For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

November 17, 2009

B2B eBusiness: Preparing For Online Liftoff
by Carrie Johnson and Elizabeth Davis
with Brian K. Walker and Kate van Geldern

Executiv e S ummary
As more and more traditionally nonconsumer brands begin to move online, questions abound: How
do we sell online? What do we sell to — or how do we service — our customers online? How do we
organize to optimize the channel? The good news is that B2B companies have many best practices
to learn, and adapt, from B2C firms, many of which are running mature or established online sales
operations. The first step: Recognize that the online channel won’t be successful as a pet project or a
silo. The Web presence needs to be a hub for sales and service, buttressed by a business plan, customer
insight, a strong organization, and a clearly defined technology strategy.

For Starters, The Site Isn’t Just A Portal Anymore — It’s For Sales And Service
B2B and B2B2C firms increasingly look to the online channel to serve customers more efficiently, open
up new business models, and increase market share — whether using a direct online method or enabling
their sales forces with on-the-go technology. Many of these B2B firms are facing unfamiliar business
challenges as they figure out how to harness the seemingly limitless potential of the Internet for their
businesses while not disrupting existing sales channels. Our advice: Learn from the best practices of
successful B2C companies that took more than 10 years to get the hang of jump-starting successful
eBusiness strategies. Here are six things fledgling B2B eBusinesses absolutely need to get started
successfully:

1. Companywide support of the online channel for sales. To engender success in your online
initiatives, make sure that eBusiness and the online channel are front and center in companywide
conversations about planning and strategy. When we analyze common characteristics of successful
eBusinesses, we find a company commitment to the channel to be a clear success factor for firms.
Of the B2C companies that we’ve classified as having well-supported eBusiness operations, 100%
claim that Web sales are important or very important to their overall sales strategy (see Figure 1).
B2B firms, however, have some room for improvement: Only 50% of high-support B2B respondents
agree with this sentiment.1

2. A senior champion and evangelist for eBusiness initiatives and the team. eBusiness leaders face
a tension between forming strong teams while also building the channel to evangelize brand and
grow sales. Leaders need to get buy-in for the channel and outline what it means to the overall
customer experience and business over and over again to different channels, support teams, markets,
and territories. It’s not easy! Senior leaders often hit the road to present Web results and plans to
many company constituents. We’ve also found universally that successful eBusinesses have strong
eBusiness teams with enough staff to complete their goals.2

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3. Dedicated IT support or a close relationship with IT. eBusiness leaders regardless of industry
have long lamented their lackluster relationships with IT. Ideally, eBusiness teams have
dedicated IT support. This support is critical to online success, particularly in the first few
years when teams need intensive work on the platform and infrastructure, and ever more so
as marketing and service requirements increase the system integration burden. Few firms pull
this off though, leaving most eBusiness teams to rely on IT departments’ support and shared
sense of urgency on direct-to-customer initiatives. There’s good news here for B2B eBusiness:
While a seemingly low 35% of our overall B2B panelists report receiving the support they need
from IT, they eclipse the 18% of B2C respondents who say they do (see Figure 2). Some tips for
continuing to move the needle on the eBusiness/IT relationship and bridge the communication
gap: Develop a common focus and shared vision, align goals and improve processes, reorganize
and colocate where you can . . . and have fun.3

4. A business plan for justifying investment in a multichannel experience. Start with any good
business plan’s basic tenet: You’ll need a realistic five-year plan and a budget that will help
achieve it. Where you can’t make a strict case for ROI, use data about your customers as a basis
for why investment in the channel is a must-have. We recently found that when asked about
satisfaction with different channels, consumers reported the highest satisfaction with the online
channel in only five out of 12 industries. Alternatively, retailers’ in-store experiences record the
highest level of satisfaction across all of the channels: 88% of consumers are satisfied with these
interactions. This data makes the case for both better online experiences and tighter integration
between channels: 1) All industries must put more effort toward technologies that enable
offline-like experiences online, such as interactive chat and smarter up- and cross-selling, and 2)
online and physical channels must work in concert to ensure smooth handoffs and experiences
across channels.4

5. Readiness — and willingness — to organize for eBusiness, which necessitates change. One
thing is certain: No matter the company, its size, or its industry, all eBusiness leaders cite room
for improvement when it comes to their organizational structure. We know that eBusiness teams
typically report into marketing. Now is as good a time as any to debate your current structure:
The first issue to consider should be around centralizing or decentralizing based on your sales
model. Almost half of the leaders we’ve surveyed tell us that the best organization would include
multiple eCommerce groups reporting into other divisions, with certain functions such as
customer experience centralized in a corporate eBusiness group.5 Regardless of how it shakes
out, make sure your team winds up with a strong, senior leader in the organization who places a
value on the Web and can evangelize your success across the organization.

