It’s official: There are now more mobile users than desktop users, and B2B companies are forging the path when it comes to making the most of mobile readiness. In June 2014 at the IRCE e-commerce conference, 100 B2B companies were surveys and the results reveal that there’s “strong interest” when it comes to investing in mobile commerce, too, taking the mobile readiness trend to the next level.
Again and again, mobile commerce is topping the charts when it comes to preferred areas of investments for companies in e-commerce, particularly with B2B transactions. Each of the 100 companies surveyed sell products online, in both B2C and B2B capacities, but it showed that “mobile commerce” is one of the top three areas for planned investments, with web commerce and social media rounding out the top three. Email marketing and internet search were also contenders.
Survey says
The survey was conducted by EPiServer in Chicago, and even though mobile commerce was the top ranker for all companies, there was a significant favoring in the B2B crowd compared to e-commerce for retail. In total, 37 percent of companies surveyed noted they were solely B2B, 36 percent were solely e-commerce for retail, and 27 percent claimed they played for both teams. EPiServer mostly caters to B2B, but chose the venue as an ideal place for an in-person survey.
Of the B2B only companies, 26 said mobile topped their investment interests, followed by 19 that said web commerce, 19 that said social, 10 for email marketing, and finally nine for search marketing. In total, the 64 companies who claimed they were part B2B and part e-commerce for retail, 41 said mobile topped their investment preferences, 35 said web commerce, 29 said social media, there were 19 for email marketing and 19 for search marketing.
Making use of the results
The purely e-commerce companies, the biggest of the attendees, included 19 who said web commerce was their top pick but it was followed closely by mobile at 17 while 12 said 12 media and ten each said email marketing or search marketing. However, what’s interesting is that the results also suggest B2B e-commerce groups have some catching up to do when comparing sales percentage via mobile commerce to the success rate of e-commerce companies.
In the end, B2B only companies revealed that 20 percent admit they get 20 percent (or more) of their total sales from mobile platforms while 44 percent claim the same in the retail-only categories. Likewise, 44 percent of businesses catering to both retail e-commerce and B2B say that’s where their sales come from. The good news is that B2B companies are in the perfect position to boost these figures.
Increasing mobile sales
Mobile readiness is one of the best, fastest and most affordable ways to optimize mobile sales. Sometimes this means creating a separate mobile website, sometimes an app is best, and other times taking care of responsive design for an existing website is the best approach. Having a reputable web designer handling this transition can ease the process for any type of company.
