On Amazon, that would be due to buyers on the failed Amazon Business to Business program.
Has anyone heard anything about that recently, or is it just being allowed to fester and rot?
Even forcing all sellers to accept NET terms did not improved the results.
I like my business customers.
If you have B2B running, you can check stats for B2B.
ditto
I get frequent reminders of how important this “tool” is and how my business could benefit from B2B pricing. No thanks, didn’t make sense when you rolled it out, doesn’t make sense for me now. For some businesses selling consumable goods (paper, ink, etc) it might make sense as you could get repeat business from those same customers. For what I sell, it makes absolutely no sense to give terms and a discount to a business that would only buy once every few years.
Yep have it
They keep telling me how I need to offer a reduction in price of 20% or more for business customers. This way I can lose money on each sale to “delight” their business customers that don’t pay for 104 days (yes I have had 104 day invoice sales.)
When I was selling on Amazon, my B2B customers were not real businesses, and those who were always paid by credit card. The big companies do not want to issue purchase orders or process payments on a single order - too expensive.
As others have noted, the B2B Program is alive and well; to be fair, it’s come a fair piece in the last few years alone - which is why Amazon is constantly touting it and/or its capabilities, such as it did with today’s 100125 News Headline “New Amazon Business bulk order referral fee discount as of October 1” (link):
It does have its uses, given the right product (and/or product selection) that appeals to true Business Buyer Accounts - but as you note, Amazon hands those out like candy.
Yep. I’ll take business over retail any day.
We have had a business account with Amazon for a while now and have never been offered terms on any order. I don’t think every business automatically gets terms. Maybe I have to apply or ask for it, but they have never said anything. I know some businesses do get terms but not us for some reason. I don’t really care if a customer gets net 30, we can handle that, but with Amazon I’m sure they delay that payment as long as they can.
-Ana
If you have American Express with Amazon, you have the choice of either 5% off each purchase or net 60. I do not like debt, whether in my personal life or for my business. I take 5% off.
However, I’ve learned since starting my business that many businesses run on constant debt. They never get out of debt. It’s all about making sure you make more monthly than your loan payments.
I really do not think the program is a failure; it has come a long way and, if you correctly set up custom pricing (discounts can be minimal) and play their game, it can drive a lot of volume. Currently, 1 in every 5 of our orders is B2B, and business customers tend to buy much larger quantities / amounts than the regular customer.
I used to wait until the end of the terms for the invoiced orders payments to go through, but I later chose to pay the 1.5% fee to get paid faster. My cash sweep account’s current annual yield is about 3.6%, which helps offset about half of that fee, and gives me immediate access to those funds. Still another thing Amazon is profiting from, but we wouldn’t get that kind of additional volume without the B2B program in place.
