Buying Groups Resource Guide

What is a buying group? A buying group is a set of people who purchase goods from a vendor in a marketplace. To implement a buying group system in your eMarketplace, you need to first segment the online marketplace and determine what features to enable. Users need to be engaged, kept informed, and provided the best experience possible. This is done through functionality and usability in the marketplace platform as well as in your marketing content. The site architecture is also very important to successful buying group implementation in a marketplace website. The platform needs to be able to scale with your business and enable seamless interaction, search, collaboration features, and more.

A significant benefit for buying groups is getting discounts, though this can be difficult if the marketplace system isn’t set up properly. This is where shopping lists come in to make things easier and faster, which is what every customer wants. Customers can make as many shopping lists as they want and reuse, name, and organize them. Items can be added to the cart for easy ordering and reordering of products. These capabilities are useful when you are purchasing different types of items for distinct clients or suppliers. Users can click to direct an item to their product details page, where they can read reviews and specifications. The simpler the user interface, the better. It should be easy for customers to click to add products as well as navigate to the list and back to their previous search. Another consideration is which people to give access to which parts of the system.

EDI eCommerce (electronic data interchange) is a computer-to-computer process that allows you to automatically place orders without involving people. Once terms and business relationships are established, automated orders can be placed. This is especially useful for warehouse and inventory management. Having EDI in eCommerce also makes you a competitive, viable option for a buying group.

Different EDI formats tell the computers how to read the data provided or sent, and multiple format options can be given to buying groups, who can choose the best option for their group. Various document types can be utilized as well. Notification systems are extremely valuable, as they can let you know about errors automatically. Notifications are also useful to provide a means of interaction between a purchaser or buying group and the platform, especially when they are getting set up. The more automation and reduced workload, the better their experience will be.

Watch list notifications tactically convey the business logic and knowledge that a buying group is interested in. When information is sent to a group, it shouldn’t have sensitive or specific information about particular members. Macro-level data about what the buying group is doing as a whole is exactly what you want to provide. This can include whether the group is purchasing premium products, middle-of-the-line products, or low-cost items. The group can determine if they should spend more for better quality or if a cheaper option would suffice. Vendors in the marketplace need notifications to be able to compare the price and quality of their products to others in the marketplace.

Depending on the position and goals of the individual or group, buyers and vendors can receive notifications when others purchase similar items to their business model to see what is working for their competitors. Notifications about inventory can help both buyers and vendors stay informed about what is available. Users can also set up watch lists with specific criteria to receive notifications about. Notifications can come in the form of emails, appear on the user dashboard, be sent as text messages, set up as automated calls, or alert the user through push notifications on a mobile application.

Buying groups often purchase the same items several times or seek out similar products. That’s why having wish lists and favorites is an extremely useful resource. These lists can be useful for reviewing items later before purchase and comparing them with other products. This is also a useful feature for when items need to be approved by management since they make collaboration easy. Teams can avoid duplicating purchases and missing important items. In addition, automated processes can present recommended items based on wish list data. This personalizes the content to the user to show items that are relevant to them. Users can set up preferences to receive notifications about wish list items.

Favoriting items put them into a separate “favorites” list, which stays on the list even after purchasing them. Buyers can also check their favorites list to make sure they didn’t forget to add anything to their online shopping cart or wish list. The favorites list can be a list of products the buyer knows they will repurchase, while wish lists can be items the buyer may like to purchase in the future. However a marketplace list is set up, it’s important to offer the best usability features so that buyers can utilize these tools in the ways that work best for them.

Product detail pages give advanced information about products. For a buying group, this is essential because the specifications needed for each product may be vastly different. The level of detail in the product specifications can mean the difference between purchasing the right product versus the wrong one. Buyers should be able to find the correct information easily. Product detail pages help buyers compare products and understand the specifics of the item they are purchasing. In addition to standard text, pictures and videos can be used to convey information. The type of product will determine what kinds of details should be shown.

