After the acquisition of Demandware for B2C solutions, Salesforce expanded its branch of SaaS Commerce by acquiring CloudCraze, a powerful B2B e-commerce tool. With the Commerce Cloud landscape spreading its wings, adding CloudCraze has allowed Salesforce to fill B2B e-commerce gap.
This strategic decision has proved to be one of the biggest strengths for Salesforce; the platform now has the capacity to offer their services at a multi-channel level through personalized interactions.
Successful B2B e-commerce players choose CloudCraze for its many benefits as a native Salesforce tool, chief among them a unification of online and offline experiences at each customer touch point. Let’s look at some of the greatest benefits of employing CloudCraze for your B2B e-commerce business.
Speed to Market
As opposed to legacy technologies that require hefty time and capital investments, CloudCraze is quick. With CloudCraze, you can quickly launch your e-commerce business and start accepting digital orders – in less than two months. ROI is quick and your organization can build a business case for projects in the future. Moreover, you don’t have to rebuild your commerce infrastructure to cater to changing market demands.
Affordable Scalability
CloudCraze’s multi-tenant environment allows you to free resources from handling infrastructure or license capacity. Instead of paying for the entire infrastructure, you pay for what you use. Because the platform automatically scales with your needs, you don’t need to worry about infrastructure. This means you can scale your business quickly on the cloud, and devote greater focus to revenue growth through the digital channel.
Powerful E-commerce Features
CloudCraze facilitates easy product and category searches. Customers can view all important information, down to a narrower category. CloudCraze also completely integrates with an AP through a middleware. Besides ordering, agents can use Salesforce’s partner community to control access for suppliers, customers, and distributors to the platform. CloudCraze can also be fully localized for B2B interactions in foreign countries – it supports 30+ languages and currencies.
Seamless Product Updates
With CloudCraze, you don’t have to look at costly custom-coded enhancements that are crucial for on-premise solutions. As opposed to legacy solutions that release major updates twice-thrice a year, CloudCraze features an agile and ever-evolving release calendar. Innovations and new features are introduced every one-two months. Thanks to Salesforce App Cloud, clients can quickly upgrade features and functionality.
Lower Maintenance Costs
CloudCraze allows you to focus on delivering quality to customers without having to employ expensive IT or DevOps resources. Since all the technology and resources you need are a part of the SaaS solution, your team can launch new products and expand business at a pace you are comfortable with. Because you don’t have to maintain your e-commerce infrastructure, you cut down on unnecessary costs. Moreover, the technology and human resources you need are part of your CloudCraze subscription. Built for modern businesses, CloudCraze efficiently supports new product launches and business model changes.
Salesforce’s B2B e-commerce offering promises a truly transformative journey for B2B players, irrespective of the industry. Embrace the power of the cloud and take your e-commerce business a notch up with CloudCraze.
Customer retention pays huge dividends, but with it being an uphill task, marketers find it a little invasive.
The truth, however, is that it pays off handsomely when you keep pace with customer retention strategies. Here’s a quote from a Bain & Company report by Fred Reichheld:
“… a 5% increase in customer retention produces more than a 25% increase in profit.”
Not many B2B marketers see customer retention as central to a business’s success.
Well, it’s worth knowing that retaining customers costs companies up to five times less than getting new ones.
In the B2B space, where the cost of contracts is significantly higher than B2C, the impact of customer retention is even more pronounced.
A Harvard Business Review research article by Frederick F. Reichheld and Phil Schefter bears our claim out by stating that customer acquisition costs push businesses into the quagmire of unprofitability.
Only by lowering costs per customer can a business turn into a profitable venture.
That happens with customer retention, as it turns a stray customer into a returning one. Trust between parties builds over time, and as their volume of purchases increases so does the ROI.
Customer retention strategies for B2B marketers
Let’s explore a few strategies for customer retention that B2B marketers can use right away.
1. Don’t let go of customers after they make a purchase.
A customer’s relationship with business doesn’t end with a purchase. A business’s long term relationship with customers begins with closure of a sale! If marketers see it as an end in itself, they’re committing a marketing blunder.
So, don’t let go off customers so easily. Forge lasting relationships with customers by delivering welcome emails. Share webinars and tutorials for their edification.
Adding value to their purchase is the first step to hook customers for a lifetime.
