Fashion has become an indispensable part of today’s modern society. Every product is considered to be more valuable if it seems more aesthetic. Due to this growing demand, B2B fashion Ecommerce has significantly grown and rapidly become one of the most favored business sectors in the present time. Following this trend, an increasing number of B2B merchants, are entering this industry to boost their profits.
Let’s explore what’s so tempting about B2B and how businesses can take advantage of this model to gain profits.
Overview
What is B2B and B2C?
Let’s start by understanding the mechanics of B2B (Business-to-business) operations. The B2B framework entails the exchange of goods between two businesses. In simpler terms, it involves one company providing products or services to another company, which then offers these goods to individual consumers. In contrast to B2B, B2C (Business-to-customer), commonly known as retail Ecommerce, is a model where online businesses sell directly to individual consumers.
Key differences between B2B and B2C?
There are quite a lot of differences between B2C and B2C. Let’s check the list:
-
Target audience:
While the B2C model aims to gain separate shoppers, buying directly from the brand, B2B targets providing products or services straight to other companies or retailers and leaving the task of selling to end customers to their partners.
-
Profits:
Instead of selling one-by-one items like B2C, B2B’s objective is to sell products in high volume.
-
Cost saving:
Speaking of cost saving, B2B is the winner on the comparison scale. The model helps a lot in making businesses spend less on budgets on several aspects like marketing, customer acquisition, operation, etc.
-
Productivity:
The B2B Ecommerce model is a better choice for optimizing productivity as it helps reduce manual mistakes with automatic features, boosts sales with customer-attract tools, shorten the order process & improve performance with advanced high-tech features.
-
Customers’ purchasing decisions:
B2B customers usually think carefully before closing the deal. Therefore, once sellers get the agreement, their buyers will likely return regularly.
-
Seller-buyer connection:
B2C customers can be one-in-a-lifetime buyers, but B2B works in the long run.
-
Payment method:
Both B2B and B2C online selling have the same goal: making profits from their sales. However, B2C customers mostly pay right after they get the products. For B2B, the payment process can take longer, depending on the size of the order.
The way B2B Fashion Ecommerce works
B2B fashion e-commerce involves online sales between wholesalers and retailers. Technology advancements like B2B platforms have opened a new era and led fashion brands to switch to online B2B sales, reducing costs and increasing efficiency. Previously, brands had to sell wholesale in person, but now, thanks to digital commerce, all process is much faster and easier.
B2B transactions are custom, with negotiable prices and longer sales cycles, depending on various factors such as the order size or total prices. Such complicated decisions may involve more people.
However, modern B2B buyers nowadays actually seek B2C-like shopping experiences, including multichannel, automated, and personalized journeys.
B2B payments now use more convenient options like contactless and remote, making transactions faster and more efficient for businesses and customers from all over the world.
Benefits of B2B E-commerce
Exploit a large and growing market
According to a report by Statista, the global B2B E-commerce market size was estimated at $12.2 trillion in 2019, with a projected 17.5% annual growth rate from 2020 to 2027. This means that there is a huge and growing demand for online B2B transactions and that you can access many potential customers looking for your products or services online.
Moreover, when you sell online, you can overcome the geographical barriers. This is better than selling through traditional channels, which can limit your market. Besides, B2B eCommerce makes it easy for businesses to monitor their stock, manage orders, and improve their processes. Therefore, they can make more money and compete in the market.
Access to more buyers and explore new markets
If you want to grow your business, you need to expand into new markets and reach more buyers. With B2B eCommerce, you can use various online platforms and channels, such as your own website, online marketplaces, social media, and email, to attract and engage your potential customers.
Your online sales channels will operate continuously. Thus, you can connect with new potential clients anytime through your online sales channels, even if your sales team is not working. Customers from anywhere can purchase your products easily, and you can expand your market reach locally and globally without any time or logistic issues.
Furthermore, you have the opportunity to target specific segments with personalized offers and content. This approach can help you increase your conversion rate and customer loyalty and expand your customer base and market share.
Improve brand awareness
B2B E-commerce helps you build and strengthen your brand identity and online reputation. You can use many digital marketing strategies, such as SEO, content marketing, social media, and email, to increase your visibility and credibility among potential and existing customers.
Besides, an online presence allows you to communicate your brand values, mission, and vision and showcase your expertise. Therefore, you can establish trust and authority in your industry and differentiate yourself from competitors.
Related Post: Guide to Boost Sales with B2B Company Accounts Magento 2
Create customer-centric experience
B2B E-commerce can enhance customer experience and satisfaction by offering a user-friendly, secure, personalized online shopping journey.
By using features and functionalities like product catalogs, search filters, reviews, ratings, and chatbots, businesses can offer their customers relevant information, personalized recommendations, and support. These tools help customers make informed and confident purchase decisions.
Speed up delivery
B2B E-commerce can shorten the delivery time and improve the products or services quality. By making use of digital tools and platforms, businesses can efficiently manage interactions with suppliers, distributors, and customers, leading to reduced lead times and minimized errors or delays in deliveries.
