From time-consuming to value-adding: Transforming B2B commerce processes
An equipment manufacturer lowers costs and streamlines order-to-cash with a fully digital B2B platform built to enhance the dealer experience.
THE SITUATION
The industrial products and construction market is evolving, and a global heavy equipment manufacturer aimed to stay ahead of the curve (and its competitors). As part of an extensive back-office transformation—and with Deloitte at its side—it had first built an enterprise tech stack designed to function as a modern commerce and order management system . And then it implemented smart factory processes and leveraged emerging technologies to streamline plant maintenance and asset management in its facilities around the world.
But unlike many competitors, the manufacturer hadn’t yet integrated modern features, process automation, flexibility and integration capabilities into its front-end business-to-business (B2B) commerce processes. It hadn’t needed to. Its legacy green-screen (text interface) systems and manual workflows were stable. However, they were also painstakingly slow for dealers.
The dealers’ ordering experience was akin to shopping from a paper catalog, and so unlike what they experienced as consumers of other large digital retailers. The current dealer experience was essentially analog and involved frequent communication with the manufacturer. The process was riddled with incremental inefficiencies that added up: extra minutes processing customer orders using legacy systems and manual workflows … the scroll through a PDF product catalog to identify compatible parts … time to consider which of the two ordering platforms maintained by the manufacturer could better serve a particular customer in a specific circumstance. On top of that, inadequate digital integration frequently led to issues and frustrations with order processing, requiring additional coordination between dealers, customers and the manufacturer to correct orders that were inadvertently misconfigured.
The old adage still holds true: time is money. The dealers could quantify the value of every extra operational minute. The negative impact on the manufacturer’s margins and cost-to-serve—both internally and externally—was also measurable. Given the early success of the manufacturer’s back-office transformation, it felt natural to take the next step: layer on a customer experience (CX)-led solution that could deliver a more intuitive and cost-effective dealer experience at the front end.
DIGITIZING THE DEALER EXPERIENCE TO REDUCE CLICKS AND ENHANCE ENGAGEMENT
THE SOLVE
The Deloitte professionals on the scene were knowledgeable about the manufacturer’s operations, and they also understood the dealers’ perspective. Deloitte team members helped the manufacturer understand the potential value of building a smooth, fully digital, dealer-facing experience with an intelligent integration of front and back offices. Leveraging Deloitte’s B2B commerce depth and the Deloitte IndustryAdvantage™ approach, the team built a CX proof of concept (POC), piloting a unified B2B platform with a handful of machines.
The platform was designed to be intuitive, with simple onboarding and streamlined processes that could standardize configuration, price and quoting (CPQ). The platform enables dealers to place orders through a cloud-based commerce application—and leverage capabilities that include both standard and custom configurations, enhanced quote management, competitive product comparison, and delivery tracking. It provides real-time updates to enhance dealers’ visibility around new, used and rental machines across the supply chain, including production distribution centers, factory warehouses and dealer warehouses. The external-facing platform’s integration with the back office can reduce compatibility-related issues and enable faster resolution when misconfigured orders do occur.
Dealers welcomed the POC and welcomed its expansion. With leaders from the manufacturer in agreement, the Deloitte team leveraged multiple disciplines—including commerce, supply chain, data analytics and cybersecurity—to implement the solution on a global scale. With two distinct ordering platforms in use by dealers, the manufacturer engaged Deloitte to evaluate them and determine which was more scalable and better suited for global deployment. The answer was neither. Both had strengths (and challenges), so Deloitte worked with the manufacturer to combine the desired capabilities from each platform in a single, all-new B2B commerce solution.
The B2B platform exemplifies Deloitte’s FrontOffice Advantage™, which leverages Deloitte’s capabilities in AI and data enablement, platform integration and operating model design to align end-to-end digital transformation across an organization’s front-, middle- and back-office operations. By integrating the B2B experience with dealer platforms and multiple internal legacy systems, the manufacturer and its dealers unlocked significant data and analytics capabilities.
This front-and-back-office integration enables dealers to use data to assess their business needs as they relate to the manufacturer’s proposed configurations that are available online and to target end customers accordingly. The B2B-B2C platform integration also supports a direct connection between the manufacturer and customers who may want to bypass dealers as they browse and order machines.
The program’s overall impact was transformational, streamlining the ordering process while helping drive growth for the manufacturer’s business and delivering an enhanced customer experience for the end users.
ENHANCING THE DEALER EXPERIENCE CAN ENHANCE THE CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE
THE IMPACT
The B2B commerce platform has become the primary digital channel for the manufacturer. Currently deployed across five regions and 10 geographies, it provides a unified, brand-aligned, digital presence for the 300+ global dealers that have onboarded to date. The benefits—for the dealers, their customers, and the manufacturer—are measurable:
- Dealers’ time to place orders has decreased from four minutes to 30 seconds.
- Order processing time has been cut in half. Improved processes have resulted in time savings and reduced operational costs for the dealers and the manufacturer—enabling both to redirect their workforce to other operational tasks.
- Order processing issues have also been reduced by 88% compared to orders placed manually, adding to increased efficiency and operational cost savings on the front and back ends.
- The program exceeded the business goal of generating 50% of all global orders by the end of 2025.
Currently, the Deloitte team is helping the manufacturer expand the platform and drive value in new areas, such as its original equipment manufacturer (OEM) business. Deloitte is also helping the manufacturer build out the desired CPQ solution to enhance the configuration journey—the first step in achieving even more-effective transactions.
Deloitte is helping the manufacturer drive toward a future state where advanced technology, including AI, can help predict dealer sales and where highly integrated systems can eliminate misconfiguration-driven order issues altogether.
The industry will continue to evolve. Now, the manufacturer has a modernized platform that can add enhancements and new features that can help it transform and grow along with it.
TIME IS VALUABLE. MODERN TECHNOLOGY AND PLATFORMS HELP GET MORE FROM EVERY MINUTE.
