B2B e-commerce features are the tools that let a business customer buy from you online the way they already buy from you offline: with their own account, their agreed prices, their approval steps, and payment on invoice. Some general e-commerce functions, such as search and checkout, also need to work differently for business buyers.
The features fall into two groups: what your buyers use, and what runs behind the scenes. Use the checklist and the worksheet at the end to build your requirements list before you book platform demos. For how a business order moves from portal to ERP, see our guide on how B2B e-commerce works.
Features of B2B e-commerce at a glance
| Feature | Relevant to you when |
|---|---|
| Company accounts | Prices, terms or addresses belong to a customer company, not one person |
| Buyer roles and approvals | Several people order for one customer, or customers have sign-off rules |
| Customer-specific pricing | Your prices differ by customer |
| Customer-specific catalogs | Product access differs by customer |
| Quick order and reorder | Customers reorder the same items |
| Quotes | You negotiate prices before some orders |
| CPQ (configure, price, quote) | Products have rules about which options can go together, and those rules change the price |
| Checkout: tax, freight, payment | You take orders online |
| Payment terms and saved addresses | Customers buy on terms or ship to several sites |
| Self-service account portal | Buyers contact you for order status or invoices |
| B2B search and product data | Buyers search by part number or technical attribute |
| ERP and CRM integration | Prices, stock, customers or orders must move between systems |
| Punchout and EDI | A customer orders from its own purchasing system |
| Sales rep tools | Reps take or quote orders for customers |
| Multiple sites and currencies | You sell under several brands or in several countries |
| Data access and staff roles | Always |
| Reporting | Always for order reconciliation; deeper analysis as needed |
What to do with this: mark the rows that apply to you. You will decide which of those are needed at launch further down.
Features your buyers use
Company accounts, roles and approvals
A company account groups all the buyers from one customer under one profile, with the company's prices, terms and addresses. Roles control what each buyer can do: one places orders, a manager approves anything over a set amount. Approval rules let customers with purchasing controls keep their sign-off step inside your store.
Check: can a buyer add colleagues without calling you? Can you set spending limits per buyer and give one company several locations? Ask the vendor to show one of your customers' real approval rules.
Customer-specific pricing and catalogs
In B2B, prices depend on the customer, the contract, the quantity (tier pricing), or the unit, such as a box versus a pallet. Some customers should only see part of your range. The platform should show each account its own catalog and prices after login.
Limits differ by plan. On Shopify, for example, the Basic, Grow and Advanced plans allow 3 active B2B catalogs across all B2B markets, and "direct company catalogs" are listed as a Plus-only feature (Shopify Help Center).
Check: where will prices come from, and how often do they update? Bring one real customer price list to the demo and ask the vendor to load it.
Fast ordering: Quick order, bulk upload and reorder
Business buyers often know exactly what they want. They need to type SKUs and quantities, upload a spreadsheet, or repeat last month's order. Quantity rules, such as "sold in cases of 12" or a minimum order, stop wrong orders before they reach your warehouse.
Check: time a reorder of 20 lines in the demo. Ask what happens when one item on the list is out of stock or discontinued.
Quotes and CPQ
Some orders need a conversation first: large volumes, special terms, or products built to order. Adobe's B2B features, for example, include "negotiable quotes," which let buyers and sellers negotiate prices (Adobe documentation). The workflow to ask to see: the buyer requests a quote from the cart, your rep replies with a price, and the buyer turns the accepted quote into an order.
CPQ (configure, price, quote) goes further. It lets the buyer or rep build a product from options and get a valid price for that exact build. Ordinary variants, such as sizes and colors, do not need it. You need it when some options cannot go together, or when choices change the price in ways a simple price list cannot show.
Check: can a quote expire? Can the buyer order straight from it? Does the quoted price carry through to the order and the invoice?
Checkout, payment terms and invoices
Every online order needs the right sales tax, including for tax-exempt customers, and the right freight charge. Many B2B customers also pay differently. They enter a purchase order (PO) number, the reference from their own buying system, and pay on invoice within agreed terms, such as net 30. Each account should see only the payment methods agreed with it, within its credit limit, and choose from its saved delivery addresses. If you confirm freight by hand on large orders, the buyer should be able to submit without a final shipping price.
