Combined e-commerce journey
Challenges
Due to legal restrictions and the structures of the business model, our client currently enjoys a monopoly position in the B2B market but has no end-customer access.
As more and more players enter the B2C market, the decision has been taken to find a way to sell the company's products and its member services directly to B2B and B2C customers using the online sales channel.
Thus, the aim of the project was to define an ideal e-commerce journey for B2B and B2C customers. To do so, the customer journey method was used as a tool to develop a customer-oriented, ideal vision of the B2B and B2C e-commerce journey – complemented by benchmarking, validated via focus groups and quantified by a capability assessment going into a high-level development plan.
Approach in detail
Definition of company-specific customer journey framework
Mindset change moving from product orientation to customer-oriented thinking, development of proto-personas, definition of the key customer interaction steps along the sales funnel and collection of first touchpoints with high level indications on critical customer needs, expectations and experiences – also builds the framework for trend analysis, benchmarking and touchpoint assessment.
Derivation of state of the art, consolidated touchpoint map
Integration of external influences and best practices into the design of the planned e-commerce channel: Identification and prioritization of relevant trends, analysis of selected 3rd party e-commerce journeys and functionalities – findings from both sources complemented the ideal to-be touchpoint landscape which is continuously adapted and enriched in the iterative approach.
Derivation of customer journey hypothesis and validation
Development of hypotheses based on all results to be empirically tested for relevance and validity: B2B and B2C focus groups to identify customer needs per interaction step and to analyze the relevance of specific touchpoints along the customer journey – classifying the groups based on "big 5" personality model for the development of personas.
Modeling of final B2B and B2C personas and ideal journeys
Merger of all gathered information to build the final B2B and B2C personas (3+3) and the persona-specific customer journeys including the relevant touchpoints per interaction. Since B2B and B2C identified similar to identical needs, wishes and requirements for the ideal e-commerce journey, these could be integrated and formed the basis for the further analysis of the underlying business capabilities (considering six decisive key elements).
Attribution of target logics and identification of organizational capabilities for implementation
Mapping of the relevant kpis in e-commerce along the customer journey framework to clarify target logics and company-specific objectives, derivation of required business capabilities to implement the ideal e-commerce journey – divided into the operating model elements process, it, organization and steering, indication on development plan providing a capability dependency matrix and high-level implementation roadmap for missing capabilities.
Created impact
reduced
cost structures thanks to a combined e-commerce journey for B2B & B2C customers
15
integrated business capabilities identified for B2B and B2C online sales
92
touchpoints attributed to 11 key interactions defining the company-wide strategic framework
6
determinant key success factors in the ideal B2B and B2C e-commerce journey
1
e-commerce market and benchmarking database incl. 19 key trends and 7 company analyses
