Make your e-commerce website “sticky,” Bob Reynolds of INxSQL Software advised conferees at the National Industrial Fastener & Mill Supply Expo.

Thus your website needs to be “easy” to navigate, Reynolds explained. B2B websites need to have features such as customer cross referencing, search for past sales, suggesting similar items and quick ordering.   

The speed of using a website is vital, he emphasized. The customer wants to “be done and move on,” Reynolds finds.

Sometimes customers want multi-level categories or the ability for interface between customers and the supplier.

Reynolds cited McMaster-Carr Supply Co. as a “master” example of a e-commerce website: McMaster.com. He pointed to the product lists and search features and ability to order from history and tracking orders. 

Suppliers may offer discounts for customers ordering online and tracking. Online orders cut costs.

Michigan-based INxSQL has 260 North American customers.  

Software helps with immediate customer followup, Reynolds said – recalling the day when “it was a sin for a salesman not to have a business card and waiting more than two weeks to visit the inquiring customer.

It is important to understand what your customer wants, Reynolds advised. “Invest in the customer” and find out what the customer’s experience is on your B2B website.

It is not necessarily what the customer needs, but what “the customer perceives he needs,” Reynolds advised.

E-commerce is growing, Reynolds declared.   Grainger reports 85% of sales now come through its website.  Nearly two-thirds of suppliers now offer mobile apps, he added. Web: INxSQL.com

Reynold’s presentation was part of a series of half-hour sessions on the trade show floor.