Shopify offers net terms, PO numbers and vaulted credit cards on all four of its plans, with ACH payments in the United States only (Shopify Help Center). Adobe Commerce has a "pay on account" option that lets a company buy on a credit line (Adobe documentation).
Check: who checks the credit limit, the store or your ERP? How are tax exemptions stored? Can buyers pay open invoices online?
Self-service account portal
A self-service portal lets buyers find answers without calling you: order status, tracking, invoices, returns, and documents such as spec sheets.
Check: which data in the portal comes from your ERP, and how often is it updated?
Search and product information
B2B buyers search by part number, by a competitor's part number, or by a technical attribute such as thread size or voltage. Product pages also need what a business buyer checks: unit of measure, pack size, stock by warehouse, and lead time when an item is out of stock.
Check: bring 10 real searches from your sales team. For exact part numbers, with and without dashes, the right product should come first. For attribute searches, check that the right products appear near the top.
What this means for you: these are the features that decide whether ordering online is easier than calling you. Test each one with your own data.
Features of a B2B e-commerce platform behind the scenes
ERP and CRM integration
Your ERP (enterprise resource planning system) often holds prices, stock, customers, orders and invoices. Your CRM may hold contacts, accounts and quotes your reps work on. The store may need to read from both and write back to them. Decide which system owns each piece of data before you build, and how changes made in one place reach the others.
Check: is there a ready-made connector for your ERP and CRM, or is it custom work? What does the store do when the ERP is offline?
Punchout and EDI
Large customers often buy through their own purchasing software. Punchout lets their buyer open your catalog from inside that software, fill a cart, and return the cart items to their system as requisition lines to edit and submit (Oracle documentation). EDI (electronic data interchange) sends orders and invoices between your system and theirs in a fixed electronic format, without the buyer using your storefront checkout.
You do not need either at launch unless a launch customer requires it.
Check: ask your largest customers how they want to order. If any mention punchout, ask the vendor which protocols it supports, such as cXML.
Sales rep tools
Reps need to see what a buyer sees, act on the buyer's behalf, and build quotes. BigCommerce, for example, lists "sales representative masquerade" for acting as the buyer, and sales representative quoting as a separate feature (BigCommerce documentation). Agree early how reps are credited for online orders. If online orders cost reps commission, they have a reason to keep customers on the phone.
Check: what can a rep do while acting as a buyer, and is every action recorded?
Multiple sites, regions and currencies
Some sellers need several storefronts, one per brand, country, or channel, each with its own currency, tax rules and catalog but one shared back office. If you sell under one brand in one country, this can wait.
Check: is a second storefront included in your plan or charged separately?
Data access, staff roles and reporting
Each customer must see only its own prices, orders and invoices. Your staff need roles too, such as who can change prices, and an audit trail of who changed what.
Reporting is a separate question. At launch you need enough to reconcile online orders with your ERP and judge how the launch is going. Later you may want sales by account and product, and a list of customers who have stopped ordering.
Check: log in as two test customers and confirm neither can see the other's data. For reporting, ask whether you can export raw data or only view fixed dashboards.
What this means for you: a demo can show data separation and staff roles. Your production ERP connection needs written, technical answers.
Which features you need at launch
You do not need every relevant feature on day one. Pick the customers and the ordering workflow you will launch with, then keep the features that workflow cannot run without. Include what those customers rely on offline today and anything they have asked you for online.
For each feature you keep, write down two things:
- The outcome the buyer needs. For example, "each customer sees their contract price at login."
- What makes it possible. Where the data lives, who maintains it, and how it reaches the store. Contract prices might sit in your ERP, a spreadsheet, or a pricing tool. If the data does not need to move automatically at launch, write down how updates will be handled instead.
How to decide: mark each relevant row "launch" or "later" based on your launch workflow, not on what vendors show in demos.