Using online tools and platforms can indeed aid in controlling the quality of products by enabling real-time monitoring, analysis, and feedback collection. This can contribute to identifying and resolving any issues, ultimately improving your product or service quality and reliability.
Increase sales
B2B eCommerce allows businesses to expand their customer base and maximize sales. Building long-term relationships with a diverse clientele ensures a steady cash flow, promoting strategic growth.
These B2B eCommerce platforms help businesses sell more products or services by enabling upselling and cross-selling and offering discounts and incentives. Companies can provide customers with relevant information, recommendations, and support by using online features such as product catalogs, search filters, reviews, ratings, and chatbots. These tools aid customers in making informed and confident purchase decisions.
Reduce costs
B2B E-commerce can lower operational and overhead costs by eliminating or reducing the need for intermediaries, physical infrastructure, and manual labor. For example, by selling online, you can reduce or eliminate the costs of renting, maintaining, and staffing a physical store or office and the costs of printing, mailing, and distributing catalogs, brochures, and flyers.
You can also reduce or eliminate the costs of hiring, training, and managing sales representatives and the costs of traveling, lodging, and entertaining your customers.
Moreover, online tools and customer service platforms can automate and streamline customer communication. Customers can use features like FAQs, chatbots, and forums to get answers by themselves without needing help from a support person. This can save a lot of money by cutting down the human and operational costs.
Boost analytics
B2B E-commerce can provide valuable insights and data on your customers, products, and performance through analytics tools and software to measure and monitor your key metrics. They include traffic, conversion, retention, and revenue, and make informed decisions and improvements.
You can also use analytics tools and software to segment and profile your customers and understand their needs, preferences, and behaviors. This can help you create and deliver personalized and relevant offers and content and increase your customer engagement and loyalty.
Moreover, you can use analytics tools and software to test and optimize your website, products, and marketing campaigns and identify and eliminate any issues. This can help you improve your website usability, product or service quality, and marketing effectiveness and increase your conversion rate and ROI.
Stay competitive
B2B E-commerce can help you gain a competitive edge and differentiate yourself from your rivals. You not only offer more value, convenience, and choice to customers but also adapt to changing market trends and customer preferences faster and easier.
For example, by selling online, you can offer customers more various range of products or services and a more user-friendly, secure, and personalized online shopping experience. You can also offer your customers more flexibility and convenience, such as 24/7 availability, multiple payment options, and free or fast delivery.
By utilizing online tools and platforms, businesses can stay informed about current market trends and customer demands.
With data and analytics, they can track and predict customer needs, preferences, and behaviors. This information allows businesses to adapt their product or service offerings, pricing, promotions, and marketing strategies promptly and effectively, thereby staying competitive in the market.
Experience scalability
B2B E-commerce can enable you to scale up or down your business according to your needs and goals. You can expand or reduce your product range, customer base, and market reach and adjust your resources and budget accordingly.
For example, by selling online, you can add or remove products from the catalog easily and offer them to different customers and markets.
Provide multi-site capability
B2B E-commerce can allow you to manage many websites and stores from a single platform. You can customize and localize your sites and stores according to different languages, currencies, taxes, and regulations and cater to various markets and customers.
For example, by using an online platform, you can create and manage different versions of your website and store for other countries or regions and offer them different products, prices, and promotions.
Moreover, when you use an online platform, you can test and experiment with different versions of your website and store and optimize them according to the feedback and data from your customers. This method can help you improve your website usability, design, and performance and increase your conversion rate and ROI.
Tips to become a successful B2B fashion Ecommerce business
Make an attractive impression
Use big and bold images
It’s no secret that utilizing big and attractive photos is one of the methods to attract customers that successful fashion Ecommerce applies. If well handled by a professional, one image can deliver the whole brand’s story. This will make your store stand out and be worth the investment.
Keep your website clean and simple
Keeping your fashion Ecommerce site clear is a must if you want visitors to continue surfing. Also, pay attention to the user experience. You definitely don’t want they to struggle, causing frustration, and leave the site. So, try to make your site as easy and interactive as possible.
With so many different choices, a shopper who is ready to buy can turn away to a competitor’s site because reviewing product characteristics and confirming checkout information is too difficult.
Be responsive
If around 25-30% of your buyers use phones or tablets, think about using responsive design for your website. People often use these devices while moving, so your online fashion shop should be easy to use and look good on any device.
«««< HEAD
In case you don’t know how to build a responsive website, take a look at our blog guidance on How To Build An Easy-to-use Website Which Reaches Customers Most.
4b65cbd1dba334ec66078c7df33fb6608122ee12
Be more competitive
Get your pricing spot on
Once you’ve put in all the effort to get potential buyers interested, bet you don’t want to lose them to a rival just because they have their price a bit lower. Take time to research pricing carefully, and don’t forget to offer special coupons or future deals to give them confidence in making the purchase.
Cooperate with suitable partners
Having good partnerships is really important for a successful B2B fashion Ecommerce website. Connect with influential people (famous in your field) like bloggers, reviewers, and Kols, who can help promote your online store. You can start by asking well-known reviewers to give positive feedback about your products. Also, try to build relationships with industry websites where you can write guest articles or get featured as a top fashion site.
