A recent electrical wholesaling e-commerce audit of 200 electrical wholesale companies located throughout the U.S. found that when it comes to procurement experiences for their buyers, electrical wholesalers fall short in offering the kind of e-commerce procurement experience B2B buyers have come to expect.
Today’s buyers want to be able “to go online and check their distributors’ product availability, check the status of existing orders and place new orders for will-call”, according to Doug Chandler of Electrical Wholesaling Magazine.
Even though, 94% of the audited companies had websites, only a small few offered a fully functional e-commerce experience.
The audit evaluated the following e-commerce factors:
- E-commerce functionality
- Search and navigation
- Product information
- Checkout
- Shipping options
- Account management
- Customer service
From the audit we learned that many electric wholesalers are at the most basic stages of servicing customers through e-commerce and will need to make improving their e-commerce strategy a priority to keep up with their customers’ needs and wants.
