Today, e-commerce has changed the game. Traditional approaches such as manual ordering processes and print advertising may still be applicable, but they’ve become less effective. Thanks to the internet and social media, we now have far more effective and modern online selling strategies. Small wonder online tools such as marketing automation and digital marketing have become the trend.
Needless to say, staying ahead of the pack requires you to keep up with and adapt to these changes. But how does this apply to you as an online wholesale store owner?
For your wholesale e-commerce business to succeed, you need to ensure that your customers enjoy a great ordering experience. This means providing them with an ordering system that’s not only fast, easy, and convenient but also conducive to their growth. After all, the success of your wholesale customers’ businesses is your success as well.
Therefore, you should determine the online tools you should use and the website improvements you need to make, as these can help you achieve such goals. For these reasons, today’s post will discuss the tools and strategies you can use to create a stellar ordering experience for your wholesale customers. In addition, we’ll talk about how providing shoppers with such an experience can benefit your business.
So let’s jump right into it!
7 Ways To Create A Great Ordering Experience For Your Wholesale Customers
Below, we discuss seven useful tools and strategies that you can employ to grant your customers a smooth and pleasurable ordering experience.
1. Wholesale Ordering Form
Having a wholesale order form installed in your online store makes it easy for customers to order wholesale from you.
As stated by Tradegecko, automating your product distribution and order management processes leads to “less waiting for busy retailers who want a simple, streamlined process.” As a result, these retailers will put “your company near the top of their lists of wholesaling firms to bring their business to.”
To take advantage of this kind of automation, we highly recommend installing a WooCommerce plugin known as Wholesale Order Form.
Simply put, Wholesale Order Form automates quick and efficient ordering for wholesale customers. In addition to giving you the tools to create wholesale ordering forms, this plugin:
- Displays your entire product catalog with wholesale prices
- Lets you set a notification for Minimum Order Quantities and other wholesale terms
- Boasts a responsive layout for on-the-go mobile and tablet ordering
- Allows your customers to enjoy an easier check-out process and faster page loading speeds
- … and so much more!
However, if you want the most comprehensive package of tools, you can get the Wholesale Suite Bundle, which includes Wholesale Order Form, Wholesale Lead Capture, and Wholesale Prices Premium. This is an excellent deal and an absolute must-have for anyone running an online wholesale store.
2. Accessible and downloadable PDF Documents
Ideally, you should provide your customers with all the information they need to make smart buying decisions.
For one thing, you should give your customers downloadable PDF documents such as your product line sheet, brochures, banners, warranty certificates, flyers, etc.
For another, it’s wise to display your product catalog, line sheet, and other pertinent data on your e-commerce store through the use of WooCommerce tools such as Wholesale Order Form. A study by Quartz discovered that people spend an average of 444 minutes (or 7.4 hours) every day looking at screens. This means that people generally prefer accessing data via their desktop computers, laptops, or smartphones.
When combined, these strategies let you save time, effort, and printing costs. Moreover, your wholesale customers can use the provided resources whenever they need to introduce, advertise, and promote your products to their clients.
For more on this technique, check out our post on the 7 Types Of Marketing Materials For Wholesale Customers.
3. Free shipping
Offering good deals and incentives can serve as the foundation of a good business relationship between you and any potential new customer.
One major problem wholesale customers face is the burden of delivery costs. And exorbitant delivery expenses serve as a major reason why many customers cancel orders.
To provide a solution to this issue, we recommend setting a Minimum Order Quantity (MOQ), then offering free shipping incentives to wholesale customers when their orders reach a certain volume.
Free shipping can influence customers to make additional purchases. After all, as stated by Manifesthq, relinquishing delivery costs is an excellent way to encourage higher spending among wholesale buyers.
Read our Ultimate Guide To Setting Up Free Shipping Restrictions In WooCommerce to learn more about free shipping!
4. Automation in every business transaction
As one of the greatest advantages e-commerce tools have to offer, automation, as Soliditech states, is a highly strategic enabler of business control and agility. This explains why leaving the traditional manual handling of business processes and taking advantage of automation has benefited many businesses.
Various business tools have been developed to automate managerial and transactional processes. For example, e-commerce platforms offer a wide variety of solutions for business essentials such as:
- Customer support
- Business marketing
- Online order fulfillment
- Generation of PDF invoices
- Product inventory management
- Business analytics
- … and a whole lot more!
For these reasons, we suggest scrapping those spreadsheets and embracing the superior alternative: an online system that lets you automate the most complex and labor-intensive aspects of e-commerce.
Taking advantage of automation will help you save time, energy, and money, thereby allowing you to focus on other important business tasks. Furthermore, your customers get to enjoy convenience and efficiency, giving them more reasons to keep doing business with you!
5. An easy, no-hassle payment system
According to Kissmetrics, the checkout page is critical. After all, the payment phase is the final stop for shoppers and is ultimately what makes a business transaction a success. Therefore, you should make it as fast and efficient for customers as possible.