How to check a feature before you choose a platform
"Yes, we support that" on a sales call can mean several things, and more than one can apply to the same feature:
| How it is delivered | What it means | What to ask |
|---|---|---|
| Built in | Part of the platform on your plan | Show me, using my data |
| Plan-limited | Only on a higher plan, or capped on lower plans | Which plan do I need, and what are the limits? |
| Add-on or app | A separate product, often from another company | What does it cost, and who supports it? |
| Custom work | Built for you by a developer | How long will it take, and who maintains it after launch? |
For example, Adobe's documentation describes Adobe Commerce's B2B features as an extension that is installed and enabled (Adobe documentation). For every feature, ask which exact plan or product supplies it, and who sets it up and maintains it.
Then split your checks in two:
- Ask to see it in a demo: buyer roles, a real customer's prices, an approval, a quote turned into an order, a 20-line reorder, data separation between two accounts, and your sales team's real searches.
- Ask for technical proof: whether the platform works with your exact ERP and version, which system owns each piece of data, how often data syncs, what happens when a sync fails, and how much of the work is custom. A generic demo does not establish your production integration. Ask for documentation and a reference customer on the same ERP.
To compare named platforms and their published prices, see our B2B e-commerce platform comparison. If you would like help turning this checklist into requirements for your own business, our B2B e-commerce team can talk it through with you.
What to do next: send the worksheet to each vendor before the demo, so the demo shows your requirements instead of theirs.
B2B e-commerce features requirements worksheet
Copy this table into a spreadsheet and keep the rows that apply to you. Add one set of columns per vendor, headed with the product and plan they propose. Mark support as yes, partial, no, or unconfirmed, and explain every "partial." In the evidence column, note whether you saw documentation, saw it working in a demo, or still need technical proof.
| Requirement | Launch or later | Vendor support | Plan, add-on or custom | Extra cost and who maintains it | Evidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Company accounts with several buyers and locations | |||||
| Buyer roles and spending limits | |||||
| Order approvals | |||||
| Contract prices shown per account at login | |||||
| Tier and quantity pricing | |||||
| Quantity increments and minimum orders | |||||
| Products hidden or shown per account | |||||
| Quick order by SKU and file upload | |||||
| Reorder from history and saved lists | |||||
| Quote request and order from quote | |||||
| Product configuration with pricing (CPQ) | |||||
| PO number at checkout | |||||
| Net terms and credit limits | |||||
| Sales tax and tax exemptions | |||||
| Freight charges, including freight confirmed by hand | |||||
| Saved delivery addresses per company | |||||
| Order tracking, invoices and returns in the portal | |||||
| Search by part number and attribute | |||||
| Stock and lead time on product pages | |||||
| ERP connector for our ERP and version | |||||
| CRM sync for accounts, contacts and quotes | |||||
| Punchout | |||||
| EDI | |||||
| Rep acting on behalf of a buyer, with every action logged | |||||
| Second storefront, currency or language | |||||
| Customer data kept separate between accounts | |||||
| Staff permissions and audit trail | |||||
| Order reconciliation reports and data export |
What to do with this: compare vendors first on confirmed support for your launch requirements, then on unresolved dependencies, cost and evidence.
Not sure which of these your business needs first? Let's talk it through.
Frequently asked questions
What are the key features of a B2B e-commerce platform?
The core features are company accounts with roles, customer-specific pricing and catalogs, quick ordering and reordering, payment on terms with PO numbers, quotes, a self-service account portal, B2B search, and integration with your ERP. Which ones you need first depends on the customers and ordering workflow you launch with.
Can a B2C e-commerce platform handle B2B?
Some can, at least in part. Several platforms built for consumer stores now offer B2B features, often on higher plans or through apps. Check each feature you need against how it is delivered: built in, plan-limited, add-on, or custom.
Is AI a must-have B2B e-commerce feature?
Only if it does a specific job in your launch workflow, such as turning a customer's emailed PO into an order. For each AI feature, ask what data it needs to work, then test it on your own examples, such as ten real POs.