After understanding customer needs, a business can assign a qualified person or direct him/her to self-help resources available in order to cater to customers’ necessities.
Hearing your customers speak about their needs could help a business serve them better. Their likes and dislikes can prove handy in improving customer experience.
A tip on the house: Businesses must conduct surveys to get firsthand knowledge of how customers rate their services and draw from it conclusions as to what else they can do to rectify problems and set issues straight.
3. Segment your customers into different groups.
It’s imperative that loyal customers be segmented from freebies – who don’t convert after the free trial.
B2B organizations cannot launch a well-directed customer retention strategy unless they understand their customer base precisely enough to target them in a personalized manner.
That is to say, marketers know exactly which group to target with conversion campaigns and which for recovery by segmenting customers into groups.
4. Resort to metrics and analytics.
Metrics and analytics play a significant role in streamlining marketing efforts.
Businesses can understand how marketing efforts fare and how it impacts the outcome in real-time with the help of metrics and analytics.
Besides that, marketers get first-hand data about customer behavior. Measuring customer interaction can help marketers optimize marketing strategies.
Customer data comes handy in identifying strong and weak points of your strategies and help you eradicate hurdles coming between businesses and customers.
5. Aim for customer satisfaction.
Every frontier of customer retention begins with customer satisfaction. As a B2B marketer, assessing how the business’s deliverables fare in the sight of customers and how you can improve their experience further, is key to ensuring your customers return.
The more focused you are on catering to your existing customer base and doing everything in your capacity to make their experience better every time they turn up at your business, you can be sure of their lasting loyalty to your business.
After all, customer retention and customer satisfaction are intertwined – and let them be!
Conclusion
These customer retention strategies help B2B marketers expand their base of returning customers. Customer retention is central to scaling up a business.
But with that being said, turning visitors into loyal customers is not an easy task either.
So, have your eyes set on benefits to reap, not the complexity of the task. Customer retention strategies are not about end results.
Instead, it prepares you to improve customer experience. With it, customer acquisition costs go down.
Besides that, returning customers explore new products and provide feedback on how efficiently your business offers solutions to each customer’s problems.
Sales no doubt increase, but positive word of mouth is the real gain for businesses implementing customer retention strategies efficiently, and helps create goodwill among the masses toward a business.
For a long time, there was a popular misconception that unlike B2C selling, B2B does not need to put the customer at the heart of its strategy.
Today, B2B sellers realize the importance of a customer-first approach and that customer relationship greatly affect their businesses in the long run.
Customer-first omnichannel commerce is becoming increasingly important for B2B sellers. This is because many factors; measurable or immeasurable, tangible or intangible; are affected by it.
According to several studies, omnichannel investments by B2B players result in greater buyer satisfaction and loyalty.
There are innumerable advantages of embracing a customer-first omnichannel strategy if you’re a B2B player in the e-commerce space.
Evolving needs of the B2B buyer
B2B players are increasingly taking to e-commerce, which means sticking to a single channel is no longer an option.
According to Forrester, over 15% of B2B sales in the US will come from digital channels by 2021, a solid 15% increase in 5 years.
The good news is that e-commerce platforms can capitalize on omnichannel strategies better than any other channel.
On the other hand, technology adoption has led businesses to make purchase decisions like consumers, which means they want fast online transactions, order fulfillment, and personalized services.
Yet, B2B brands fail to offer the kind of omnichannel customer experience they need to.
Improving customer experience through an omnichannel strategy results in personalized attention which can boost revenue growth immensely.
Converting a single-channel B2B buyer into an omnichannel buyer can increase their spend significantly.
And, more corporate buyers use analytics tools to optimize purchasing, which sellers can leverage to predict purchasing trends and offer personalized services.
With the power of analytics, brands can gather and synthesize customer data to uncover behavioral patterns – a goldmine for sales opportunities.
Greater buyer satisfaction
B2B buyers today expect the same intuitive and personalized experience they receive in the B2C world.
An omnichannel strategy gives sellers the opportunity to make sure that their customers are satisfied and get what they really want.
It also succeeds in giving a B2C customer experience to B2B buyers, which further increases satisfaction with the purchase experience.
By properly responding to their buyers’ problems, sellers have the opportunity to build customer loyalty.
