We have all been there. You can have a specific item in mind, or simply be aimlessly browsing the beautiful online catalogue when it happens. You know what you want, you’re ready to purchase it, but – for some reason – you get stuck.
For buyers and small business owner’s it’s equally frustrating to place inventory orders from their reps and manufacturers. Reps aren’t visiting due to COVID and it’s difficult to identify merchandise online, and even more difficult to place orders.
There are several bumps along the way that can distract, confuse, or frustrate B2B and Wholesale eCommerce purchasing so it is imperative to see around those corners and make the process easier.
How do you do that? Here are a few incredibly common pitfalls that might be holding you back.
Barrier # 1: It’s pretty, but it’s not functional
For many companies, a catalogue is somewhat of a prized possession. Lots of time and effort goes into getting the design just right, including everything from perfectly posed images to a carefully selected font and color scheme.
While choosing to include your (or your manufacturers’) catalogue masterpiece on your web site is an incredibly smart business idea, it will backfire if it’s not done correctly. Customers should be able to do more than simply swipe through the pages and zoom in and out.
Instead, it should be an interactive experience for your customers, allowing them to search the catalogue, get their tiered pricing, click on and easily add items to their cart.
Barrier #2: A bad checkout experience
The shopping is done, the cart is full and it’s time to complete the purchase. This is the make or break moment for an eCommerce store as the statistics speak for themselves. Research conducted by 99 Firms found the average cart abandonment rate to be 67.91 percent, which equates to about $4.6 trillion in abandoned merchandise in a year.
Checkout optimization can recover $260 billion in eCommerce sales, according to their research.That’s why it is most important to make this part of the process as streamlined as possible.
The steps along the way should be optimized for the customer experience. The cart should be accessible throughout the shopping process, your B2B shoppers should be able to review their pricing, see item features, add and remove as necessary as they go along, and the payment process should be as easy as possible.
Barrier #3: Website Availability
Aside from the obvious features of visual aesthetics, ease of use and availability navigation should be of the utmost importance for any eCommerce site including B2B and wholesale sites. The web site should be secure, and offer your customers the same products and level of service you deliver in person or in the showroom.
Service on an eCommerce site equates to making sure the web site loads quickly and is in no way confusing at any point of the buying process.
Your Wholesale eCommerce Solution
At Aleran, we aim to make selling simple. We offer a one-of-a-kind suite of products targeted at that goal, including the Catalogue Catalyst, otherwise known as the solution you need to break down these eCommerce barriers.
Catalogue Catalyst is an easy to use digital sales tool that lets users automatically turn their existing PDF catalogs into shoppable online catalogs. Aleran’s proprietary and first of its kind AI and machine learning-based software saves you the precious admin hours spent manually hotspotting PDF catalogs, as Catalog Catalyst quickly and carefully analyzes your catalog files and the associated tags.
The program offers full eCommerce capabilities, optimized for B2B and B2C, allowing users to upload catalogues with shopping cart functionality, order history, suggested items, payment
and shipping options, order confirmation, free hosting and platform support, and SSL
security and PCI compliance.
For more information, or to request a demo, call (952) 405-7310 or visit us online.
