12 Expert Tips To Help Grow Your Wholesale Business

Wholesaling business model has grown significantly in recent months. Statista reports that total monthly sales of wholesalers in the U.S. amounted to $696 billion in May. Wholesaler sales increased to four billion dollars from April.

To grow your wholesale business just like these sellers, follow useful recommendations from industry experts. We’ll present you with twelve such expert opinions to assist you in increasing your sales.

Move Your Wholesale Business Online

Chris Shalchi, President and CEO of Mavecca Group

The revolution of digital technology has changed the way businesses operate now. It has transformed relationships between businesses and clients. It has also changed the traditional ways of operating businesses. B2B businesses should adapt to digital trends to survive in today’s market.

Customers prefer online shopping due to its simplicity. They can easily access information with mobile applications, social media platforms, and more channels. Buyer expectations have evolved.

Digital technology has benefited businesses in the following ways:

Future buyers will not only prioritize but insist on buying online. Online shopping is gradually becoming the new norm of purchasing for B2B buyers. It saves your time and streamlines your buying process.
B2B eCommerce lets buyers and sellers enjoy a better shopping experience online. Provide your buyers the online platform which they crave for. Customers enjoy buying online while you gain valuable insights into your customers’ buying experience.
Your digital platform allows you to cross-sell and up-sell products. You can increase your customers by easily reaching out to maximum people. This will assist you in implementing personalization. You can suggest products to your customers which are relevant to their requirements.
Your online platform provides you with useful data regarding your customers. With the analytics of your customers and sales, you can devise strategies. You can bring important changes to your business based on available data analytics.

Now to increase their sales, B2B businesses should:
Produce captivating content such as customer testimonials and research-based articles to educate and engage their customers.
Conduct meetings between sales and marketing teams to work together to improve customers’ buying experience.
Acquire important data related to customers to follow up with new plans to meet customer requirements.

Sell on Online B2B Marketplaces

Nadeem Ballaj, Founder & CEO of SeeBiz

Online B2B marketplaces are currently the fastest growing digital sales channel. Last year, the collective sales of these marketplaces amounted to $56 billion as per Digital Commerce 360.

B2B marketplaces are providing tough competition to traditional wholesalers. Marketplaces are growing due to sellers and buyers rapidly subscribing to these platforms. The reason is that marketplaces provide many benefits to sellers including:

Assist you in setting up a digital storefront for your business
Facility to negotiate prices and offer deals to buyers
Outreach of your business to a wide range of buyers
Reduction of operational costs with automated payment and shipping
Promotion of your business via:
> Emails
> Marketplace homepage
> Search engines
> Social media platforms

Provide Excellent Customer Service

Josh Kohlbach, Founder and CEO of Rymera Web Co

Strengthen relationships with your current buyers instead of investing time and capital in acquiring new customers. Elevate the standard of your customer services to achieve this goal.

Employ accountable, apologetic, empathetic, and professional behavior while dealing with your customers. Providing an overwhelming buying experience to buyers on your website can also improve your customer service. Enhance user experience on your website by:

Letting buyers track the progress of their orders
Simplifying order placement for your buyers

Great customer support and buying experience keep customers happy and retain them.

If you add good customer support features to your website you can easily attract new buyers. For example, adding a live chat feature on your website is an effective customer support technique. You can provide instant responses to customer queries through live chat. Your assistance can help buyers in their buying process.

Provide Special Discounts To Buyers

Jacqueline Wibowo, Investor at Whale Rock Capital Management LLC

Incentivize your buyers with special daily, weekly or monthly discount offers. You will benefit from these offers as your sales will increase quickly. It leaves a good impression on your buyers. They will place more orders to save money and increase their profit margin.

The wholesale model itself offers cheaper prices per unit in bulk orders. You should offer incentives on top of that to please your buyers.

Attracting new customers is as important as retaining current ones. Offer them special discounts on buying from your company for the first time. This increases the possibility of buyers coming back to buy from you.

Create a Modernized eCommerce Website

Jake Rheude, Director of Marketing at Red Stag Fulfillment

The number of sales is increasing on online platforms. Wholesalers running businesses digitally are giving tough competition to traditional wholesalers. The reason is that eCommerce wholesalers are entertaining customer needs and demands.

They’re presenting high-resolution product images and modernized product pages. They build attractive landing pages on their website by adding amazing content. These include specialized discount offers, testimonials, and free shipping on large bulk orders.

Wholesalers have modernized their product catalogs just like the B2C marketplaces. Improve your website standards by adding:

Extensive product descriptions
Accurate answers to frequently asked questions (FAQ)

Implement Personalization

Andrew Butt, Co-Founder of Enable

Customers expect wholesale businesses to understand their needs and fulfill them. A majority of customers prefer to buy from businesses that provide them with personalized buying experiences.

