger (if desired).
Payment Processing (eCommerce, POS)
Payment processing is the most critical part of any multichannel eCommerce solution. This can be especially true for B2B companies, who often need to pay upfront and have a high volume of transactions.
For example, suppose you’re selling software or services on your website and through an app store like iTunes or Google Play Store (or both). In that case, payment processing will be essential for ensuring that all sales are accounted for accurately and in real time.
It’s also vital if you sell physical goods–for example if you sell cameras through Amazon Marketplace and use Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) to ship them from their warehouses directly to customers’ doorsteps. In this case, payment processing will help track which orders were fulfilled by FBA versus those fulfilled by third parties such as UPS or FedEx so that everyone gets paid appropriately.
Content Management and SEO Integration (CMS)
A CMS is a system that allows you to manage your website content. The best multichannel eCommerce solutions provide an easy-to-use CMS that allows you to create, edit and delete content on your site. It also helps manage the links between pages and provides search engine optimization functionality so that users can easily find what they’re looking for.
Benefits of a B2B multichannel eCommerce solution
With a B2B multichannel eCommerce solution, you can offer your customers the best of both worlds. And with all the benefits that come along with it, this is one decision you don’t want to make on the side.
Benefits of a B2B multichannel eCommerce solution include:
- Allows customers to shop anytime, anywhere: Your customers can shop from any device they choose–from their smartphones or tablets at home or work, through an app on their smartwatch while running errands, or even while relaxing in bed after a long day. Plus, they’ll never have to worry about forgetting something because they can order from anywhere.
- Delivers personalized recommendations: With our machine learning algorithms in place (which learn from each customer’s behavior), we can provide highly targeted offers based on their interests and preferences so that every purchase feels tailored just for them. This significantly improves conversion rates by ensuring each shopper sees precisely what they want–and nothing else.
- Offers more payment options: Our platform supports all primary payment methods, including credit cards (Visa/MasterCard), PayPal®, bank transfers, and cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, which gives businesses greater flexibility when choosing what form of payment works best for them.
Allow customers to shop anytime, anywhere.
With the rise of online shopping, customers are increasingly looking for convenience. They want to buy products without having to leave their homes, and they want those products delivered quickly. Online retailers can offer both of these features and personalized service, giving them an edge over brick-and-mortar stores that only allow you to shop during regular business hours.
Deliver personalized recommendations
Personalized recommendations are an essential component of a multichannel eCommerce strategy. The best way to do this is by leveraging your customer data, including previous purchases and browsing history. You can also create recommendations based on customer preferences, location, or time of day.
For example: If a customer buys one type of product from you often (e.g., paperclips), they are more likely to purchase other related items when they revisit your site or app. With this information, eCommerce marketers can make intelligent guesses about what else might interest their target audience members based on their past behavior–and deliver those items directly into their inboxes via push notifications.
Offer more payment options.
Offering multiple payment options is a great way to increase sales. You can allow customers to pay with their favorite payment method, which will appeal to different types of customers. For example, some people prefer paying by credit card, while others want to use PayPal or Apple Pay.
You can also offer different types of payments based on the size of your business–for example, allowing small businesses and individuals who aren’t able to charge large sums of money on their credit cards the option of paying through wire transfers or checks.
The best way to determine what types of payments you should accept is by looking at how similar companies are doing it and seeing what worked well for them.
Drive sales through personalized marketing campaigns.
Personalized marketing campaigns are more effective than traditional mass-marketing techniques. By targeting specific customers, you can create more relevant content that resonates with them and personalize their experience by making suggestions based on previous purchases and browsing history.
In addition to helping you attract new customers, personalized marketing also increases customer loyalty by making them feel like they’re a part of something special–the feeling that only comes from knowing that someone has taken the time (and effort) to think about what would make me happy or solve my problem at this moment.
A multichannel eCommerce solution helps B2B companies drive more sales with their existing sales efforts.
A multichannel eCommerce solution helps B2B companies drive more sales with their existing sales efforts. A good example is when a prospect enters your website and then calls you on the phone.
A multichannel eCommerce solution allows you to capture that customer’s information, even if they don’t complete a purchase at that time. That way, when they call back later or visit again online, you can offer them an upsell or cross-sell based on previous purchases or interests (like how Amazon does).
Final thought
A multichannel eCommerce solution can be the key to success for B2B companies. It allows them to offer their products and services in any format their customers prefer, whether online shopping or in-store pickup. This flexibility gives businesses more opportunities to sell their products and services while also helping them improve customer satisfaction levels by providing a better experience throughout the buying process.
