Role of Magento in b2b eCommerce

Magento out of the box is b2b ready

Some of the biggest eCommerce markets out there are b2b. Additionally, they are some of the best suited for eCommerce. B2b users tend to have better training and support internally, be used to operating online to purchase and most importantly worth investing time to train and develop as they will be repeat long term clients.

For example Automotive group Volkswagen is one of the largest manufacturers of Vehicles on the plant. It controls brands like Bugatti, Audi, Seat, Bentley, Skoda and Lamborghini.

Volkswagen current has around 322000 employees and operates plants out of Africa, Europe, Americas, Asia/pacific rim. Volkswagen Group has many branch companies that annually purchase individual parts, supporting raw materials and automotive parts worth 86 billion Australian Dollars. In typical Volkswagen style the process of ordering, logistics, procurement is highly automated online.

Volkswagen manages almost all of its b2b requirements through an online platform. Delivering more than 30 different online b2b applications, such as; contract sign off, Live quotations, product purchases, project management, purchases orders and payments, after sales care and warranty servicing.

Volkswagens online catalog is vast, having more than 2.2+ million items from 550 worldwide suppliers. There online facilities have in excess of 13500 internal users who conduct more than 1.1 Million transactions, 3310 contract negiotations and involve some 4100 different companies. Figures for 2006-2007 showed 23 Billion dollars worth of contracts being conducted online.

Using Volkswagen as a successful example of the potential of online b2b sales. I would like to introduce Magento as a solution for small to Enterprise level business.

Magento as a b2b solution

Most people aren’t aware that Magento is a powerful b2b tool right out of the box. It is also happy to manage many tiers of b2b customers and retail customers at the same time through the use of assigned user groups.

Where other platforms can’t even get started with b2b eCommerce Magento and Magento Enterprise have the bases covered.

Some of the stock features:

  • Multi tier discounting for user groups, such as; Retail, many tiered discounts for wholesale users groups.
  • Different Invoicing
  • Auto Invoicing
  • Payment gateways, Pay later, B-Pay and others standard gateways
  • Tier shipping
  • User account interface
  • Order tracking
  • Advanced Stock control
  • Backordering
  • API for integration with suppliers
  • API for integration with salers
  • API for accounting integration

    Some additional features which can integrated, which we have developed.

  • Drop Shipping vendors
  • Whole sale shipment tracking
  • Shipping/customs integration
  • Warehouse logistics
  • Advanced stock control systems
  • Vendor logins and stock management
  • Shipping, warehoure, shop front stock logistics
  • POS Sytems
  • Special pricing requests to vendors
  • External sales management
  • Affiliate sales
  • Integrated quoting systems

    The amazing thing with Magento is that it can handle mass traffic out of the box. The platform is stable with 50,000 plus simultaneous users, 1000 categories and 100,000 products. The effort to make it handle even more is not that grand either.

    The other point which makes Magento ideal for b2b cloud solutions is Magento is just so flexible. You can create and intergrate virtually anything into it.

    My company Mebsites.com as a Gold Coast Website Development company is very focused on requirements for business online. Every month we develop original solutions for all sorts of businesses. Not all envolve Magento, but many do. We deal with local and international clients on a regular bases. Furthermore we do white label development for other Website designers and Developers who need specialist developers.

    Contact us Click to email. Or at our website Mebsites.com

    Bibliography:

    Magento, Marketing Team (2014). MAGENTO IS THE FASTEST GROWING ECOMMERCE PLATFORM PROVIDER ON THE IR TOP 500. [ONLINE] Available at: http://magento.com/blog/magento-news/magento-fastest-growing-ecommerce-platform-provider-ir-top-500#.VQ5LFfmUdSh. [Last Accessed 22/03/2015].

    internetretailer.com (2015). U.S. B2B E-commerce is Big and Getting Bigger. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.internetretailer.com/b2b-ecommerce/market-facts/?cid=2015-B2BGuide-IRTLead2. [Last Accessed 22/03/2015].

    eBay Enterprise named a Strong Performer in The Forrester Wave™: B2C Commerce Suites, Q1 2015 (2015). eBay Enterprises. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.ebayenterprise.com/commersations/publications/ebayenterprisenamedastrongperformerintheforresterwaveq1_2015/. [Last Accessed 22/03/2015].

    BERNARDINE WU (2014). Five key components of successful B2B e-commerce. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.internetretailer.com/commentary/2014/11/21/five-key-components-successful-b2b-e-commerce. [Last Accessed 22/03/2015].

    Sarwant Singh (2014). B2B eCommerce Market Worth $6.7 Trillion by 2020: Alibaba & China the Front-Runners. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.forbes.com/sites/sarwantsingh/2014/11/06/b2b-ecommerce-market-worth-6-7-trillion-by-2020/. [Last Accessed 22/03/2015].