Long-term partnerships are key to scaling a B2B business. Repeat customers account for nearly half of a business's total orders – and 74% of B2B buyers would switch suppliers if another online store offered a better digital experience.
What distinguishes B2B from B2C customer service?
B2B purchases involve around ten stakeholders (global deals can stretch to 15+), compared to one person in B2C. The average B2B buying cycle spans 11.5 months, and B2B customers negotiate formal SLAs with response times of four to eight hours.
1. Qualify potential buyers before purchase
Save your sales reps' time by qualifying new prospects before onboarding. Build buyer persona documents that detail ideal company types, their social media presence, and industry. AI models can automatically approve or flag buyers based on credit risk.
2. Enable customer self-service
Create password-protected portals where buyers can view wholesale price lists, payment terms, and invoices themselves. Laird Superfood saved $50,000–$60,000 annually by dropping phone orders in favor of a Shopify portal, increasing wholesale sales from 25% to 75% of total sales.
3. Be proactive, not reactive
Automate the delivery of helpful content throughout the buying cycle: blog posts about pain points at the top of the funnel, webinar invitations in the middle, and case studies with ROI demonstrations towards the bottom. Use Shopify Flow to build automated workflows.
4. Offer omnichannel support
Buyers expect to engage across email, LinkedIn, live chat, and chatbots that resolve level-1 questions 24/7. Use a CRM platform to track messages on all channels and provide consistent answers.
5. Keep buyers updated on shipments
Integrate 3PL partners for automatic status updates. Integrate ERP software like NetSuite for visibility into shipments across the e-commerce platform, CRM, and inventory management system.
6. Promote your resellers' businesses
Resolve your B2B customers' pain points by promoting their businesses to your audience. This increases foot traffic to their stores and keeps them competitive.
7. Provide marketing collateral
Support resellers with retail displays, product packaging, high-quality photography, and product information. This resolves pain points and ensures consistent brand presentation across all retailers.
8. Collect feedback regularly
Track Net Promoter Score (NPS), customer satisfaction, and repurchase intent. Use customer feedback tools to collect both qualitative and quantitative data – and actually act on the insights you gather.
AI and automation for scalable support
Gartner estimates that by 2026, 80% of business software will have embedded generative AI. Shopify Inbox uses Shopify Magic to generate personalized responses that can reference negotiated prices and invoices directly from the company profile.
