Claim OwnershipMaster B2B Friday 15
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Each Friday Master B2B founders Andy Hoar and Brian Beck take a quick 15 minute spin around the world of B2B eCommerce, with their take on breaking news and lively conversations about the most pressing topics facing manufacturers, distributors and brands selling online.
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Brands have failed to rein in unauthorized distributors who re-sell their products on marketplaces like Amazon and eBay. Is there nothing they can do to protect themselves?
We speak with attorney Jon Groza from the firm KJK about how manufacturers and brands can maintain control of where their product is sold.
More about Jon Groza
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This week Brian Beck attended the Amazon Accelerate seller conference and came back to share the key themes that he took away from the event:
1) AI AI AI (and also AI)
2) Fulfillment is now a strategic pillar for the company
3) Will they commercialize their analytics capabilities?
4) 1p vs 3p is now a war
This week, Andy & Brian look at whether there is a future in so-called "composable commerce" or if both tech providers and buyers need to adapt. Should retailers be in the business of building tech? And do tech providers need to re-think their approach and offer solutions that offer a mix of pre-built modules and flexibility? Or is this all the wrong way of thinking about it?
This week, Andy & Brian look at whether the current trend of flattening organizations will actually be good for businesses. They discuss concerns that managers will find it impossible to oversee a team of 15 on their own, and what happens when junior employees are not able to spend sufficient time with their managers. Who will do the development? (Obviously it'll be ChatGPT.)
This week, Andy and Brian talk through a recent MIT report that found 95% of AI projects fail. They discuss the barriers to success - specifically that the challenges aren't technical, they're strategic and cultural.
And they walk through the 3 "un's" - these projects are often undefined, unfocused and unmeasured. Finally, they discuss the best practices they've learned working on their own AI initiatives.
Andy & Brian speak with American Eagle's Tim Ahlenius about how systems integrators are adapting to the new world of AI. They discuss the need for systems thinking - understanding how different systems fit together and how changing one piece affects the whole - and how AI can help speed up parts of implementation projects, while requiring a different set of skills to ensure success.
American Eagle
This week, Andy & Brian speak with former Grainger, Caterpillar, and Rexel executive John Pehler about how he has transitioned from being a full-time Chief Digital Officer in B2B companies to building a series of part-time gigs into a career.
This week on the Friday 15, Andy & Brian talk about the changing structure of the workforce and how gig roles will become increasingly prominent in B2B eCommerce, and how people will change their approach to working and build careers where they’re doing multiple jobs on a gig basis.
Then they share how they’re embracing this change in their own careers.
Notes:
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The WSJ article about CEOs cutting jobs.
This week on the podcast, Andy & Brian speak with Ed Fenton, the Vice President of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Transformation at wholesale distributor Graybar, about what it’s like for senior executives to search for a job in the age of AI.
Ed talks through six key lessons he learned from his own six month job search.
Andy and Brian walk through the results of Andy's Paradigm B2B Combine reports on eCommerce platforms, and they discuss strategies for preparing for a platform selection.
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Key takeaways from this week's episode:
Home Depot continues expanding into B2B, leveraging its digital strengths and logistics infrastructure.
B2B eCommerce teams are significantly smaller than their B2C counterparts, often due to legacy thinking.
88% of the Master B2B community believes B2B eCommerce teams are too small.
Many B2B companies lack foundational digital roles like merchandisers or CMOs.
Understaffing can lead to lost revenue, poor customer experience, and missed market opportunities.
B2B companies must rethink how they structure and resource eCommerce teams to compete in today’s digital-first world.
One of the big questions of the moment in AI is whether we are experiencing a REvolution or an Evolution when it comes to whether new technologies will enhance the decisions eCommerce practitioners make in their day-to-day roles, or whether it will soon take over many of the decisions practitioners make.
Join Andy Hoar, Brian Beck, and HCL's Brian Gillespie as they try to bust the myth that AI be making all of our decisions for us.
The Mythbuster discusses:
– Can Agentic AI agents build dynamic experiences on the fly based on multiple factors (e.g., weather, inventory demand, etc.) for buyers?
– Will all the elements of experience design be automated?
– Have we reached the end of complex, cumbersome pricing rules because pricing will be dynamic?
– Are we getting to a point where AI understands the context of human relationships?
Check out all the Master B2B events at MasterB2B.com.
When we surveyed B2B practitioners, we learned that they have chosen not to invest in mobile, even though their B2C counterparts have long ago made the shift to focus on mobile.
We heard that 34% of B2B companies have less than 5% of their sales on mobile, while 18% don’t even track mobile sales.
In this podcast, Andy and Brian talk about some of the reasons why mobile is on the back burner, and why this is a huge missed opportunity for most companies.
Learn more about our upcoming events and the practitioner Forum at MasterB2B.com
In B2B eCommerce practitioners are all asking the same question: how do I get my products to show up in search results when people are searching on an AI tool like ChatGPT or Perplexity?
The answer, it seems, is to create authority around your listings, and in this podcast Andy Hoar and Brian Beck discuss exactly how to do that.
Andy and Brian dig into the new (and mysterious) world of Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) and what that means for how B2B eCommerce companies that are looking to drive traffic to their websites (which is, of course, all of them).
How will it replace their SEO efforts (if at all?)
They share 5 emerging GEO best practices:
- AI answers reduce clicks (AI provides the answer up front)
- Semantic relevance rules: focus on topics, not just keywords.
- Expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness (EAT) now more important than anything else
- Structured, scannable content wins
- Visibility is more important than ranking: Success now includes being mentioned in AI outputs, not just appearing in top search results.
For more Master B2B resources and events, visit http://www.masterb2b.com And for practitioners, we offer the Master B2B Forum, a free community exclusively for B2B eCommerce practitioners. Learn more at http://www.masterb2b.com/forum
Andy & Brian offer six criteria for how B2B eCommerce practitioners should select a system integrator when they are embarking on a commerce technology project.
The Friday 15 is presented by Master B2B Nexus, your personal B2B digital lifeline.. Visit us at http://www.masterb2b.com/nexus
This week - Andy and Brian debate whether someone looking to implement a new eCommerce platform should choose their system integrator first, or whether they should select their technology first. And whether that's the right question to be asking at all...
Visit us at masterb2b.com to see all our upcoming events and to join our Forum.
Andy & Brian talk through their key takeaways from the dozen executive roundtables they held with B2B eCommerce practitioners across the country.
Andy and Brian recap the key themes from B2B Online in Chicago, including what it means when younger executives take over senior roles in a company, and how practitioners are talking about tariffs.
Learn more about Master B2B, the online forum and NEXUS at MasterB2B.com.
Andy and Brian recap their on-stage debate from B2B Online where they wrestled with whether private equity is ultimate good or bad for B2B companies. Is it true that PE firms never invest for the long-term? Is it true that your career is at risk if your company is bought by a PE firm? Are there benefits to having a PE owner?
Visit our website to learn more about Master B2B.
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