6. An eCommerce technology strategy, defined by the business need. eBusiness executives

are placed squarely in the middle of key technology decisions as they must rely on a stable,
robust, and flexible technology platform to succeed and optimize their businesses. While the
development or selection effort will often be a partnership with IT, most eBusiness leaders will

November 17, 2009 © 2009, Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited

B2B eBusiness: Preparing For Online Liftoff 3
For eBusiness & Channel Strategy Professionals

either drive or be intimately involved in decisions around eCommerce technology. Focus on

driving the business requirements for your eCommerce technology through your customer
experience needs and business goals, while understanding the technology-oriented success
factors for which the eCommerce leaders may rely on another team, vendor, or consultant
to execute.6 By focusing on this, eBusiness leaders have a much better chance to find and
implement a technology solution that is well suited to their business and customer experience
needs.

Figure 1 Half Of High-Support B2B Firms Say The Web Is Important To Company Sales Strategies

“How important are Web sales to your company’s overall sales strategy?”
(4 or 5 on a scale of 1 [Not at all important] to 5 [Extremely important])

*All high-support eBusinesses 53%

B2B high support 50%

B2C high support 100%

“How effective do you think your company is at Web sales?”

(Responses of “best-in-class” and “not quite best-in-class”)

*All high-support eBusinesses 33%

B2B high support 43%

B2C high support 20%

Base: 30 eBusiness and channel strategy professionals

*includes financial services companies
Source: Forrester’s February 2009 Global eBusiness And Channel Strategy Professional Online Survey
55564 Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

November 17, 2009 © 2009, Forrester Research, Inc. Reproduction Prohibited

B2B eBusiness: Preparing For Online Liftoff 4
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Figure 2 Sixty Percent Of B2B eBusiness Firms Cite Senior Management Support

“Our eBusiness organization gets the support we need from senior management”
(4 or 5 on a scale of 1 [Does not describe my eBusiness group at all]
to 5 [Describes my eBusiness group very well])

*All respondents 51%

B2B respondents 60%

B2C respondents 42%

“Our eBusiness organization gets the support we need from IT”

(4 or 5 on a scale of 1 [Does not describe my eBusiness group at all]
to 5 [Describes my eBusiness group very well])

*All respondents 29%

B2B respondents 35%

B2C respondents 18%

Base: 279 eBusiness and channel strategy professionals

*includes financial services companies
Source: Forrester’s February 2009 Global eBusiness And Channel Strategy Professional Online Survey
55564 Source: Forrester Research, Inc.

recommen d ations

conflict comes from all sides — Partner with It from the start
Managing and operating a successful eBusiness team and operation is full of challenges. As B2B
firms look to enter the online space or to ramp up online operations, we recommend that, above
all else, eBusiness leaders:

· Recognize that change will probably not be smooth or easy. In a B2B environment, where
the salespeople in the field or on the phone are the straightest line and strongest conduit
to your end customers, change is likely to be difficult — or even threatening. A corporate/
sales conflict example: The company may feel like this is a prime opportunity to wrest back

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customer control from sales, while at the same time customers are looking for increased
efficiency that an online presence can create. The overall company will need to determine
the strategy to overcome this conflict fairly. An eBusiness/IT conflict example: While
eBusiness is often tasked with growing online presence and sales, IT is generally goaled on
cost savings, and resolving such conflict can be incredibly difficult. Here it’s in the eBusiness
and IT leaders’ best interests to create a road map for conflict resolution and creation of
mutual buy-in and support.
· Remember that a strong eBusiness and IT relationship is the best defense. Forrester has
organized recommendations for creating a strong relationship with IT into one overarching
TEAM approach: transparency, embedded groups, alignment, and management buy-in.7
Transparency requires open communication with your IT team. Embedded groups mean
creating shared tasks and using cross-functional teams to attack the problems. Alignment
means creating common goals for the two groups to focus on — say, meeting customer
demands quickly and efficiently or increasing familiarity and collaboration. Management
buy-in means building channel business cases with IT front and center and evangelizing
these initiatives companywide — and creating a winning reason for IT to continue its strong
support of the channel.

