What is B2C eCommerce?
B2C eCommerce, a.k.a. business-to-consumer eCommerce, refers to the method that enables businesses to sell their products/services to consumers online.
Businesses are now realising the many great advantages of implementing a B2C eCommerce solution and selling online. This is because more and more people are choosing to shop online via their mobile devices.
Latest trends show that many businesses are adopting a more modern way of selling, and are investing more resources into online sales and promotion.
With this in mind, today we’ll talk about how businesses can break free from the traditional bricks and mortar route to market.
So, if you’re wondering what B2C eCommerce is, what the benefits are and why it's on the rise, then this post is for you so keep on reading.
What is B2C e-Commerce?
B2C eCommerce refers to a sales method which can enable you to sell your products or services online to your end customer using an online eCommerce webshop.
It’s an easily accessible digital representation of your physical store that’s open 24/7, 365 through which customers buy your products online.
Your customers use your eCatalogue to browse through your products to find items that they wish to purchase quickly and conveniently without having to wait.
The Benefits of B2C eCommerce
In all honesty, there are so many great benefits that businesses can avail of by implementing a B2C eCommerce webshop. For the sake of convenience and to save time, we’re going to list the top 5 benefits which will have a big impact on your business as opposed to listing each little benefit that comes with such an online solution.
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Increased Sales & Revenue
Every business owner’s goal is to increase sales and revenue for their business. A B2C eCommerce solution will do that for you.
It adds another sales channel through which your customers or potential customers can view your products online and place orders instantly.
A B2C eCommerce solution can help your business reach new markets, new customers, new time zones, in different languages and different currencies.
You can also use your webshop to list and sell your products on the world’s largest marketplaces like Amazon, eBay, Google, Facebook, Instagram and many more.
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Reduced Business Costs & Ordering Errors
Implementing an B2C eCommerce solution and going full on digital ensures that a lot of your admins time will be freed up to spend on other online tasks instead of putting together catalogues for print and distribution.
The recurring print and distribution costs as well as your admin time and effort will be greatly reduced. There will be very little need for customer support or manual order taking which can result in ordering errors.
There’ll be no more need to send physical copies of invoices or statements to your customers as they will be available online.
There’ll be no more need to update customer account information such as addresses or bank account details as they will manage this themselves online.
There’ll be no more need to spend valuable time and resource hours on manual processing of orders as the customer is in the driving seat online.
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Gathering Accurate Consumer Data
Having your own B2C eCommerce site comes with the great benefit and ability to control and monitor every step of your sales process.
Digital marketing tools like Google Analytics and Hotjar allow you to monitor your website pages to gather accurate and actionable data such as:
- What product pages are visited most frequently
- What pages visitors spend the most time on
- What kind of elements consumers interact with on the page
- What offers work and what ones don’t
With this type of data, you’ll be able to understand how your customers interact with your online business. It will allow you to take action and to optimise the buyer journey accordingly, to help them make a purchase and to sell more products.
You will also be able to run product A/B tests in order to see what products sell better and make improvements to the products that don’t.
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Providing a Digital Catalogue
Nowadays, eCatalogues are becoming more and more popular and it’s also safe to say that they’re now what’s expected as the industry standard of online selling.
Digital catalogues are very convenient as they allow your business to share your products with retail, wholesale customers or prospects online in a matter of seconds. It saves you the trouble of printing and posting new ones as you add new products to your catalogue.
The transformation of your print catalogue into a digital one adds a whole new dimension of convenience to your company for customers and prospects. It allows them to easily find your catalogue online by searching for your product or brand and to browse through your catalogue at a time and a place that suits them.
A digital catalogue has way more to offer and you can read more about that topic here.
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Improved Customer Experience
B2C eCommerce solutions offer customer self-service and online ordering facilities that have a direct impact on your customer experience.
Online self-service allows them to place orders 24/7, 365 from any device which saves them the hassle of going to your physical store to find what they want while queuing to pay for it. Recent data suggests that there is a lot more product variety online and customers now prefer to click and collect or have items delivered to their chosen address.
Also, through their online account, your customers can view account information, their history, statements, they can make payments and more which adds to the overall customer experience being better.
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Provide accurate information while reducing workload
Integrated eCommerce allows your solution to be connected in real-time with your ERP system or business management software. This real-time integration provides your customers with real-time product pricing and stock information plus order history, statements, and much more directly from your ERP.
And you know what’s even better?
This real-time integration ensures that you only have to maintain the data in one system, your ERP. With standalone ERP systems, you need to manage two systems (the ERP and the CMS of your standalone eCommerce). These need to be manually updated through spreadsheet imports to keep disparate data silos in sync.
In Summary
A B2C eCommerce solution is the online version of your business, where customers can come and quickly find products, services or information that they require at any time.
This information can be accessed from anywhere on a mobile device and the 24/7 opening times plus the customer self-service experience is what’s expected across the industry nowadays.
Remember, to have your own online B2C eCommerce solution offers you massive benefits. It allows your business to reach new markets, increases sales, increases revenue, you can gather useful, actionable consumer data, it allows your business to open 24 hours a day, it reduces business costs, and offers a better overall customer service experience while you do less of the heavy lifting.
Once you’ve reached a point where you find it hard to maintain or update multiple systems to achieve the same sales goal, then it’s time to upgrade your manual process, your existing B2C eCommerce or to move to an ERP integrated eCommerce solution that will drive even more efficiency across your business.
So, If you’re in the market for a B2C eCommerce solution, then why not take a look at Aphix B2C eCommerce solution. It’s an ERP integrated solution that will streamline, automate and future-proof your business operations.
If you would like more information, please request a demo and one of our eCommerce experts will contact you as soon as possible.
Alternatively, give us a call on (041) 213 7222 and we will be more than happy to answer any questions you may have.