WooCommerce is flexible enough that you can use to set up an online retail store that scales as you gain more clients. However, if you plan on targeting wholesale customers, you’re going to need access to a lot of features that WooCommerce doesn’t include out of the box.
For example, WooCommerce doesn’t enable you to create wholesale customer roles or assign specific discounts to different types of customers. With those two features, you can create a wholesale website that caters to buyers big and small.
In this article, we’re going to talk about three big tasks you need to tackle to create a wholesale website using WooCommerce (and how to solve them). Let’s get to it!
1. Set Custom Wholesale Prices for Each Item
Although WooCommerce enables you to modify your product prices at any point, it doesn’t provide you with a lot of options when it comes to dynamic pricing.
By ‘dynamic’ pricing, we mean features such as being able to modify prices for specific user roles or offering special discounts for customers that purchase in bulk.
The easiest way to implement those features is by using plugins. If you’re a fan of coupons (but find WooCommerce’s options lacking), you can use Advanced Coupons:
The Advanced Coupons plugin enables you to implement all sorts of discounts on your store and it’s a great complement if you plan on targeting wholesale customers.
For example, you can use Advanced Coupons to offer special prices that trigger when customers add over X amount of an item to their shopping cart:
You’ll notice that coupon is configured to work for two types of users, and those are customers and wholesale customers. That last user role is automatically set up if you use the Wholesale Prices for WooCommerce plugin:
With this plugin, you can set a custom wholesale price for any WooCommerce product that you add:
Those prices will only work for wholesale customers and you get to decide who fits into that role. That way, you can avoid regular customers getting access to prices that they shouldn’t.
As you can see, user management is key if you want to create a wholesale website and that brings us to point number two.
2. Add Multiple Wholesale Customer User Roles
If you use the Wholesale Prices for WooCommerce plugin, it’ll automatically set up the wholesale customer user role for your website.
That’s an excellent start, but as your customer base grows, you’ll probably need to set up more targeted user roles.
For example, if you want to offer one price to clients that buy products by the dozen and another for those that buy in the hundreds, the best way to do that is by creating a tiered wholesale system.
The easiest way to add multiple dedicated wholesale user roles is to upgrade to the Wholesale Suite of tools which includes a lot more features than its free counterpart:
With the Wholesale Suite, you can add as many dedicated wholesale user roles as you want to your store. You can also set unique prices for each product and for each role.
More importantly, the suite also enables you to generate custom wholesale user registration forms. That means you can customize the registration process for your best customers from the ground up:
If you want to, the Wholesale Suite also enables you to approve user registrations manually. That’s important if you require wholesale customers to submit documentation before they can purchase from you.
3. Streamline the Wholesale Ordering Process
If you want your wholesale customers to stick around, you have to go a step further than just offering them the best prices that they can find. You also need to ensure the entire ordering process is as seamless as possible.
Since we’re talking about customers that order dozens or hundreds of products at once, optimizing your store’s ordering and checkout process to cater to them is a smart move.
There are several ways that you can do that. If you’re using the Wholesale Suite, you have access to the Order Form plugin. That plugin enables you to display you store’s entire catalog in a single page that’s easily searchable:
One fantastic feature that the plugin adds is that it enables customers to see how many items you have in stock. That’s excellent if you’re buying in bulk so you don’t run into errors by trying to add more products that the store can sell at the moment.
Once your wholesale customers find the products that they want, you can decide whether to let them pay using traditional WooCommerce gateways or submit a personalized invoice.
You can do that using the WooCommerce Invoice Gateway plugin, which enables you to invoice customers via your preferred accounting software:
Which approach to use should depend on what your customers prefer and what is easier for you from an accounting standpoint. Since you’re selling items in bulk, traditional gateways might not be the best choice in some cases.
Conclusion
If you want to create a wholesale website that’s successful, using WooCommerce is the perfect place to start. However, you’ll also want to complement plugin with other tools that make your wholesale customers’ lives easier.
Some ways to improve the wholesale experience in your store include:
- Set custom wholesale prices for each item.
- Add multiple wholesale customer user roles.
- Streamline the wholesale ordering process.
Do you have any questions about how to create a wholesale website using WooCommerce? Let’s talk about them in the comments section below!
