B2B e-commerce for electrotechnical market

B2B e-commerce for electrotechnical market

For whom:
Grodno

Kind of action:
E-commerce

The e-commerce platform for Grodno Group's network of electrical wholesalers provides service in 95 locations and online sales in Poland. The distribution chain currently offers more than 500,000 items. The wide range of products includes electrical components, installation materials, network products and photovoltaic systems from leading national and international suppliers. Installers, wholesalers and stores, construction companies, industry, or investors receive special business conditions and access to a wide range of products. They benefit from attractive promotions, deferred payment terms, dedicated dealer limits, competitive prices and the support of dedicated dealers.

Online shopping on a dedicated business platform

  • Attractive and modern design.
  • Advanced technology solutions.
  • Access for business clients.
  • Quick and easy product search.
  • Dedicated product pricing.
  • Administration simplicity.
  • Modular design for easy maintenance.
  • System in a browser on any device.
  • Cloud data access without interruption.

Easy management of the sales portal

The comprehensive configuration mechanism allows employees to seamlessly manage the operation of the B2B portal. Employees can also do their customization in response to market changes. Certusoft system allows create and manage multiple portals for different sales channels and applications - based on the main product configuration, we can support multiple B2B and B2C sales channels.

Configuration of the main elements of the B2B portal is available in a special module of the Certusoft B2B system. The system user can change several portal elements, such as editing advertisements, mailing - the appearance of messages and the moment of sending them, changing the delivery method and payment type, products - the range of products available on the portal, newsletter - managing the mailing list and message content, managing category and product descriptions, managing the automatically generated menu of the B2B portal, language versions of the B2B portal, and much more.

Customized accounts for clients and employees

Any number of employee and client accounts with personal logins and passwords can be created with our solution. The accounts allow accessing the Sales Portal Panel as well as accessing the ERP system.

  • Unlimited employee and client profiles.
  • Ability to define permissions, privileges and access locations for a specific user.
  • History and ability to review actions performed by system users.
  • Ability to change the language of the ERP system panel for a user.

Buying and selling on a single platform

The nature of sales in the electrotechnical industry is characterized by the variety of products, but also by the seasonality of sales of certain types of assortments. The ERP system we developed with a module for managing sales portals allows employees to manage banners on the sale portal. What is important is that the employee can determine the place and time of the banner's appearance. If a client clicks on such a banner, he will be directed to the list of goods related to the promotion.

The prices correspond to the established promotion conditions prepared in the Price and Discount Management module. Thanks to the uniformity of the system, a system user can create a much more complex price list of promotional products. If necessary, the displayed price of a promotional product can take into account additional discounts and promotions that apply to the client, the client's group, or product groups. Each time, the system calculates and displays the current price of the product in real-time.

Consents Management

When selling over the internet, companies must comply with many terms and conditions, including legal requirements. Clients are informed about terms and conditions, purchase conditions, promotions, returns and payments. Our solution allows employees to manage client consents. Each consent is fully configurable by Grodno employees. The system controls the version of the applicable document. An update can be prepared and automatically delivered to clients according to a set schedule. It is also possible to set an expiration date for a given document, which is useful for promotions, etc.

Monitoring the status of approvals related to a specific company is extremely important. Often, the B2B portal is accessed by several employees of a given company. For this purpose, the system keeps track of which user has been granted an approval in relation to a specific company. The system records the date and time the approval was granted, the user ID, and the IP address from which the employee logged in.

After logging into their account on the B2B portal, each client can review the consents they have given, download documents, or revoke consent. In addition, if the content of the terms and conditions has changed and new consent is required, a message appears on the portal page. This message is only displayed to affected clients.

Integration with sales systems

To improve the efficiency of online sales and increase the company's revenue, the system has been integrated with external marketplaces and communicates via API with systems that handle incoming orders. To sell to individual clients and display product data with prices, the Certusoft solution supports integration with IdoSell and Magento. In addition, Grodno also handles inbound orders from external partners. For such sales, the system receives and enables processing of incoming orders thanks to integration with Mirakl's API.

  • Issue products from any warehouse.
  • Quick listing tools with links to price lists, groups and categories.
  • Ability to transfer orders from the marketplace to the warehouse at the ERP system level.
  • Automatic inventory synchronization between marketplace platforms and warehouses.
  • Ability to automatically close bids with zero inventory.
  • Automatic synchronization of prices in listings according to pricing policy.

Sales reports for manufacturers

Grodno is a leading distributor of electrical and lighting products in Poland. This naturally conducts close cooperation with manufacturers of products. To report the sales of products from manufacturers, such as Signify (Philips), NKT and Schneider Electric, the Certusoft ERP system has been equipped with a reporting mechanism. Product sales are automatically analyzed by the system, and then a report is prepared according to the required file structure, which is then sent to each manufacturer based on the established schedule.

Multiple shopping carts and order placement

Business clients can use several ways to place orders. The basic one is adding products to a shopping cart. Grodno B2B portal is equipped with support for multiple active shopping carts within a single client account. This makes it possible to complete orders with delivery to different points of sale or client locations (e.g. construction sites).

