Mobile Strategy: Streamlining B2B mobile purchasing

This article explores the benefits, processes and possibilities when offering a mobile ordering app to your B2B customers. The goal is to help you build a stronger mobile strategy to increase sales, loyalty and customer lifetime value.

Consider this if you sell goods to a trade – such as building supplies, landscaping supplies, plumbing or electrical. More than 80% of your orders are same day, next day, or within a week. The website or call-centre are your primary channels for taking orders.

If you have an e-commerce store, you’ll probably notice that more than 50% of your users are coming on mobile devices.

Simplify the ordering experience

Offer a faster, more convenient way for customers to buy.

If you’re company stocks and distributes products to B2B customers, you might find that considering improving the mobile booking experience in order to encourage customers to buy more frequently, increase order value and increase loyalty.

The younger generation or Millennials are taking over family businesses, and these are heavy mobile users. They desire effortless, mobile-first ways to buy.  A Millennial could research a product, find it, look around for the best deal, and make a transaction all from their phone – and it’s preferable to many of them.

Ideas to consider

• Make the ordering experience fast, so you’re the least-path-of-resistance to purchasing
• Use personalisation to offer products that are most relevant to each customer
• Look at your mobile web stats. Don’t built for Android if 80% of your customers are on iPhones.
• Millennials demand a customer-centric buying experience. It’s about being treated like a valued customer. Consider a personalised mobile experience where the app gives them access to critical information such as delivery updates
• To reflect customer demand, customise your offerings across channels in the ways millennials want, which typically boils down to providing better, faster, more memorable service.

Be consistent across mediums

Ensure customers see the same information across desktop, mobile and in-store.

• Be consistent with other channels; things like branding, design, product inventory and prices should be consistent everywhere.
• Integrate your operational elements so that you can have a single “conversation” with customers, not one that changes from smartphone to desktop to physical stores. This might mean connecting your app to ERP and CRM.
• Connect the app to your existing web site to take advantage of the data already maintained there – user accounts, price lists, product data and order history

Provide real-time data

Offer the most up-to-date stock levels and delivery information.

Customers expect up-to-date information, so consider how to ensure they see accurate stock levels and delivery status.

• On average, 89 percent said having access to real-time product availability information would influence their shopping choices in terms of which supplier they would chose.
• Take stock levels directly from your ERP system, and present that in your app.
• Provide customers with delivery tracking links for active orders.

Offer loyalty rewards

Actively reward customers and entice them with offers.

• 95% of millennials say they want their brands to court them actively, and coupons sent via email or direct mailed to their homes will have the most influence on them.
• Use push messages to promote timely offers, giving your users control over what kind of content they receive.
• That said, don’t over-use push messages. Millennials prefer fewer, more relevant and timely push messages.