What Does A B2C-Like Digital Customer Experience For A B2B Company Really Mean?

B2B e-commerce, like any industry, is subject to evolving opinions and trends. One notable trend that appears repeatedly has to do with digital commerce customer experience (CX). B2B digital customers, we're told, now demand a B2C-like customer experience.

Thought leaders like McKinsey and Deloitte point to good digital CX as the key to success in the modern B2B world. Still, it's easy for leaders to misinterpret this insight. The truth is that B2B customers want the ease and simplicity of the B2C experience that we've all grown accustomed to. However, this is often confused for B2C use case scenarios.

Let me explain. When leaders oversimplify the customer demand for B2C-like CX, they're often led to believe that it means their B2B businesses should adopt B2C e-commerce solutions to provide some variation of a webshop to their customers. Unfortunately, doing so can be a grave mistake.

B2B user scenarios are, by nature, highly complex and nuanced. As Deloitte analysts describe it, "B2B relationships are inherently complex. With high dollar values and company reputations at stake, experience and engagement will never fully displace performance and value. B2B sellers need to deliver on both."

When B2B leaders adopt B2C e-commerce solutions to provide simple B2C scenarios to their customers, problems can arise from a misguided attempt to shoehorn processes that don't match the fundamental needs of the B2B customer. According to my experience, the most successful businesses are the ones that identify their customers' root needs and develop customer-focused and user-friendly solutions that address them.

Instead of simply buying a B2C solution that wasn't designed for unique business needs, this approach sees companies invest in customer loyalty and data-driven insights that create a virtuous cycle of improvement. Here are three cases in which large B2B companies did this and managed to generate exceptional results.

Case 1. Industrial Heavy Machinery Manufacturer

The first case concerns a multinational heavy machinery manufacturer. Historically, standard tasks like ordering replacement parts and accessing service contracts and sensitive product information were arduous offline multistep processes that were costly for customers both financially and in operational overhead.

Understanding customers' needs, the manufacturer focused on providing fast, comfortable, and secure access to the product information and replacement parts ordering.

Their solution was a bespoke customer portal that made it easy to role-based access all the required information of their clients. The resulting portal was a B2B solution that captured the spirit of the B2C-like experience in a way that proved to be highly effective for the end-user.

Understanding the nature of the pain their customers were experiencing, the company developed an elegant and efficient solution that has not that much in common with B2C user scenarios. Looking at B2B eCommerce from the right angle led the company to intelligent decisions about priorities and technologies.

Case 2. HVAC Manufacturer

The second case concerns a Fortune 500 company specializing in manufacturing heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning systems and relying on third-party retailers to reach end customers.

These last-mile partners (typically installer companies) served as the end consumer's primary points of reference, having a massive impact on the end consumer's decision-making.

Recognizing the need to understand the last-mile experience and behavior, the manufacturer developed a loyalty portal where partners could register their products, access support, and earn loyalty points redeemed for various perks in a vendor-managed marketplace.

The B2C-like simplicity and comfort of the created solution inspired last-mile partners to register and communicate with the vendor directly and provided the insights and connections they desired while respecting a long-established distribution model that had served them so well.

This case does not have anything in common with relatively trivial B2C eCommerce scenarios. It demonstrates how smart companies use B2B eCommerce technologies to generate deep customer insights, identified by the McKinsey Global 2021 report as one of the most critical conditions for success.

Case 3. Fast-Moving Consumer Goods

Our final case study centers around one of our large customers, a Fortune 500 company, a fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) business. This company also utilized a model that sold to select distributors that then resold to retailers before selling to the consumer.

The vendor was looking to get direct access to retailers to strengthen relationships and generate valuable insights. On the other hand, retailers and distributors suffered from communication challenges stemming from non-existent or unreliable digital channels.

Without direct contact with retailers, the company couldn’t control brand perception or customer experience. To solve this problem, the company developed a B2B2B digital commerce portal that put them firmly in control of the relationship. In fact, this kind of challenge (and the subsequent solution) isn’t uncommon. We’ve seen a similar scenario occur with a Fortune 500 electronics manufacturer, for example.

This platform allowed the vendor's distributors to sell online to retailers. Because the vendor owned the platform, they gained visibility into the supply chain landscape and communicated directly with retailers. In turn, these developments enabled them to promote products, give discounts, facilitate purchasing volumes planning, and much more.

Each user in the supply chain enjoyed the B2C-like customer experience quality, while the complexity of scenarios and business logic goes far beyond anything similar to B2C webshops.

Combining multiple players into a single digital ecosystem is an ambitious task. However, it creates an incredibly sticky process for stakeholders and creates a seamless customer experience.

Conclusion

The key takeaway for leaders is that B2B providers must focus on understanding the unique needs and scenarios that their customers encounter and strive to add measurable value.

Once this is in place, they can develop solutions that provide the much-sought-after B2C-like CX that their customers demand.

Oversimplifying this complex process and implementing traditional B2C solutions hoping they'll solve your customer's challenges can result in expensive and time-consuming mistakes that are difficult to unwind.