B2B consumers are well-versed in digital. Many work remotely, and almost 90% of B2B sales have moved to a virtual model. With that shift, the importance of digital channels for B2B organizations has grown significantly.

When it comes to digital commerce, B2B consumers have increasingly high expectations. They are accustomed to intuitive, self-guided experiences at every stage of the ecommerce journey—and they know they have other options if you don’t deliver.

To create an ecommerce website that performs, you have to understand the needs, wants, and expectations of your specific customer segments. And this can’t be figured out around a boardroom table. Your ecommerce strategy needs to be based on actual customer data.

How to collect customer data

Most businesses have long-held assumptions about who their customers are and how they shop, communicate, and make decisions. Now more than ever, it’s time to put those assumptions to the test. What do you know about your customers? How have they evolved over the years? You won’t know until you conduct a customer segmentation study.  

Start with qualitative research 

Customer segmentation studies uncover institutional “knowledge” and pressure test it against real customer feedback. Using interviews or focus groups, you will identify the long-held beliefs of your organization. You’ll compare and contrast them, find themes, and identify conflict.

Nothing uncovers alignment (or misalignment) better than talking to your stakeholders. Before you implement or update ecommerce, speak to decision makers from each department—from the C-suite, IT, marketing, product, customer services, finance, human resources, and more.

The goal is to uncover what they believe is important to your organization, customers, and ecommerce website. You will use these insights to benchmark where you are today versus where you need to be with the project.

Listen to the voice of your customer

You can find ample data online about your industry, but your customers are unique. They buy your products for a reason—and you need to know why.

It’s one thing to read about broader audiences in your category. It’s another to survey your customers directly. Why and where do they buy from you? What do they expect? What are they not getting that they wish they were?

For example, OEMs sometimes lack a full understanding of their end customer because they lack visibility into dealer interactions.

Illustration showing an example OEM (original equipment manufacturer) value chain. Sometimes, OEMs sell to dealers. Other times, they sell direct to end consumers. Ancillary players in the game include parts suppliers, component suppliers, distributors, part retailers & wholesalers, and independent service providers.

The goal with a customer segmentation study is to identify your unique customer segments—and your most profitable opportunities.

  • Which customers are most valuable to your business?
  • How can you serve them better?
  • How can you get them to spend more with you?
  • Who are your promoters? How can you leverage their positive experience?
  • Who are your detractors? What can you do to improve their experience?
  • How can you grow your other customer segments?

Apply customer data to your ecommerce strategy

Often, businesses invest in research but struggle to turn their insights into action. Don’t let the momentum fade after collecting all that data. If research is the critical first step; application is the second.

Customer segmentation data should be used to inform your ecommerce strategy. From your wireframes to your content, specify who is expected to use it and what problem you’re trying to solve. This ensures that your ecommerce site anticipates the needs of your audience.

Ecommerce personas

Personas get a bad rap. Often, they’re created with broad brush strokes, based primarily on assumption, and colored with flowery, irrelevant stories. This type of persona isn’t helpful because it isn’t rooted in reality.

Personas should be accurate representations of your customer segments. No made-up stories or heuristics. Personas are snapshots of your actual customers, backed by data.

They should summarize how different customer groups want to engage with your brand and what they expect. There are no hard or fast rules about what type of data personas should include—demographic, psychographic, attitudinal, behavioral. If the data is useful and representative of a customer segment and practical for the business, include it.

Diagram showing an example persona introduction slide—a Fleet Supervisor. It outlines his job title and company description, as well as what he’s responsible for.

Diagram showing an example persona slide. It summarizes a Fleet Supervisor’s priorities, motivators, barriers, and how to reach him. It shows his estimated annual budget, average price he pays for equipment, his most common purchases, and his must-haves. It also shows details of his relationship with the company, i.e., how long he’s been a customer, his Net Promoter Score, and his fleet size.

Ecommerce journey maps

If personas are a snapshot in time, buyer journeys give you the panoramic view. Ecommerce customer journey maps tell the lifecycle story of each persona. They illustrate preference across the conversion funnel, from awareness to consideration, to purchase, and beyond.

With journey maps, you can see at a glance when each group of customers wants to engage with your brand, what questions they have, and what information they need at every phase.

Because these maps are backed by data, you can use these insights to inform the architecture and functionality of your ecommerce website.

  • Why are customers visiting your site? At what stage in the conversion funnel?
  • What information do they expect to find?
  • What do they want to accomplish on your site?
  • How do they prefer to contact you?

Whether the differences across your customer segments are subtle or significant, they’re critical in planning for ecommerce. Journey maps can help your business identify the specific needs of each customer type and highlight what you should do to optimize their experience with your brand.

Diagram showing an example customer journey map. This diagram shows the process a Fleet Supervisor goes through from the time he identifies a need for a new piece of equipment, through research, configuration, negotiation, purchase, delivery, and ownership. The journey follows the persona’s need through end of life of the machine.

Ecommerce user stories and user flows

Ecommerce user stories are the next step in making your customer data actionable. They outline specific customer needs and map them to website requirements. User stories are typically expressed in a simple format:

As a [persona], I want to _____ so that I can _____.

Based on the buyer journey example above, we know that Fleet Supervisor Steve visits our OEM website in the “configuration” phase. The user story for this insight might read:

For each persona, you should have several user stories. This helps you map out each reason a customer segment might visit your site.

As a fleet supervisor, I need to configure a quote online so I can reorder machinery and be prepared for my forecasted work.

When creating user stories, it can be tempting to capture what a persona wants without capturing why they want it. Don’t skimp on the value statement; it helps remind the entire team why you’re creating each feature. Then, when it’s time to QA your site before launch, user stories can be applied once more to ensure every persona need is addressed.

A customer segmentation study gives you the intel you need to create an ecommerce website that performs. And performance means it answers the needs of your target customers—resulting in more sales and better customer experiences.

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