Fluid Commerce and Hokodo reveal the Top 50 UK B2B ecommerce brands on Magento Open Source and Adobe Commerce.
In the third annual edition of the Top 50 B2B Ecommerce Report from Fluid Commerce, there has been significant changes of who is leading the pack, and who is falling behind.
Analysing the leading UK B2B sites for evidence of ecommerce excellence, the report reveals:
- Which B2B brands are excelling at ecommerce in 2023
- What tech to invest in to reach – or stay – at the top
- How to create an outstanding product page
- Who is excelling at payments & checkout
- Examples of ecommerce best-in-practice
The Post-pandemic Landscape
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, increasing numbers of B2B merchants had begun to turn their attention to their ecommerce sites. Once the pandemic hit, this slow growth accelerated at full speed.
As buyers and sellers could no longer meet in person at physical stores, merchants had to adapt – and quickly. The pivot to working from home helped to expose – and develop – new technology that was dedicated to supporting remote business.
Combined, this meant that brands had to adapt, or face losing out to competitors who embraced the rapid digitisation of B2B commerce.
Now, nearly three years on from the start of the pandemic, life may largely be back to normal, but the switch to B2B ecommerce is irreversible.
The Movers & Shakers
In 2023, there were three B2B retailers who increased their score dramatically year-on-year:
- Dental Sky climbed up from 24th to first place
- Trutex grabbed second place, up from 39th
- R Tech moved up from 48th to 8th place
In order to move up the ranks, they each invested in several critical areas of ecommerce best practice. These included:
- Speed
- Search
- Checkout
- Product page imagery
- Checkout
Key Growth Areas
In reviewing the data from the three annual B2B Top 50 Ecommerce Reports, there are three key areas of ecommerce best-in-practice criteria that stand out: Speed, Trust and Search.
It is in these areas that B2B merchants have invested most of their time and resources in order to improve their online stores.
Speed
Using Google PageSpeed Insights, which produces a score out of 100, our analysis found that there has been a 22% increase in the average speed of websites on desktop and mobile between 2022 and 2023.
This builds on a 21% increase between 2021 and 2022.
| 2021 Report | 2022 Report | 2023 Report | YoY % Change 2022 v 2023 | |
| Average Desktop Speed | 47 | 57 | 70 | 22.8% |
| Average Mobile Speed | 20 | 27 | 33 | 22.2% |
The need for improved speed is something that we have long emphasised as an agency, launching our PWA service at the start of 2022, and recently announcing our partnership with Hyva.
Today’s B2B customer expects a rapid online service, from page load speed to customer service to checkout – nothing should stop or slow them down in finding what they need and placing an order.
Trust
Demonstrating trust on your website is a hugely important conversion tool. Customers who are new to your store will look for trust signals to reassure them that your brand is reputable, your products are good quality and that they will receive good customer service.
In our analysis, we look for reviews on the home page and product page, as well as reassurance messaging or icons on the homepage. Examples of reassurance messaging include:
- Credentials
- Awards
- Affiliations
- Memberships
- Finance offers
- Years of service
- Price matching and so on.
With 92% of brands including reassurance messaging in 2023, up from 80% the year before, trust has proved a key area for improvement for most B2B brands:
| 2021 Report | 2022 Report | 2023 Report | YoY% Change 2022 v 2023 | |
| Reassurance Messaging on Homepage | 58% | 80% | 92% | 15% |
| Reviews on Homepage | 54% | 66% | 76% | 15.2% |
Search
Perhaps the most significant area of improvement for B2B Magento merchants has been in search.
In 2021, just 32% of merchants offered a dynamic search – one that returned search term recommendations of categories, blogs etc as well as product recommendations. In the most recent report, this has jumped to 86%.
| 2021 Report | 2022 Report | 2023 Report | YoY % Change 2022 v 2023 | |
| Dynamic Search | 32% | 54% | 86% | 59.3% |
Dynamic search is an essential tool to help customers navigate your site. In the B2B sector, many users know exactly what they are looking for and want to get to it straight away.
By having a sophisticated AI-powered search on your site, not only can you provide this product to the user, but you can also use it to showcase related products to improve your average order value.
Why Adobe Commerce for B2B?
Magento and Adobe Commerce are designed to help B2B ecommerce businesses succeed. Unlike other platforms, Adobe Commerce offers integrated B2B capabilities such as:
- Customised catalogues and pricing
- Personalised experiences
- Self-service customer portals for easy account management and ordering.
See it in action for the Stone Group here.
To find out more about Adobe Commerce for B2B, visit https://www.fluidcommerce.co.uk/services/magento-2-ecommerce/b2b
To download the B2B Top 50 Ecommerce Report, visit https://www.fluidcommerce.co.uk/2023-b2b-top-50-ecommerce-report/
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