To streamline and speed up the process of ordering goods, the client can use the functionality of importing products into shopping carts. With support for external files and copying from the clipboard, a shopping cart is completed based on the list of items with EAN and the required quantity.

Another option for placing an order is the merchant support option. A dedicated employee of the company can prepare and process a shopping cart on behalf of the client. Due to the individual nature of sales in the industry, and with the ability to manage complex pricing policies dedicated to goods and clients, the merchant can prepare a dedicated offer for products. The terms of such an offer are determined individually. The amount of margin for a given order or a longer payment term than the default setting for the counterparty is determined by the merchant.

Dedicated sales account manager

Each business client has a dedicated sales manager. The system allows for the assignment of the right person to the right company. This gives several options for online sales. After logging into an account on the B2B portal, a person who wants to place an order can see which salesperson is the account manager for the company, including the salesperson's phone number and email address.

Clients can place orders themselves, but they can also use the service. On their behalf, the salesperson can complete and order orders in conjunction with their client account. The system allows the salesman to select an account from a list of assigned clients and place orders on their behalf. This is undoubtedly an improvement in order management and easier contact with business partners.

Fulfillment of online orders

The management and fulfillment of orders placed through the marketplace, stores, distributors, or with the help of a consultant is done in the Certusoft ERP system.

  • Fast order processing through automated actions.
  • Ability to transfer fulfillment orders in the form of dropshipping (Grodno distributors).
  • Sending parcels (individually, in bulk, automatically).
  • Issue invoices, proformas, adjustments and receipts and their transfer to accounting systems.
  • Automatic email notifications with order information.

Client Account and Billing Control

All business partners have their client profiles. The Certusoft system allows to assign several users to one business client. Thus, no matter how large the company is, employees of different departments of such a company, from different branches and delivery locations can order goods.

Billing and Document Retrieval

The client panel allows an employee to control the company's payments, the status and the amount of the granted and used merchant limit. For each order, it is possible to download documents in electronic form (PDF and ECOD). The user can manage data for financial settlements, manage given consents (marketing consents, newsletters) and multiple addresses for delivery. The client's statements are presented in a clear form with their aging and information about overdue payments.

Product Catalog Management


The electrotechnical industry consists of thousands of products and millions of records with product data. For the needs of the entire Grodno Group, we have created a PIM system for the electrical engineering industry. It supports the software of online shops.

It allows Grodno employees to manage product information, which is then used on the B2B portal, external marketplaces and online portals of franchise partners. One of the most important elements, in addition to the unification and accessibility of the information base, was the ability to quickly add new products or changes to the current product range. For this purpose, the Certusoft ERP system enables the import of a large amount of data, amounting to several gigabytes. This data is provided by manufacturers in the standardized BMEcat format. The system organizes the collection of product data in the form of the buffer and the production catalog. The buffer is continuously replenished with files from manufacturers describing their products. Using the buffer, the system manages a database of several million products. After verification, new products and changes to old ones are added to the Grodno production catalog.

Pricing Policies to manage prices and discounts in an efficient way

Together with the Certusoft PIM (Product Information Management) module, Grodno can freely create pricing policies. Our system allows them to fully reflect the company's sales model. The price of a single product, groups of products, individual contractors and their groups are among the many variables that affect the final price. Calculations can take into account different price lists, margins, and markup amounts. Promotions, sales, or special discounts can also be taken into account. All elements affecting the calculation can be presented as a sum or as a product of the sum. Nothing prevents employees from specifying selected elements, for example, as a sum and for another stage of the calculation as a product. The price calculation mechanism is designed to take into account the final individual price of the product offered to a particular client under the business model and company strategy.

  • Discount or surcharge for product groups.
  • Groups of contractors discounts or surcharges.
  • Assign groups of contractors to groups of promotional products.
  • Set prices, discounts, and markups for the product.
  • Assign discounts and markups to a vendor for a specific product.
  • Product list prices.
  • Take into account promotions and sales that affect prices.

Analysis of client purchasing patterns


Additional support for online sales is a mechanism that helps determine the minimum margin. It analyzes the client's buying behavior and helps determine additional discounts or markups.

Dedicated online stores for electrotechnical distributors

Electrotechnical distributors working in franchise cooperation with Grodno also have access to the benefits of a unified product catalog. Franchisees maintain their own dedicated B2B portals. Product data is updated in real-time from Grodno's main database. They also have the opportunity to add their products. The catalog uses a central price list but allows partners to manage prices within their distribution. Currently, the product catalogs of the individual partners contain more than half a million items. The well-designed system guarantees uniformity and timeliness of information, as well as flexibility in sales policy. Whether it is the national level of Grodno or local sales of franchise partners.

  • Possibility of additional cataloging of products outside the main Grodno offer.
  • Synchronization of stocks and prices between central and local warehouses.
  • Import of products manually, by import with the possibility of creating products in stock and by using external files.

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