In fact, buyers will conduct online research even when buying offline, solidifying the need for an omnichannel commerce strategy.
Meeting customer expectations is an excellent reason for B2B brands to invest in omnichannel initiatives.
Another important reason to do so is to offer a consistent customer experience regardless of the channel since the customer lifetime value depends on a seamless commerce experience across all channels.
Building an omnichannel commerce approach
Building world-class omnichannel B2B commerce requires the right technology platform, qualified commerce professionals, and a solid customer-first mindset.
Therefore, B2B brands must differentiate their offerings in the age of the customer, delivering personalization across all stages of their journey.
Using technology to tap into the power of data to delight customers is no longer an option; it’s a requirement.
Because buyers expect to be engaged anywhere they are, brands should weave individual touchpoints together to deliver a seamless omnichannel experience.
Instead of organizing channels as silos, B2B sellers must adopt an enterprise-wide digital strategy to leverage their omnichannel capabilities.
To start doing so, embrace a powerful integrated technology platform that sits between and across enterprise systems and customer touchpoints.
Discern customer needs and predict buying behavior with the right tech suite. Put your customers first!
The success of nearly every business is dependent on its ability to attract and retain customers.
The B2C world has resorted to tailored customer experience to ensure customer retention. B2B companies, however, have mostly stuck to traditional marketing and customer interaction strategies.
While there is nothing wrong with maintaining some conventional aspects of B2B customer interaction, borrowing some customer service strategies from B2C companies can put a B2B company well above its competition.
Competitive Pressure
Overcoming competitive pressure is pivotal to the success of any B2B organization. Most traditional B2B companies focus on methods such as developing new products and offering competitive prices to do that.
However, competing in dimensions such as price may require you to compromise product quality – something that will drive away regular customers.
For this reason, many companies chose to modify customer interaction methods to gain an edge over their competitors.
Recent times have seen many small and big B2B businesses altering their IT infrastructure to accommodate better customer service technology.
Rather than making adjustments to products and prices, firms have started focusing on customer-centricity.
Modern Consumer and Digitization
In B2B marketing, customer relationships are believed to be extremely dynamic and often complicated. However, the old philosophy “the customer is always right” has stayed true even in business-customer interaction.
Several B2B companies have had to alter their business portals to suit the habits of their consumers.
Such altercations are essential for every brand that wants to stay relevant and successful.
In 2016, a Forrester Research study concluded that 40% of consumers “are willing to change spending patterns based on a single experience with a business”.
If your brand fails to make that first customer experience engaging, you might end up losing 40% of your valuable consumers.
For the past few decades, digitization has dominated every aspect of our lives, making it impossible for B2B companies to escape the realm of digital customer interaction systems.
When someone experiences a seamless online transaction fueled by massive digitization from one seller (be it a B2C or B2B seller), they become conscious of its efficiency.
These expectations include an attractive user interface, engaging website design, faster load speed, and hassle-free resolution of queries. When sellers fail to meet these expectations, they risk losing customers to a competitor who does.
Redefining Customer Service
Customer experience is no longer a transactional relationship where consumers call in to log complaints and businesses provide solutions to those.
Instead, predetermining possible product errors and customer behaviour to provide answers even before the customer asks a question is the new norm. Digitization of customer portals is nothing new to B2B firms.
However, the use of more advanced technologies, including artificial intelligence, augmented reality, and process automation to enhance customer experience haven’t been popular amid B2B brands until recently.
How to Use Digitization to Your Advantage
Utilizing AI technology enables businesses to determine customer behaviour more accurately. Modern customer service is based heavily on this behaviour.
Courtesy of increasing digitization and changing consumer behaviour, traditional B2B giants like KONE, Gap, and Intel have been forced to change their perspective on consumer interaction.
They have had to overcome their internal silos to ensure better service and increased convenience for their business customers.
To do this, Intel shifted its focus to customer-centricity in 2015, streamlining different product portals into a single-entry point and providing customized service dictated by automation.
For KONE and Gap, it meant gathering more operational data to improve future interaction.
Later, both of these brands utilized Salesforce technologies like service cloud and field service lightning to monitor product response and customer behaviour, thereby developing personalized support.
Personalization comes in several forms, all of which involve increased consumer participation while resolving problems.
