A B2B sales system is a closed portal where a business customer logs in, sees their own price list and places the order themselves - no email, no phone call, no sales rep in the middle. There is one difference against an ordinary store, but it is fundamental: prices, discounts, credit limits and availability are calculated for a specific company, not for an anonymous visitor. That turns an order which today takes three emails and a phone call asking “have you still got this in stock?” into a click on a cart button at 10pm.
Below: what a portal like this has to do, what not to build at the start, what the rollout looks like and what it costs.
How a B2B sales system differs from an ordinary store
A B2B sales system is a store where everything depends on who is logged in. In a retail store a product has one price. In B2B the same item code can carry three different prices for three different customers, a different free-shipping threshold, a different payment term and a different set of available products.
| Element | B2C store | B2B portal |
|---|---|---|
| Price | one for everyone | individual per customer or group |
| Catalogue access | open | after login, often after account approval |
| Payment | up front, online | bank transfer with a term, credit limit |
| Ordering | browse and click | list, code, file, repeat of a previous order |
| Quantities | single units | cases, multiples, pallets |
| Who orders | one person | several employees with different permissions |
That last difference gets underrated: at the customer’s end the warehouse worker places the order and the owner approves it - otherwise the whole company works off one password.
How to tell it is time for your own ordering portal
The signal is always the same: your sales rep is retyping orders instead of selling. If you recognise at least three points from this list, the subject is worth costing out.
- Orders arrive by email, in Excel or over WhatsApp - and somebody keys them into the warehouse system by hand
- Stock-level questions come back every day and eat your reps’ time
- Price lists circulate as PDFs and some customers are working off an outdated version
- Item code mix-ups - the customer orders “the black ones, like last time” and the wrong thing arrives
- Orders only during office hours - while your customer does their buying in the evening, after closing their own shop
A portal does not replace a sales rep. It takes the retyping off them and hands the time back for negotiations, new contracts and complaints.
What a B2B portal has to do in version one
Version one has to handle the repeat order of a regular customer - and nothing beyond that. In wholesale that is usually the bulk of daily traffic.
- Login and a company account - one customer, several users, invoicing details pulled in automatically
- Individual price list - net price after login, discount per product group or per item code
- Quick ordering by code - a field where you paste a list of codes and quantities, and the cart is ready in a dozen seconds
- Reorder - one click on a previous order, with quantities adjustable
- Shopping lists - the customer’s own sets (“Monday delivery”, “summer season”)
- Stock level as a signal - in stock / low / on order with a date, rather than a raw unit count
- Order history with invoices and fulfilment status: received, being picked, shipped, tracking number
What NOT to build at the start: a product configurator, a multi-level approval workflow, a mobile app and a quoting system. Those belong to stage two, and each of them can push the budget hard.
Per-customer pricing - this is where implementations fall over
An individual price list is a rule stating what price a specific company sees after logging in. It sounds simple and it is the hardest part of the whole system, because in most wholesalers the pricing rules exist only in the owner’s head and in comments in a spreadsheet. They have to be written down before building starts. Usually one of four models comes out:
| Model | How it works | When it fits |
|---|---|---|
| Price groups | the customer lands in group A/B/C with a percentage discount | the simplest start, most wholesalers |
| Discount per category | a different percentage on different product groups | when margin varies between categories |
| Fixed prices per item code | a negotiated amount for one customer | contracts with chains and large buyers |
| Quantity tiers | more units, lower price | manufacturers and pallet sales |
In practice I most often build a hybrid: a price group as the base plus a list of exceptions for key accounts. Those exceptions have to be editable from the admin panel by you, not by a developer - otherwise every commercial negotiation ends with a support ticket. The process of opening and verifying those accounts I described in the piece on B2B trade account registration.
Integrations: warehouse, accounting and KSeF
A portal with no link to the warehouse and to invoicing moves the problem rather than solving it - instead of retyping orders from email, somebody retypes them from the portal. So integration is not an add-on, it is part of the project.
