GBCORP BLOG · IT SERVICES
B2B Ecommerce Platform Development: Wholesale That Sells Itself
Wholesale customers order the same things every week, at their own price, on their own terms, and they phone because the website cannot do that. A B2B ecommerce platform is built around those four facts.
B2B ecommerce platform development differs from a consumer shop in what the customer is: a business account with several users, a negotiated price list, credit terms, an approval chain and a delivery schedule. GBCORP’s white-label marketplace and ordering platform is built for that customer, is in production for GBCORP clients supplying trade customers, and is configured for a new supplier within days at a flat monthly plan with no commission.
What a B2B platform contains
| Part | What it does | Where it lives |
|---|---|---|
| Accounts | Company account, several users, roles, approval limits | Console |
| Pricing | Price list per customer or tier, volume breaks, contract prices | Console |
| Ordering | Repeat last order, order templates, quick order by code, bulk upload | Customer app and web |
| Terms | Credit limits, payment on account or by card, due dates | Console |
| Fulfilment | Delivery schedules, partial shipments, back-orders | Console and driver app |
| Documents | Quotes, order confirmations, delivery notes, invoices, statements | Generated |
Customer-specific pricing
Each account sees its own prices, and only its own. Price lists, tiers, volume breaks and contract prices are set in the console; a change reaches the customer’s next order. Sales reps see the customer’s price list and margin beside it. No customer ever sees another’s price, which is the reason most wholesalers never put prices online.
Ordering the way trade customers order
Repeat last order in one tap. Templates for the weekly order. Quick entry by product code. A spreadsheet uploaded and turned into an order. Approval by a manager above a limit. A delivery slot from the supplier’s schedule. The order confirmation, delivery note and invoice generated and sent from the supplier’s own domain. The phone stops ringing for orders and rings for relationships.
Integration with what stays
Accounting for invoices and statements, stock for availability, a warehouse system for picking: each integration is scoped as its own item where the system has an API. Where it does not, the platform becomes the record and exports to the accountant. GBCORP decides this in the scoping week and never asks a supplier to keep two sets of books.
Configure or build
Distributors, wholesalers, manufacturers selling to trade and suppliers to hospitality fit the white-label platform and are live within days. Marketplaces with many suppliers, RFQ and tender flows, or complex contract pricing are custom B2B ecommerce platform development, scoped in a week and quoted per release on the same engine.
Checklist before launch
- Catalogue with codes, units, pack sizes and stock.
- Price lists per customer or tier, exported from the current system.
- Customer accounts with users, roles and credit terms.
- Delivery schedule and zones; partial-shipment policy.
- Which accounting and stock systems must stay and whether they have an API.
- The three numbers to watch: orders by phone, order value, days to invoice.
The numbers to expect
Live within one to five working days on the web, store listings after review, a flat monthly plan with no commission. Integrations priced as separate items. Customised or more complex functionality is quoted separately before any work starts.
A worked example
A food distributor supplies three hundred restaurants and takes orders by phone and message until mid-morning every day. On the white-label platform each restaurant gets an account with its own price list, its users and its delivery days. Restaurants reorder from a template in a minute, before the cut-off, and the order confirmation and delivery note are generated. Reps see their accounts’ orders and margins. Invoices sync to the accounting system. Within a quarter most orders arrive through the platform, the morning phone shift is redeployed to sales, and days to invoice fall because the invoice exists when the van leaves.
Quotes, tenders and contract pricing
Larger trade customers ask for a quote before an order, sometimes as a formal request with several suppliers. The platform handles a quote request per customer with the rep’s response, the customer’s acceptance and conversion to an order at the quoted prices. Contract prices with a validity period are configured per account and expire on schedule. Where a business runs many suppliers and tenders as a marketplace, that is the custom route on the same engine.
Reports a sales director reads
Orders and value by account, by rep and by product. Accounts ordering less than last quarter, which is the list to call. Margin by account against the price list. Back-orders and their age. Credit outstanding against terms. Days from order to invoice and from invoice to payment. Exports for finance. All of it live in the console, so the Monday meeting starts with the numbers rather than with collecting them.
The customer’s users and approvals
A trade customer is several people: the buyer who orders, the manager who approves above a limit, the accounts person who receives invoices, the site staff who receive deliveries. The platform gives each a user under the company account with the right role, so an order above the limit waits for approval in the app, invoices go to the right mailbox and delivery notes reach the site. The supplier sees who ordered and who approved, which ends the disputes at invoice time.
Questions we hear first
Can customers pay on account?
Yes. Credit terms per account, with card payment as an option and statements generated monthly.
Can reps place orders for customers?
Yes. A rep console places and edits orders on a customer’s behalf, at that customer’s price.
Does it connect to our accounting?
Where the system has an API, invoices and payments sync; otherwise exports are generated.
Can we also sell to consumers?
Yes. A retail price list and a public catalogue run on the same platform.
Where to start
The GBCORP Marketplace and Ordering Platform is the product; the GBCORP white-label app range shows the delivery and portal engines beside it. For the many-seller version, read the white label marketplace app explained.
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