[{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BlogPosting","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2019\/08\/14\/b2b-customer-journey-cx\/#BlogPosting","mainEntityOfPage":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2019\/08\/14\/b2b-customer-journey-cx\/","headline":"The new B2B customer journey: Winning the moments that matter","name":"The new B2B customer journey: Winning the moments that matter","description":"The B2B customer journey is changing as buyers begin to expect B2C experiences at work. Smart B2B businesses are realizing new growth by adjusting CX.","datePublished":"2019-08-14","dateModified":"2023-03-29","author":{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/contributor\/paroma-sen\/#Person","name":"Paroma Sen","url":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/contributor\/paroma-sen\/","identifier":335,"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1fe6b3b2d90921fef2923a35bc8d88870d618452c85002de654f6df7eb407449?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/1fe6b3b2d90921fef2923a35bc8d88870d618452c85002de654f6df7eb407449?s=96&d=mm&r=g","height":96,"width":96}},"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"The Future of Commerce","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/logo-foc-schema-app-1.png","url":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/logo-foc-schema-app-1.png","width":172,"height":60}},"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/thumbnail-e8912d9843164d645516a0aabea963d7.jpeg","url":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/thumbnail-e8912d9843164d645516a0aabea963d7.jpeg","height":375,"width":1200},"url":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2019\/08\/14\/b2b-customer-journey-cx\/","about":[{"@type":"Thing","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/commerce\/b2b\/","name":"B2B Commerce","sameAs":["https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/B2B_e-commerce"]},{"@type":"Thing","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/commerce\/","name":"Commerce","sameAs":["https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Commerce","http:\/\/www.wikidata.org\/entity\/Q26643"]},{"@type":"Thing","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/marketing\/customer-engagement-marketing\/","name":"Customer Engagement","sameAs":["https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Customer_engagement","http:\/\/www.wikidata.org\/entity\/Q5196451"]},"Customer Journey","Future of Supply Chain",{"@type":"Thing","@id":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/sap-customer-experience-live\/marketing-live\/","name":"Marketing","sameAs":["https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Marketing","http:\/\/www.wikidata.org\/entity\/Q39809"]},"Sales Success"],"wordCount":1170,"keywords":["B2B Customer Experience","B2B Customer Journey","Consumer Journey","Customer Journey"],"articleBody":"When it comes to the B2B customer journey, do you feel your control on the product experience as a B2B professional is limited? Is the customer experience diluted or fractured because of your channel strategy? Do you wish you had better data and analytics surrounding consumer behavior to leverage for continual improvement?Chances are, the answer is “yes” to all of the above.Hey Siri: How did the B2B customer journey get so far off track?Ask a room full of B2B professionals, and your frustrations would no doubt be echoed far and wide.Here’s an example of a broken B2B journey:You’re a manufacturer of engine oil, but have no insight into how and why consumers pick your product over a competitor\u2019s. Your service delivery channel partners only give you aggregate information, and all the actionable insights of consumer purchase patterns are often lost because you don\u2019t have direct access to the consumer.Why and how does this happen?B2B companies have spent the better part of the last century improving and perfecting operations. Machine utilization, warehouse capacity, raw material, and finished goods inventory: All these and more have been examined ad infinitum by operations and finance experts. Every last cent that could be saved has been saved. The science of cost reduction has been perfected on par with technological capability today.But competitive pressures continue unabated, and the demand for stronger profit margins and healthier balance sheets means that B2B companies cannot rest \u2013 they have to look elsewhere for continuing profitability.Is this search for new areas of profitable growth just a mirage in the relentless desert of the B2B world?      Top B2B e-commerce challenges and how to overcome them                Here are the top B2B e-commerce challenges companies face when transforming their commerce model to meet the needs of today's B2B buyers.      Transforming the B2B customer journey from the funnel to moments that matterSmart B2B businesses are realizing new growth by reassessing their views of the business customer journey. In the past, organizations would orchestrate a series of pre-designed steps in an effort to move prospects from awareness to purchase to service. Along the way, the marketing, sales, and service teams would play their part.Thanks to the consumerization of B2B buyers, this linear, siloed approach no longer holds water. Their preferred journeys snake, shift, pause, and speed up on their terms.So, instead of a rigid focus on stages, B2B innovators are increasingly focused on winning moments that matter.These moments are exactly those customer touchpoints where experience gets created and solidified. Every touchpoint in the customer\u2019s journey with you \u2013 from being a marketing prospect, to a sales lead, to a service scheduler, to a production operator, or even a delivery professional \u2013is an opportunity for you to deliver a stunning experience and create a brand-loyal customer for life.      