Beyond specifications of the product itself, such as material, color, size, shape, uses, product number, etc., other crucial information includes the base price, available discounts, warranty, whether the item is in stock, and location-based data for inventory and shipping. Also, page design matters. Pages shouldn’t be cluttered or empty; therefore, the page needs to adapt to match the level of data. It is imperative that the webpages be optimized for different screen sizes and devices, including smartphones, tablets, and desktops. Optimization for these devices includes page design and organic SEO, since people tend to search differently based on what device they are using.

Advanced inventory logic ensures inventory data is up-to-date and accurate. Data that isn’t up-to-date will cause a lot of issues for the buyer and seller alike. Some eCommerce systems are difficult to keep integrated and synced, resulting in data disparity between different databases. Users need to see how long it will take for a purchase to be fulfilled, and the processes of fulfillment and inventory management need to be optimized. This isn’t possible without accurate data being constantly updated and checked automatically. Buyers need this information to make good purchasing decisions within their timeline, and sellers need to know when/if items are in stock to notify the end user.

Accurate information will also build trust and credibility for the vendor and the marketplace as a whole. In addition, buyers and sellers can utilize resources such as notifications for when items are restocked or recommendations for similar items. With accurate data, searches turn up all the relevant items in the marketplace, and users can find the items they are looking for.

Complex pricing rules can cause issues for a buying group, because if prices or rebates aren’t accurate, the system doesn’t work. Information needs to be kept up-to-date to be accurate. It’s in your interest to look at how pricing works with different vendors when considering a buying group eCommerce system. The marketplace platform needs to be able to handle the different scenarios that may come up.

Quantity-based discounts and account-specific pricing are two important requirements. Items should be able to be grouped together to get the buyer the largest discount, as well. These are all part of the complicated price rules and price points the system needs to be able to implement. The underlying data needs to be consistently updated and synchronized and may need to be pulled from existing systems. Getting the right platform that meets your needs is key to having an easily manageable and usable platform.

Integrating a catalog system into an eCommerce platform can be very costly because of the specific capabilities needed for different lines of business applications. These capabilities include warehouse and inventory management, customs and duties, warehouse transfer, and other tools. Scaling your buying group and eCommerce systems opens up opportunities for optimization as well as new challenges. Fundamental integrations include an accounting system or ERP, and it’s useful to have APIs to help interact with the system.

Catalog information is also important for presenting specific types of data. A highly integrated system that can standardize and automate business logic will be the best avenue for customer satisfaction. Additionally, system integration is helpful for returning items and receiving shipping notifications. Customers need to be kept updated on shipping times and order status. Having the right capabilities and integrations for buying group members increases the longevity and versatility of the eCommerce marketplace platform.

The ability for site visitors to search and easily find products is crucial to a successful marketplace platform. The first step is having accurate data in the system, and then the platform must be able to take that data and present it intuitively. Autocomplete is a great feature to have. It helps the customer find the product they want faster, and things like synonyms, fuzzy search, and other advanced search filters can be incorporated. That way, the customer has a wider variety of options available, and the search results aren’t too narrow to specific terms.

It’s important to consider how the user interface will appear across different devices, including the locations of the search bar and buttons. With advanced search filters, you also don’t want the interface to be overwhelming, so just the most popular attributes within a filter type should be shown, with a “load more” button at the end so the customer can expand options if they want to. Lastly, if a customer is logged into the system, they should see prices and products that are specific to their account and location in the search results.

It’s common for vendors for order fulfillment to come from multiple different warehouses. This can become challenging to manage as the buying group scales and bulk orders increase. While the items may be coming from different locations, it is still necessary to fulfill the orders in a timely fashion. This can be done with multi-warehouse implementations. Buying groups often place orders that include multiple items, with each type of product coming from a different vendor, each with multiple warehouse locations.

Accurate information for lead times and inventory, as well as the ability to synchronize that data, are essential for high customer satisfaction and streamlining processes for buying group operations. It is important to consider the capabilities of the platform, including whether updates are in real time, how the system handles maintenance, inventory transfers, notifications, and whether configurations can be optimized for the best possible performance.