As such, you should offer shoppers online payment options such as Paypal, credit cards, and the like. Thankfully, the best e-commerce platforms offer a wide variety of plugins and widgets that enable online payment on your website.
In addition to letting customers pay online, you should also give them the option to pay offline. This way, you cater to all of your customers. Offline payment modes include cash via meetups, bank deposits, remittances, etc.
Moreover, e-commerce tools such as Wholesale Order Form not only let you display your whole product catalog on one page but also come with essential wholesale tools such as Add to Cart buttons, search boxes, a responsive layout, category filters, and much more. All these features make purchasing your products more convenient and enjoyable.
In short, simplifying the payment process for customers can help increase conversions and sales.
6. Order updates
Typically, customers grow impatient waiting for the appointed day of delivery. This is especially true if you don’t give them any updates about said delivery.
Therefore, you should keep your customers informed about the status of their orders. From the placement to the fulfillment of said orders, make sure to give them news about every stage of the transaction. This creates the transparency required to build customer trust.
We suggest sending notifications about the transaction stages via email or text. In addition, you can automatically send them invoices through email. Remember: communication is a critical factor in establishing human relationships – a fact that applies to businesses as well.
7. Excellent customer service
Your job doesn’t end after a transaction has been made. It is also your responsibility to help your customers sell the products they bought from you.
Providing the right tools and resources to your wholesale customers is a way of telling them that you care about them and the success of their business. When things turn out right thanks to your help, you’ll encourage them to keep buying from you.
Furthermore, to provide excellent customer service, you need to give your wholesale customers an easy way to reach you. Thus, use your website to give customers access to a Contact Form, through which they can submit queries, suggestions, and complaints. Consider creating an email account that customers can use to directly contact your Customer Service Department. You may even offer to communicate with them via LiveChat so that you can respond to their concerns immediately.
These measures can help provide a positive online shopping experience, thus boosting customer loyalty and encouraging repeat purchases.
Going the extra mile
Always keep in mind that providing your customers with an excellent ordering experience is vital. After all, it’ll make doing business with you extremely pleasant and your store itself far more memorable, both of which can convince customers to purchase from you repeatedly. In other words, having the initiative to go the extra mile for the benefit of your customers can elevate your business to greater heights.
This brings us to…
4 Major Reasons Why You Should Ensure a Great Ordering Experience For Wholesale Customers
So, what exactly are the benefits of having your wholesale customers enjoy a great ordering experience? Let’s find out!
1. Greater exposure
Today, most people use their mobile phones and computers when searching for products they want to buy. For this reason, having a website ensures that your wholesale store can be easily found online, thus exposing your business to more potential customers.
This, of course, leads to…
2. More customers
As your store gains exposure, hundreds or even thousands of people will visit it. Needless to say, this is great for business. However, to take full advantage of this flood of visitors, you need to be able to track, contact, and keep potential leads, especially wholesale customers.
To ensure that you capture quality leads, install the Wholesale Lead Capture plugin. This tool automates the recruitment and registration of wholesale customers. Plus, it lets you separate regular customers from wholesale customers. This tool provides a dedicated login page for wholesale customers so that they can avail of wholesale prices and amazing deals from you.
3. Increased sales
The more customers you have, the greater your sales.
In addition, the fact that online ordering makes the ordering process easier contributes to a boost in sales. According to research by Kissmetrics, one of the reasons why most online shoppers don’t make it past the first step of checkout is because of the website’s poor user experience. In other words, making your website easy to navigate and use is crucial. A website that boasts a section that specifically caters to the needs of your wholesale customers can especially be helpful if you plan to sell wholesale.
4. Customer loyalty
So, what’s one of the best outcomes of providing an excellent ordering experience? You strengthen their trust in you and convince them to stay loyal to your store, leading to them becoming regular sources of income.
A great ordering experience also encourages loyal customers to give you great reviews. According to studies, 93% of consumers claim that online reviews influence their shopping choices. In other words, customer loyalty can do wonders for your reputation, which, in turn, can attract new potential customers to your store. Indeed, the best marketers for your business are your satisfied customers.
Supplying your wholesale customers with the tools they need to succeed is a great investment. As they say, “You reap what you sow.” So be good to your customers to enjoy amazing results!
Conclusion
Providing your wholesale customers with a spectacular ordering experience is crucial if you want your business to grow and succeed.
To recap, you can use the following strategies and tools to ensure the best ordering experience for your wholesale customers:
- Wholesale Ordering Form
- Accessible and downloadable PDF Documents
- Free shipping
- Automation in every business transaction
- An easy, no-hassle payment system
- Order updates
- Excellent customer service
And these are the benefits you can expect to enjoy when you use such tools and strategies:
Do you have any questions about how to provide your wholesale customers with a fantastic ordering experience? Let us know in the comments section below!