Best examples of B2B e-commerce: Companies winning the game                B2B buyers have changed. How are companies keeping up? Here are five brands that provide shining examples of B2B e-commerce.      The benefits of predictabilityTo achieve this mission, B2B market leaders are looking outside of operations. They’ve discovered that B2B buyers \u2013 like consumers in the B2C space \u2013 will pay more for experience; and not just a better one, but also a more predictable one.In many ways, B2B business hinges on predictability: Predictability of performance of a specific product, delivered at a predictable frequency, quantity, and location \u2013 all this predictability results in reliable outcomes and profits, and ultimately customer loyalty and shareholder satisfaction.However, predictability can be consistently delivered only when rich feedback is implemented in the system \u2013 data, analytics, and therefore insight, from the ultimate users and consumers of the products and services, flowing back to the manufacturing, distribution, and design processes.A three-pronged solution for a great B2B customer journeyTo be able to integrate these feedback mechanisms and deliver a consistent experiential interface to the world at large, B2B companies need a three-pronged approach:Make direct-to-consumer engagements a priorityConsider a business customer\u2019s entire journeyPrioritize solutions that break down silos between marketing, sales, and service      The future of shopping: Here we are now, entertain us                The future of shopping is entertainment. It's not enough to have an online storefront \u2013 brands must do more. Consumers today are looking for novel, immersive, and entertaining shopping experiences.      First, B2B businesses need to make direct-to-consumer engagements a priority. These engagements can range from social media interactions to robust e-commerce platforms that sell directly to consumers.They should also prioritize the consumers\u2019 data privacy by explicitly stating what data is being collected and the purposes for data processing. By setting up these trusted, direct channels, B2B businesses can collect the data and feedback they need to better inform the rest of their processes and not run afoul of data privacy regulations.Secondly, they should consider a business customer\u2019s entire journey. This means deploying the right technologies at the right touchpoints so customers can have trusted, personalized, and predictable experiences in every moment that matters.Remember: The journey starts way before a sale is actually made \u2013 sometimes even before a business manager articulates the existence of a problem.With business buyers doing the lion\u2019s share of their research before raising their hand to a sales rep, the onus is on you to identify online visitors as early as possible, begin building trusted relationships, and deliver personalized content.In addition, the B2b customer journey doesn\u2019t end when the contract is signed. Business customers expect personalized, trusted experiences to continue beyond the initial sale. This puts the focus on customer service and field service operations to maintain \u2013 and even deepen \u2013 customer satisfaction by making their engagements seamless, effective, and reliable.The third prong of the strategy addresses connectivity. Many times, B2B businesses struggle because of internal issues \u2013 knowledge and insights are not shared across teams, or information does not flow between groups because activities are carried out in silos.To solve this challenge, B2B businesses should prioritize solutions that break down silos between marketing, sales, and service operations.Following the above guidelines will help to create a virtuous B2B customer journey and cycle where:Sales teams get better leads thanks to access to rich marketing dataService teams can serve customers with more efficiency and accuracy thanks to improved access to sales informationMarketers can better identify potential brand advocates to showcase thanks to feedback received from customer service and field serviceFor customers, this connectivity results in less friction, faster and more accurate responses, more relevant content, and better experiences along every step of their journey. These winning moments will not only enhance their brand loyalty, but open up new revenue opportunities as well.  Digital selling.Interactive reports.Better outcomes.Try out the future of sales for free\u00a0HERE."},{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"2019","item":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2019\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"08","item":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2019\/\/08\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"14","item":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2019\/\/08\/\/14\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":4,"name":"The new B2B customer journey: Winning the moments that matter","item":"https:\/\/www.the-future-of-commerce.com\/2019\/08\/14\/b2b-customer-journey-cx\/#breadcrumbitem"}]}]