Employing methods like chatbots and FAQs is becoming a popular way to improve the customer experience for many businesses.
Leveraging a customer service portal that is made for end-user consumption and solves basic queries without human interference is an effective personalization strategy.
The fundamental secret of implementing a useful customer portal is understanding the relationship you share with your clients.
Broaden your perception of customer service to include operational insights, personalized product recommendations, and increased convenience.
To gain a competitive advantage through your customer portals, employ advanced technologies to attune yourself to your customer.
A decade back, when CPQ (Configure, Price, and Quote) gained interaction, it was seen as a revolutionizing phase for Chief Revenue Officers (CROs), Sales personnel, and VPS. Now, when most industries are integrating machine learning to grow their businesses, why not CPQ?
In an article published by BCG, it was found that AI-driven CPQ platforms will help organizations increase their revenue by 5% in just nine months. AI assists to quote the most accurate price with suitable product bundles.
Automating tasks such as price quotations, user-experience analysis and other data intrusive work will reduce the risk of errors and help businesses divert manpower into something that requires human support. AI is apt for analysing big chunks of data in just a few seconds when combined with a robust Salesforce CPQ system.
The Salesforce CPQ software primarily helps businesses quote accurate pricing for orders, but when combined with AI, its power is tenfold. Artificial intelligence makes everything faster; its integration with Salesforce CPQ will allow businesses to understand user behaviour and offer them items that match their past sales trends.
Problems that Businesses might be facing using the regular CPQ
As we are adapting to more user-friendly technology, just using traditional CPQ and billing tools might not be enough to increase customer retention and grow revenue for businesses. It’s time that businesses must supercharge CPQ with AI and overcome some of the biggest problems mentioned below:
Lack of customer interactions, leading to lower closed deals;
Absence of personalized offers that the users might be interested in;
Higher up-front cost due to unavailability of efficient tools for handling a wider audience;
Single-price listing is not feasible for businesses with varied prices across regions or partners;
Inability to market content; just focused on selling;
Manual coding is required while making any changes;
Incompetence to synchronize omnichannel and multi-channel sales; and
No user insights to help businesses make the right decisions. Sales reps have to study extensive data to be able to come to a conclusion.
How AI-based CPQ helps to improve sales?
1. Real-time pricing quotations
AI-driven CPQ software identifies what customers are willing to pay in real-time and chooses the most appropriate product mix.
The technology helps in finding out the relevant discount percentage to make an appropriate quotation. Businesses try to maximize user experience by identifying their weak spots and offering the best product bundles.
Real-time pricing quotations functionality will also allow easy upselling and cross-selling which is super handy for b2b e-commerce businesses.
Moreover, it is much quicker than traditional methods and multiplies the chances of closing the deal. AI-based Salesforce CPQ places the right information on the dashboard within seconds, helping users choose the most appropriate quote.
2. Analyse user behavior to offer personalized quotations
According to research done by McKinsey, it was found that businesses that used user-behavioral insights outperformed 85 % of their competitors and generated 25% more gross revenue. This is because customer behavior plays a major role in identifying the best quote for the clients. The AI-based CPQ analyses every user’s purchasing pattern and comes up with a personalized quote that has the highest capacity of closing the deal.
3. Interact using chatbots
AI-Chatbots are much smarter than a regular messaging app. Customers can now directly ask questions through websites, email, or apps and get direct sales quotations. They don’t have to wait for a salesperson to get approval and then send them a response.
Also, chatbots are preferred by approximately 50% of online businesses, minimizing the risk of customer loss. As the conversations go, these chatbots also upsell and cross-sells, bringing in more sales.
4. Make adequate changes using AI-driven CPQ
Classic CPQ is not capable of capturing crucial information from databases to help CROs and VPs make regular quotation upgrades.
However, by integrating Salesforce CPQ solutions into b2b e-commerce, businesses can create an ecosystem that learns, implements, and relearns to offer the most accurate quote.
Powered by efficiency and accuracy, businesses get rid of unproductive user discounts and free up their financial resources. This price optimization technique through AI has resulted in increasing revenue by a substantial percentage.
5. Competence to scale up businesses
AI-based Salesforce CPQ solutions break all barriers while scaling up businesses. Here, sales reps are not dealing with per-user or per-transaction charges but rather unlimited quotations, which can be generated without any price raise.
