Why and how B2B digital strategy differs from B2C strategy
When it comes to B2C and B2B business strategies, it's easy to conclude that e-commerce is simply e-commerce. Both strategies aim to make things easier for customers and to generate purchases.
However, appearances are deceptive and to shed light on this, we first need to look at the differences between these two types of customers.
2C customers are looking for solutions to their problems - or they just want to buy what they want. B2B customers, on the other hand, are people who visit your website because they need to be there.
They may not want to be on your website, but it's their job to be there.
Learn more in the individual areas:
Benefit comes before usability and design
It should be clear to everyone that an e-commerce strategy must aim to make your customers' jobs easier.
When your customers find it easier to work with you through efficient and simple work processes, they come back - and when they come back, they spend more money.
Therefore, a B2B strategy is very different from a B2C strategy, where the focus is on the benefit and not on usability and design.
For example, a B2X Partners survey asked which B2B store is the best place to research and buy electrical products.
The "Platt" website with the look and feel of the early 2000s turned out to be the winner here.
The online store impresses with easy-to-find information and products and is rated as excellent by the product content.
This leads to the logical conclusion that the benefit for B2B customers takes precedence over usability and design.
Complexity is the customer context
Customer differences are important. But B2B organizations and their buying cycles also differ because they tend to be more complex.
Compared to B2C brands, B2B companies have:
Exclusion procedure
Seventy % of B2B purchasing decisions involve at least two decision makers and 28 % involve more than five decision makers.
Complex organizations
Organizations can have multiple sites, users, subcontractors, departments, distributed and centralized contracts.
Price structures
Customer individual prices, each product can have a different and complex price per customer.
budgets and quotas
Allocation of customer budgets and approval processes.
Customized catalogs:
Targeted customer catalogs, through which exactly the products that may be purchased are found.
Different roles
A user finds the right product, while the administrator is responsible for making and approving purchases.
Additional tools
Customers need to view and pay invoices, set up users, and check order status.
System complexity
B2B customers use enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, order entry systems, and product data management (PDM) or PLM systems.
Companies working with a B2B model should consider the complexity of their business and the missions of their customers when developing a digital strategy.
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