Invest in marketing wisely
As discussed above, B2B fashion Ecommerce brands don’t need to pay attention to promoting as the task is implemented by their partners. However, there are several other ways of doing marketing without having to pay huge budgets for ads.
Improve SEO efficiency
Search engine optimization (SEO) is like a secret code to help people find your fashion website easily. It’s like putting signs on the road so that everyone can see where to go. Work with an SEO expert to make sure all the words on your website are set up in a way that search engines understand. This way, when someone looks for a product, they can find your website quickly.
This method is especially useful in modern days when people prefer to do searching and shopping online. You might lose many customers just because your website is nowhere to be found in the search results.
Tell interesting stories
Don’t just write boring stuff about your products. That only makes your visitors sleepy and leave. Instead, tell exciting stories that make people imagine owning what you’re selling. For instance, instead of saying, “A beautiful dress for parties,” you can say, “Imagine yourself as the star of the party, turning heads in this stunning black and white dress that’s fit for a queen.” This way, customers can really see themselves enjoying your products.
Raise customer retention
Offer dedicated support
Bad customer service can make turn a potential loyal customer into a hater. For example, if returning items is too complex, customers might choose another store next time.
It’s inevitable that customers may return the items due to lots of factors like the wrong size/ color, faulty products, etc. It will be great if there is always someone to help customers solve their problems. This helpful support can speed up how quickly shoppers make purchases and feel like coming back again. To ensure a high retention rate, it’s essential to have effective communication channels in place. Investing in a reliable business phone service can ensure that customers always have a direct line to address their concerns, fostering trust and loyalty.
Give your shoppers a reason to return
To make customers want to shop with you again, you need to show them the benefits of being your clients. Perhaps send them emails with daily deals, occasion/ event incentives, or special discounts for different groups of customers, making them feel special, and not everyone has that deal. This way, your fashion store will stay in their minds.
Where to start your B2B fashion Ecommerce brand?
After having all the ideas to make your dream fashion commerce brand come true, it’s time to build an attractive website. However, if you’re not carefully choosing the right platform, the business might not go as expected.
Let’s see some important things to consider when picking a platform for your online fashion store:
Nowaday, it’s no longer difficult to connect with any place around the world. The need for international brands has grown significantly. So, to compete with others, your store needs to reach people worldwide too. Since different people speak different languages, your platform should also be able to work in different languages.
When people shop online, they still want a nice experience. The platform you choose should be easy to use and work well on different devices like phones, tablets, and computers.
In the business world, prices can be tricky. Sometimes, the game changes depending on the quantity. Shoppers who buy more products get more incentives. Your platform should have a price customization feature so that you can change prices for different people or groups of customers with ease.
An effective platform should give you insights into your customers by showing you their data. This feature helps businesses understand what customers like to buy and how they behave when shopping. With this information, merchants can create better ideas and products that match their customers’ interests.
At this point, I bet that you would love to know which platforms can meet the above criteria. Let’s find out the best B2B platform for fashion Ecommerce businesses!
1. Adobe Commerce: Suitable for large businesses
The platform allows users to set up and manage their websites for multiple brands. Additionally, Adobe Commerce enables to create accounts for multiple team members to use.
Key features:
- Different storefronts for various brands
- AI-powered product recommendations
- Advanced customer accounts
- If you’re interested in Adobe Commerce, check out the Points to consider for launching an Ecommerce store with Adobe Commerce for a smooth go-live operation.
2. Shopify: Suitable for newcomers
Shopify is a great option to build websites for new merchants who are starting their Ecommerce businesses, as it is famous for its user-friendly interface and simple features.
However, the price is not as affordable as Adobe Commerce, so make sure to consider it carefully.
Key features:
- Simple website building
- Separate B2C and B2B stores
- Personalized customer storefronts
3. Shift4Shop: Suitable for businesses with a variety of products
Shift4Shop functions as a payment processing firm. It provides numerous choices for B2B Ecommerce vendors and is entirely cost-free for users who generate a minimum of $500 in monthly revenue through Shift4.
Key features:
4. OpenCart: Suitable for small businesses
OpenCart is a great choice for small businesses as the platform is 100% free. With OpenCart, users can download, customize, and add open-source online shopping carts to their websites with ease.
Key features:
- Choose your payment processor
- Multiple currencies and languages
- Manage multiple storefronts
5. NetSuite: Suitable for businesses that offer custom pricing
NetSuite works well with enterprise-level businesses. It offers price customization and built-in customer support, making it different from other similar platforms.
Key features:
- Offer quote-based pricing
- Flexible payment options
- Integrated customer support
Conclusion
The article has given a deeper insight into how B2B fashion Ecommerce works and helpful tips for those who want to enter this field. Of course, the B2C model is also one of the four majorly favored models in business. However, with all the mentioned advantages, it’s clear that B2B can contribute significantly to your brand in the B2B fashion industry.
Take time to consider which platform best matches your business, follow our tips to optimize your website, and everything will go well.