Wholesalers have strong business relationships with suppliers which result in expertise and knowledge of the industry. They are well informed about shipping costs, order fulfillment duration, and other relevant aspects of the business. This lets them provide better-personalized services to their buyers.

Wholesalers should use their vast experience in the industry to provide a tailored experience to buyers. They should improve their fields of business such as:

Customer Support
Inventory Management
Order Fulfillment

Streamline Processes

Ling Wong, Content Experience Strategist

Simplify the buying process of customers by automating operational tasks such as:

Order Placement
Payment
Shipping

Streamlined processes are essential to convert potential leads into sales and retain existing customers. These processes reduce the chances of errors and delays in order fulfillment. It reduces time and costs for your buyers. It improves your customer retention rate.

Use Omnichannel Marketing

Paula Chiocchi, CEO of Outward Media, Inc.

The COVID-19 pandemic changed the buying process for B2B customers. Lockdown enforced social distancing and the trend of communicating online flourished.

Businesses that were already using digital channels gained a competitive edge over other sellers. Video conferencing also became commonplace. B2B eCommerce began growing.

It has paved the way for omnichannel marketing to succeed. Omnichannel marketing is essential for the growth of your wholesale business in the modern age. There are four reasons for it:

As per McKinsey & Company, B2B buyers use more than ten digital channels to communicate with sellers. The number of channels has doubled in the past five years. B2B marketers need to use multiple channels to promote their products and services. They should also improve the quality of their marketing campaigns and content for effective results.
B2B buyers prefer to use multiple ways of buying. It includes visiting physical stores, communicating remotely, and using self-service mediums. It provides them with more flexible options during their research and buying process. B2B marketers should use multiple channels to plan their marketing strategies and produce content. Brand testimonials are useful in improving the trustworthiness of your brand.
Brand loyalty is in jeopardy. The majority of B2B buyers look to switch brands if sellers do not entertain their needs. Use data to search for and identify buyer needs. Facilitate their needs to increase buyer loyalty toward your brand.
A section of B2B buyers is willing to spend $500,000 or more to buy via digital sales channels. Digital channels are not just a source of communication or providing and gaining information. These channels have also become important sources for online shopping.

Present Testimonials

Neil Patel, Digital Marketer and Founder of NP Digital, UberSuggest and CrazyEgg

B2B buying is more complex than B2C. There are multiple entities involved in the B2B decision-making process. Demonstrate the value of your product or service to convince them.

It is possible by presenting testimonials of your buyers who have used your products or services. Their experience inspires new buyers to buy your products or avail of your services.

Automate Inventory and Order Management

Jay Black, Sales Executive at IBM Sterling

The supply chains slowed down in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It led to businesses taking a digital approach.

Manual inventory and order management are not reliable in an era where businesses are shifting online. It is increasing business costs and causing human errors and delayed order fulfillment.

Automate your inventory and order management by implementing management software. Management automation reduces your time and costs.

There are many benefits of using inventory and order management software including:

Accepting sales orders from multiple digital channels
Providing accurate real-time information about your inventory
Streamlining payment process
Tracking the progress of your orders

Produce Captivating Content

Todd Stansfield, Content Marketing Manager at Entrepreneur

Content marketing is important to generate leads and grow your B2B business. There are the following reasons:

Today’s B2B buyers prefer to search content on digital channels instead of communicating with sales representatives.
There are multiple decision-makers involved in B2B decision-making. These teams collectively consume 24-50 pieces of content before making a decision. Thought leadership in your content helps to attract and inspire buyers.
Content marketing helps to spread brand awareness even before you launch a product or service. Companies can benefit by producing blogs and email marketing campaigns in advance to target customers.

Ensure Quick Order Fulfillment

Zev Herman, President of Superior Lighting

B2B buyers want to receive their orders quickly. They’re even willing to pay more for that. Fulfill your orders quickly. It improves your relationship with your buyers. It also boosts your sales.

Conclusion

These recommendations by industry experts are important for your operational and marketing strategies. You can essentially expand the outreach of your wholesale business.

Author Bio:
Usama Saleem is a Search Engine Optimization Executive at SeeBiz Inc. He is a business analyst who helps companies to improve their search visibility and grow their business sales and revenue.

This is a Contributor Post. Opinions expressed here are opinions of the Contributor. Grindsuccess does not endorse or review brands mentioned; does not and cannot investigate relationships with brands, products, images used and people mentioned, and is up to the Contributor to disclose.