Webtelligence is the most deeply integrated and most versatile ecommerce solution for Sage 300. Our platform and methodology allow for functionality that other solutions just can’t accommodate.
Business to business (B2B) presents different challenges than business to consumer (B2C) sites. Yes, there are similarities. You want to expose all of you products to your customers, make it easy for customers to find what they’re looking for, and provide opportunities for them to buy more. But often in the B2B space it’s important to your customers that they can get their order in quickly and easily so they can get back to work. Webtelligence can help you do that.
Multiple Order Methods
Making it easy for your customers to place orders can be the difference between them buying from you or someone else. Providing the right option that works for your customers can be the difference.
Quick Order Pad
This is a great option for those customers who are familiar with your product names or SKUs. It’s much like a web-based order entry form that uses our Smart Finder to locate the right products.
The Smart Finder can be set up to search multiple fields based on what is entered into a field in the Quick Order Pad. For example, if a customer types in 3 or more characters of a product description or item code and stops typing for a second or more, the Smart Finder will return a list of all possible matches. The more characters entered, the more the list of possible matches is narrowed. And this is a “contains” type of search, not a “starts with” search. Much more forgiving for the user.
The fields searched can include Optional Fields or any other field in Sage that may help return the desired result. This can be a very effective order method for B2B customers.
Re-order From Prior Invoice
It’s common for customers of distributors to regularly replenish their inventory. That means that they are frequently buying the same products on a regular cycle. Allowing them to place a new order based on a prior invoice can save them a lot of time. Either replicate the entire order or just specific line items from previous invoices. And rest assured that current pricing will be reflected on the new order and they can adjust quantities before they buy.
Private Catalogue
Most people are familiar with the concept of a wish list. You place items on the list that you want to buy later. When you ultimately buy the item you move it from the wish list to the shopping cart.
A private catalog is similar in that customers place items in their private catalog to purchase at a later date. In the case of B2B buyers this can be a list of products that they frequently purchase from you. So rather than having to navigate the usual category and product pages to find what they need, they simply access their private catalog and order from there. And unlike a wish list, when a product is ordered from the private catalog, it stays in the catalog for the next purchase.
Your customers can keep as many catalogs as they need for different purposes. For example, they may have seasonal catalogs, or equipment specific catalogs, or task specific catalogs. Having that option makes it easier to do business with you than your competitor, building customer loyalty.
Most Frequently Purchased
Some of our customers challenge us to provide new and interesting ways for them to service their customers. And that’s a good thing because it allows us to provide that functionality to all of our customers. Since we are a multi-tenant SaaS solution, once we deploy a new feature it’s available to all customers. This is an example of one of those features.
As discussed earlier, wholesale customers often buy the same things repeatedly. Some items they buy more frequently than others. This feature shows the most recently purchased items (you determine the date range) and orders them from most frequently purchased to the least. From that list customers can add items to their shopping cart with a click of their mouse. And those purchase details come directly from Sage, not just the web store, so it doesn’t matter how the order got placed. If it’s in Sage, it’s included.
Those are just a few of the methods we’ve deployed for customers that are standard in Webtelligence. If you’ve got other wild and wonderful ideas to make it easy for your customers to order, let us know.