The minimum scope, which is usually enough: stock levels from the ERP system into the portal (a scheduled sync, usually every fifteen minutes or so), the product file and prices from the ERP as the single source of truth, orders from the portal into the ERP automatically, and invoices from the ERP into the portal for self-service download.
On top of that comes KSeF, Poland’s mandatory e-invoicing system, which is already in force - the largest taxpayers have been issuing invoices through it since February 2026, everyone else since April 2026. So the invoice for a portal order is created on the accounting or ERP side, and the portal shows it to the customer and keeps the link back to the order. How to wire that up without manual work, I laid out in the piece on WooCommerce, ERP and e-invoicing integration.
What to build it on
The choice comes down to how unusual your commercial rules are. The more exceptions, the less sense a ready-made subscription platform makes.
| Approach | Pros | Cons | Who it suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| WooCommerce with a B2B layer | full control, any integration, no licence fee on the engine | it has to be designed, not just installed | most wholesalers and manufacturers |
| Hybrid: Woo + a custom module | catalogue from the store, B2B logic built to your rules | higher cost to start | complex price lists, large catalogue |
| Ready-made subscription platform | fast start | the fee grows with turnover, your data sits with the vendor | simple price lists, few exceptions |
Decide up front whether the portal is to stand next to the retail store or be part of it - that decision is hard to reverse later, and I took it apart factor by factor in the piece on B2B and retail in one store.
Rollout step by step
The order I follow, so that nothing gets built that nobody will use:
- Write down the commercial rules - price lists, discounts, payment terms, limits, case quantities; on paper, before a line of code exists
- Data audit - is the product file in the ERP fit to show to a customer (this is where most project time disappears)
- A portal mockup - clickable, to be signed off by you and two sales reps
- Build the core - login, pricing, cart, order
- ERP integration - stock, products, orders, invoices
- Pilot with 3-5 customers - preferably the most demanding ones
- Rollout - invitations for the rest, a short guide, the old channel running in parallel for the first month, and fixes where real traffic shows the gaps
The last point is non-negotiable: do not switch off email and phone on launch day. A customer who fails once to place an order goes back to email for a long time.
What it costs and where to start
A B2B portal is priced by scope, not by page count. On my side, fixed-bid projects usually land at 5,000-10,000 PLN net (Polish market rates) - within that range sits a portal with individual price lists, quick ordering, history and one integration with a warehouse system. Above it come the unusual items: several data sources, a configurator, multiple languages. There are also costs outside my control - hosting and any licences; their price lists change, so I quote them after checking current rates. I go wider on the cost structure in the piece on what a B2B platform costs.
I start with a free diagnosis: I look at how orders come in today, what sits in your ERP and which pricing rules can be reproduced without rewriting half the company. Out of that comes the scope of stage one and - on a larger job - a fixed bid in writing before anything starts. When the portal is added to an existing store, I run it as development and optimisation; when it is built from scratch, it is an e-commerce store project.
Frequently asked questions
How does a B2B sales system differ from an ordinary online store? Everything depends on the logged-in customer: price, available products, payment method and logistical minimums. An ordinary store shows one price to everyone and takes the money up front; a B2B portal calculates the contracted price and lets people buy on deferred terms.
Can a B2B portal be built on WooCommerce? Yes, and it is usually the most sensible route - WooCommerce gives you a working catalogue, cart and orders, and the B2B layer (per-customer pricing, limits, quick ordering, ERP integration) is written on top. The key is designing the pricing rules before building, rather than bolting on more plugins along the way.
How long does a customer ordering portal take to implement? With tidy product data and one integration, usually a few weeks from mockup sign-off to pilot. The longest part is not the coding, it is cleaning up the product file and writing down the pricing rules.
Will customers actually want to use it? Usually yes, provided an order can be placed faster than by email - hence the emphasis on reorders, shopping lists and pasting codes. A soft transition helps: both channels run in parallel for the first month, and the sales rep shows the portal during a normal conversation.
Running a store where something does not work the way it should? I build and rebuild WooCommerce stores - from a single fix to reworking the whole sales flow. Tell me what you are dealing with and I will send back a scope and a price.