How three B2B sellers migrated to Sana from Shopify to streamline e-commerce

    Intro

    Three unique companies, three frustrating experiences with Shopify

    Three companies from very different verticals sought to migrate from Shopify to a platform that supports ERP integration to enhance the B2B buying experience, including:

    • A global military support provider aimed at streamlining the quoting and bidding process.
    • A stock box provider servicing the Salt Lake Area that had to adapt to changes in customer demand and behaviors during COVID.
    • A water sports equipment seller that wanted to offer a one-stop-shop experience for retailers to purchase premium brands.
    PR

    The challenge

    The challenge: Shopify offered limited capabilities for B2B growth

    All three companies were frustrated with their e-commerce platform, Shopify. Shopify offered limited out-of-the-box features and did not provide true ERP-integration. This required complicated workarounds and manual data entry to keep the businesses’ ERPs and web stores in sync.

    The mission support provider sells to the military and must navigate a complex bidding and approval process. It needed to consolidate multiple systems and move to a single stack approach. Unfortunately, Shopify didn’t support a tight enough integration between their e-commerce site, ERP, and their accounting software Quickbooks to allow this company to handle their complex business needs. The manual processes led to many errors that required re-ordering, putting strain on the sales reps and increasing operating costs.
    Sana Commerce Team

    Additionally, Shopify didn’t have a built-in quoting feature that allowed customers to put products in the cart, generate a quote for internal approval, and lock in the pricing to ensure that the approved amount matched the final payment. Even though the company could purchase a Shopify add-on, the ERP integration would require additional engineering time and costs. The company needed a simple, integrated quote tool that could accommodate the complex needs of their customer’s lengthy approval process. Shopify’s solution came up short.

    Meanwhile, the pandemic accelerated the need for the stock box provider and water sports equipment seller to have a robust web shop to service customers who wanted to get quotes or place their orders online any time instead of picking up the phone. At the end of the day, they needed a platform that could be managed by a small e-commerce team of one to two people, freeing up their sales team to focus on growing their business and customer relationships.

    The solution

    The solution: Built-in features streamlined the B2B experience

    The companies migrated to Sana in 2020 to integrate their ERP with their e-commerce platform for a modern B2B customer experience. The deployment process went smoothly, and they launched the new, ERP-integrated web stores in less than four months – a tight turnaround for a complex undertaking.

    The mission support provider implemented a purchasing process that addressed their customers’ needs, met the complex requirements of military contracts, and enabled sophisticated integration with various systems and software.

    Our solution streamlined the quoting and approval processes: customers could now add products to the cart, but instead of checking out, they could configure all the purchasing options, receive a quote that includes shipping costs and lock in the pricing all in a matter of seconds as they went through internal review and bidding processes.

    Upon approval, buyers would simply visit the customer portal to download the quotes, reference the content, or place their orders. The clean and intuitive user interface allowed users to easily compare bids and convert a past purchase into a re-order to save time and simplify workflows.

    For the sporting equipment seller, Sana set up the platform to integrate with their ERP to assign product character categories across different brands. Through this integration, products that are frequently purchased together (such as a surfboard with a specific tether) can now be grouped within the ERP, and customers are given the ability to purchase them individually or as a kit.

    Since product grouping in the ERP is a standard out-of-the-box feature on Sana, no customization was required — reducing deployment time while allowing the retailer’s small e-commerce team to manage the web store easily. This feature makes it easy for customers to find products that complement each other from different brands. It also helps the seller drive cross-sell and upsell to increase the average order value.

    The results

    Real-time ERP integration boosted efficiency and customer satisfaction

    The quoting feature was a big success for the mission support provider. They can now provide real-time, accurate quotes in a competitive industry riddled with red tape. Meanwhile, our ERP integration and product grouping capabilities have allowed the sporting equipment seller to effectively manage their inventory based on real-time ERP data to augment the customer experience.

    Sana’s seamless ERP integration and robust customer portal has enabled these companies to deliver a modern B2B experience without a large team. Buyers can get quotes and purchase directly from the sites with minimal assistance from the sales reps while still keeping customers satisfied and loyal.

    In turn, this reduces the stress on the sales and customer service teams, who can now focus on resolving more complex requests, going after new business, and building customer relationships.

    Explore how similar companies have found success

    Creating customized commerce solutions

    Sana Commerce Cloud can take your company’s e-commerce to the next level with modern, customizable solutions.