This helps businesses scale up and create a multichannel and omnichannel path for a wider audience reach. AI CPQs is competent to work on extensive data to come up with the most optimal quotations.
6. Removes 70% of businesses administrative work
Traditional CPQs only forward the Bill of Materials (BOM) to either CRM (Customer Relationship Management) or ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning). However, this is definitely not the finish line for businesses dealing with 10-12 vendors simultaneously with different quotation parameters.
On the other hand, the Salesforce CPQ will gather past user information and dig through the insights to get the perfect quote within seconds. AI-based CPQ is already generating sales, therefore, manpower should be directed towards handling the administrative work.
Final thoughts
AI-driven CPQs are here to change the operational dynamics of businesses, helping them scale and get more business done. The Salesforce CPQ and billing system allows businesses to deal with multiple vendors without compromising the accuracy of the quotations.
One of the most important factors that any business should ensure when setting up is that it should never put a limit on its growth in any sector.
It should never close off any doors that lead to expansion of any kind just because it feels at that moment there is no chance of it happening.
With time, a lot of opportunities will appear and if a company is not ready to grab them and scale up, they will never get any further than their current state.
It is for this very reason that the B2B business solutions one chooses should have inherent scalability.
Salesforce has always been recognized as a premium B2B commerce solution. In fact, a 2016 study by the International Data Corporation (IDC) in the USA surveying 333 marketers revealed that among others, Salesforce was considered one of the cutting edge options for B2B solutions.
While it is primarily known for its CRM products and services, the lines have blurred. Today, Salesforce is the leading provider of B2B and B2C e-commerce solutions, sales and marketing products, and analytics services.
One of the main reasons behind its popularity is its ability to cater to businesses of all sizes, its flexibility, and scalability.
Salesforce B2B Commerce is especially highly sought-after. Its products and services are greatly suited for the kind of business that B2B represents.
Besides high customer-centrism, analytics-driven processes, and customizability, its capacity for scaling is very useful in providing tailored products to businesses of all sizes.
Whether you want a budget-friendly package or enterprise B2B solutions, Salesforce will be able to provide it for you.
Salesforce B2B Commerce Products for Scalability
When utilizing any B2B service or product, one of the properties you search for is its capacity to adjust to a whole circumstance, including the development of your business. Essentially,
It should not get collapsed in extensive conditions when there is a high volume of information being traded or a significant level of exercises being accomplished.
It should be adaptable and versatile to change the ways to deal with working together. In other words, regardless of what direction your customer comes to a decision to take to finish a transaction, the product should permit it without a hiccup.
It should be recyclable and reusable. Just due to the fact your organization has upgraded one of its business measures doesn’t mean you need to get a trendy product each time. A couple of changes should be sufficient to utilize similar items in new working conditions.
Last but most importantly, it should be truly scalable. What it means is that as your business grows with time, the product should not become bulky due to application of updates and make your operations slower. It should still operate with full efficiency after it has been scaled.
Salesforce, with its scope of items and administrations, guarantees precisely that. We will study how short scalability can be cultivated with the utilization of cutting edge Salesforce B2B arrangements.
Salesforce CPQ Solutions
Salesforce CPQ and Billing solutions streamline B2B payment solutions with automation and simplification. CPQ optimization plays a major role in making scalability more easily achievable.
When a company expands or grows, the nature and size of its monetary transaction change accordingly.
If their CPQ platform is not able to adapt to these changes, it can seriously hamper or even halt the new transactions that come with growth.
Expansion becomes a highly expensive process in that case, with the requirement of subscription to new B2B software solutions. Salesforce tackles this issue in an incredible manner.
1. Simplification of Complex Transactions
Salesforce CPQ makes the process of settling and completing complex deals easier and less confusing. Its configuration wizard breaks down the process of choosing the right products for your client into simple steps and guides you through the entire procedure.
The Solution Configurator, which helps you predefine pricing rules, and the Pricing Engine, which applies said rules in the required pricing model, makes it easier to generate individual, branded quotes tailored to a client.
2. Optimization of Repeat Business
Repeat business must be given equal importance as new clients during the scaling process.
This becomes easy with Salesforce. Contract negotiations, upsells, and cross-sells can be easily integrated into the pricing system without error or complications.
