Top 10 Ways to Improve Your Online B2B Performance One of the key trends affecting business-to-business eCommerce is the way B2C shopping expectations reflect the expectations of B2B consumers in your enterprise web store. Your B2B customers' personal online shopping (B2C), which they continue to do more often, gives them expectations when it comes to business-to-business online shopping for work-related purchases. Fortunately, you can keep up with these trends and keep your customers happy by following these 10 basic business-to-business eCommerce best practice tips. #1-Friendly User Experience: Simplicity is the new mantra of online customer acquisition. Keep the site clean and free of needless distractions. Your B2B customers are there for a purpose, not pleasure. Make it as easy as possible for them to find what they want. Ideally, after logging in, your customer should be at the web store checkout in 3 pages. The efficiency of your site reflects the value-added efficiency of your company and products. #2-Product or Site Search: This follows a friendly user experience. Customers should easily be able to find what they are looking for in the site search box. As people search for things in different ways, this box should be intuitive enough to recognize product descriptions, manufacturers, product numbers, and more. #3-Visible Catalogues: There are two reasons for this. One is that it allows search engine crawlers to index the product pages, making them visible in search results and increasing the overall search rankings of the site as a whole. The second reason is that you create a 'risk-free' trial environment for your B2B consumers, allowing them to invest the time and effort necessary to induce loss aversion. #4-Offer Quotes: To follow the visible product catalogs, allow the visitor to add products to a shopping cart and request a quote. This is easy customer acquisition. With website behavioral data, knowledge of that customers' desired products, and a cleverly designed eCommerce quotes request form, you have all the information you need to acquire that business-to-business eCommerce customer. #5-Acknowledge the Competition: Your customers know that you have competitors, and any competent purchase decision-maker at a business will review the competitive landscape before making a purchase. Acknowledge this and make it easy for the customer to compare reviews and product specs and/or prices with competitors. The key is to devise a way in which to do this that keeps the customer on your website. #6-Customization: Using advanced site analytics that integrates with your B2B eCommerce CRM, you should be able to build individual customer profiles. Use these profiles to individualize the site experience. You know what this customer wants or needs, so design their experience around those desires. Save their purchasing information in their customer profile for easy, one-click checkout. #7-Mobile Friendly: Mobile continues to be a factor of major strategic importance for business-to-business eCommerce. While consumers may not purchase directly from their mobile device, "93% of people who used mobile to research go on to make a purchase." Collect data from mobile analytics and, if someone researched a particular product, have that product front and center the next time they log in from a computer. #8-Automated ERP Integrated Inventory Management: When showing a prospective customer the availability of an item in your enterprise web store, most sites display a simple "IN" or "Not In" stock. An automated back-end ERP integration can calculate your organization's capability to deliver the product at the desired time or, if unavailable, the earliest instance of potential delivery. You might be surprised how many people will go through with a purchase simply because they are given an exact delivery date, even if different from their preferred date of reception. #9-Flexible Payments: "59% of consumers will abandon a transaction if their preferred payment method is not in place on your enterprise eCommerce platform." Payment integration is an essential component of any serious B2B eCommerce solution. Remember that you can also integrate industry or product-specific forms and offline payment options in the checkout process. #10-Automated Tax, Shipping, and Currency Calculation: While shipping, tax, and currency calculations are integrated into most eCommerce platforms, most B2B organizations take this as a relatively common-sense tip. However, the key here is automation, which makes your site more efficient and the users' experience more pleasurable. An automated solution recognizes their location relative to the supply chain and calculates region-specific tax and shipping costs without the customer having to fill out another form. Clarity's Business-to-Business eCommerce Solution Clarity's team has over 300 years of combined experience in enterprise eCommerce application design and development. Our intensive research and interview process as well as strong project management ensures you get the highest quality solution possible, delivered on time and within budget. View our portfolio to see a snapshot of the 350+ satisfied clients and 700+ projects Clarity has delivered. When it comes to business-to-business ecommerce development, experience, and professionalism are key. Give Clarity a call today and let's end your search and give you the solution you've been looking for!