Endnotes
1
We broke eBusiness leaders into two segments — those that agree with attitudinal statements that suggest
they have a highly functional eBusiness organization (referred to as “high support” in this report) and the
reverse of that (“lesser support”). To determine high-support eBusiness leaders, we combined those who
responded 4 or 5 on a scale of 1 (does not describe my eBusiness organization at all) to 5 (describes my
eBusiness very well) on the following statements: We have the financial resources we need to complete our
goals; we have the adequate staff to achieve our goals; we get the support we need from IT; and we get the
support we need from senior management. See the October 20, 2009, “Best Practices For Tackling Universal
eBusiness Challenges” report.
2
eBusiness leaders’ biggest challenge lies in facing the tension between forming strong teams while also
building a channel to evangelize the corporate brand and grow sales — all while managing internal politics
and IT. By assessing the maturity of an eBusiness organization and incorporating well-documented best
practices for team building, there is hope for eBusiness executives to create best-in-class teams. See the
April 15, 2009, “Building Best-In-Class eBusiness Teams” report.
3
eBusiness and IT are inextricably linked. You cannot have an effective and productive business online
without an effective technology environment and the support of great technical resources. Yet we hear
every day from eBusiness leaders about how the relationship between the business and IT is not working.
Forrester looks into the ways in which eBusiness leaders can bridge the communication gap and has
identified some of the solutions to help improve collaboration and get the work done — like developing a
common focus and shared vision, aligning goals, reorganizing, colocating, improving processes, and having
fun. See the October 6, 2009, “Improving The eBusiness And IT Relationship” report.

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4
How well do experiences meet the needs of customers? Not very well. A survey of more than 4,500 US
consumers shows a low level of satisfaction with Web, phone, and in-person interactions across 12 different
industries. It turns out that Web interactions have the highest satisfaction levels in five of the industries. But
there are differences across industries, companies, and consumers. Banks and credit card issuers provide
the best Web experiences; USAA, a credit union, and Amazon.com come out on top when it comes to
phone interactions; and Gen Yers are often the least satisfied with all types of interactions. Given these
results, companies should use Scenario Design to improve their interactions. See the April 14, 2009, “The
Experiences That Satisfy Customers, 2009” report.
5
In the face of the global economic downturn, eBusiness leaders face heightened scrutiny as firms place
increased emphasis on the Web as a driver of sales and growth for their companies. eBusiness leaders, under
pressure to perform, look to optimize their organizations for success. Through our periodic surveys and
years’ worth of conversations with eBusiness and channel strategy professionals, we’ve compiled dozens of
eBusiness organizational charts. We’ve used this information to identify the pros and cons of centralized
and decentralized organizations, along with five examples of organizations that have made their structure
work best for them. See the August 6, 2009, “Best Practices In Organizing For eBusiness” report.
6
A solid technology foundation is one of the keys to success for eCommerce businesses looking to optimize
their customer experiences, market effectively and creatively, and scale their business to make more
meaningful contributions to their companies. Yet many eCommerce business and technology professionals
will tell you that they struggled to get their eCommerce technology foundations to where they needed
them to be. Forrester worked with eCommerce business and technology leaders to identify important
lessons learned and key success factors to help businesses avoid trouble and meet the increasingly critical
eCommerce platform needs to run and optimize their businesses and customer experience. See the August
3, 2009, “Keys To Successful eCommerce Platform Projects” report.
7
If you are an eBusiness leader, there is no avoiding working with IT. The range of support required from
IT varies greatly because many businesses outsource much of their eBusiness technology needs. But even
in that case, there are times when integration and project support are required. By focusing on your team’s
relationship with IT and approaching it strategically and holistically with our TEAM framework, you will
derive benefits such as support for investment in initiatives, improved project quality, and adoption of the
channel’s needs into IT as a whole. See the October 6, 2009, “Improving The eBusiness And IT Relationship”
report.

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and technology. Forrester works with professionals in 20 key roles at major companies providing proprietary research, customer insight, consulting, events, and
peer-to-peer executive programs. For more than 26 years, Forrester has been making IT, marketing, and technology industry leaders successful every day. For
more information, visit www.forrester.com.
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