The renewal process is made simpler, even with the automatic incorporation of changes to the contract midway.
Moreover, sales agents have constant access to a client’s complete purchase history, allowing them to make more informed pitches.
3. Risk Management
Many B2B cashflow solutions slow down from compliance and compatibility issues that give rise to fatal errors and discrepancies during dynamic changes made in contracts.
Salesforce largely eliminates the chance of such complications by unifying the different parts of the sales funnel and maintaining real-time alignment to pricing rules, company policies, and product and client-based terms and conditions in contracts.
By consolidating related B2B solutions, sales can be undertaken with minimum risk and maximum confidence.
4. Customer Lifecycle Regulation
Customer loyalty is largely based on the ability of a business to fulfill the growing expectations of the client.
This implies that with time, a company must scale up its processes that cater to individual clients to prevent their churn in favor of more modern solutions.
Salesforce attains this by making the processes of order management and invoicing as straightforward and flexible as possible.
Electronic payments are made faster while customer data integration into the system is made quick and accurate to keep all allied operations and analytics running smoothly.
For more detailed insights, you can check out this page solely dedicated to Salesforce CPQ.
Salesforce Einstein
Salesforce B2B portal solutions are now powered by Einstein, an AI technology that leverages the power of ML, NLP, and advanced data science to let businesses scale more smoothly, no matter the type or size.
You can utilize Salesforce Einstein AI for scalability in the following ways:
1. Data Insights
Business data is vast. Every day, as more and more data is generated, and old and apparently insignificant data can get buried in the pile.
Clients interact with your company at a variety of points. Your B2B e-commerce solutions may not detect all of them. The absence of certain data in your analytics can skew your views about the market.
Einstein Analytics prevents this and provides quick access to the right data from every relevant source, including the Salesforce B2B cloud solutions to the right people, allowing better vision and decision-making.
2. Accurate Forecasts
Using Einstein AI, you can harness the power of machine learning and use to predict customer behavior and requirements more deftly using past data.
Accordingly, you can create a customized experience for them by configuring your B2B marketing solutions, customer service, and other CRM systems.
3. Planning and Guidance
Einstein makes Salesforce business process capture and decision-making more accurate without complicating it.
Having all the data in a simplified, easily visible form allows every employee to take the best step forward to engage the customer and simplifies the process of making customer interactions more intuitive.
4. Workflow Automation
If your systems are not automated, scaling will only overcomplicate every process and make them tedious.
By automating the process of customer data capture and integration of said data and derived insights into workflows, every business operation is streamlined to a high degree.
Moreover, Salesforce is best known for its B2B CRM solutions, so it is understood that AI chatbots will be provided for better customer service.
Salesforce AppExchange
The Salesforce AppExchange repository is like a treasure chest of B2B IT solutions.
You can get any product you want, and when you don’t, you can be the one to provide it. There are three specific ways you can use AppExchange to your advantage.
1. Apps
Apps on Salesforce AppExchange provide B2B global solutions, ie, they are not restricted to those using Salesforce for their business processes.
You will find applications for every industry and department a business can be in or have.
When you scale a business, it is natural that you will be required to extend your operations. These apps help you do that seamlessly.
2. Components
Salesforce Components are reusable modules providing a particular functionality that can be added out-of-the-box to your sites or apps. Components are quite useful when you require quick scaling.
Instead of having to build every functionality code by code from the ground up, you can simply use the ones provided by Salesforce.
3. Consultants
When you scale up a business, it is expected that you will not be very adept in using the systems usually associated with the higher level of operations involved.
To that end, you can hire the services of technical Salesforce business consultants who will use their knowledge of the industry and their expertise in Salesforce to help you with the incorporation or application of AppExchange solutions to your B2B platform.
Salesforce Quickstart Commerce Solutions
This is the newest offering from the Salesforce team to help businesses set up and scale quickly so that they can reach their customers more effectively during the COVID period when many businesses are on the wane.
The B2B e-commerce solutions under that are specially designed to impart greater power to business runners to grow and increase their ROI at every point.
If you are new to Salesforce, try Docmation Quick Start Solutions for Salesforce B2B Commerce for a seamless upgradation. Also, check out why it is even more important to Scale Up for Growth with Salesforce Commerce Cloud Quick-Start Solutions in these times.