How to Build a B2B Ordering App

Why B2B ordering is not consumer ecommerce

A restaurant buying from a food distributor, an electrician restocking from a supply house and a boutique reordering from a brand all order the same items again and again, on account, under terms a sales rep negotiated. Consumer checkout flows get most of that wrong. Tepia starts B2B ordering projects by listing the differences, because each one becomes a requirement.

If your current store needs plugins and manual work to handle four or more of these rows, a purpose built ordering app usually ends the stream of phone, text and email orders your inside sales team retypes every morning.

Steps to build a B2B ordering app

1. Map how orders arrive today. Count orders by channel: phone, email, photos of handwritten lists, rep visits and EDI. Tepia samples a few weeks of real orders to see what buyers actually ask for, including substitutions and delivery notes.
2. Model accounts and rules. Parent companies, locations, users and roles; which items each account can see; contract rate rules with effective dates; minimum order quantities; and who must approve an order above a threshold.
3. Design the order guide first. Repeat buyers want their usual list with last ordered quantities and par levels, not a search box. Add quick reorder, barcode scanning from the stockroom shelf, and a cart that follows the buyer across devices.
4. Connect the ERP. Items, inventory, account terms, credit status and order status flow from the ERP; orders flow back. Decide which system owns each field before anyone writes sync code.
5. Handle cutoffs and delivery days. Show the next delivery date for each ship to location, warn before the cutoff, and flag items that cannot make that route.
6. Build the sales rep mode. Reps place orders on behalf of accounts, review account history and open orders, and work offline in basements and walk in coolers.
7. Pilot with your best accounts. Invite a handful of high volume customers, watch where they still call, and fix those flows before a broad rollout.

Getting ERP and inventory sync right

Most B2B ordering apps fail quietly in the integration, not the interface. Tepia writes a field ownership map early: the ERP owns items, units of measure, inventory, credit limits and terms; the app owns carts, order guides, favorites and user permissions; contract rates live in whichever system your finance team already maintains. Getting this wrong means two sources of truth and an argument over every short shipment.

Common ERPs in distribution include NetSuite, Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, SAP Business One, Sage and Epicor, each with its own API style and limits. Inventory should sync often enough that buyers do not order stock that is gone, and orders should post back with an ERP order number the buyer can see. Larger accounts may also require EDI documents, which Tepia routes through your existing EDI provider rather than replacing it.

For CRM context, such as letting reps see open opportunities beside order history, Tepia connects Salesforce or HubSpot. Our ecommerce inventory sync and ERP integration page covers sync patterns in more depth.

Plan for sync failures too. When the ERP is down for maintenance, Tepia queues orders in the app, shows the buyer that the order is received and pending confirmation, and posts it as soon as the connection returns, so a Sunday night outage never loses Monday morning orders.

How Tepia approaches B2B ordering apps

Tepia applies its six phases to B2B ordering with an emphasis on account rules and ERP data. A US based project manager is your single point of contact throughout.

1. Discovery: a review of sample orders, interviews with buyers, reps and customer service, and a third party integration review of your ERP and EDI setup. Deliverables are an Investigation Summary, an Interview Summary and User Stories such as a kitchen manager reordering from last Tuesday’s list.
2. Design: a design questionnaire, moodboards and a style guide, then wireframes for the order guide, the account switcher for multi location buyers and the rep’s customer view.
3. Development and Testing: an Alpha with internal staff placing test orders into an ERP sandbox, then a Beta with pilot accounts. Test plans cover contract rate accuracy, cutoff logic, credit holds and offline rep orders.
4. Training: remote sessions for customer service and in person sessions for reps, plus short guides reps can hand to buyers.
5. Launch: migration of accounts, users and order history so guides are filled on day one, then a staged move of accounts off phone ordering.
6. Support: issue resolution, bug tracking and feature requests such as regional promotions or a new warehouse.

Typically Discovery takes 1 to 3 months, development and QA 2 to 6 months, and launch about a month. More on how we work.

Portal, app or both, and when to buy instead

Desk based buyers, such as purchasing managers at retailers, often prefer a web portal. Buyers on their feet, such as chefs and contractors, reorder from a phone. Reps need both. Tepia usually builds one backend serving a responsive portal and a mobile app, so account rules live in one place.

A packaged B2B module on your ecommerce platform may be enough if your account rules are simple, your catalog is small and your ERP has a ready connector. Custom wins when contract rules are complex, when reps need offline ordering, or when you want ordering tied to your own delivery routes and cutoffs. See our pages on B2B distribution ordering apps, wholesale ordering apps and B2B ecommerce portals, or talk to Tepia about your accounts.

Frequently asked questions