Large companies, governments, and institutions almost exclusively use procurement systems to streamline their purchasing operations and order online from suppliers. If selling to these large businesses is something you do today, or plan to do in the future, just having a B2B eCommerce store is no longer enough to meet their needs. Your B2B eCommerce store also needs a punchout catalog.
What Is a Punchout Catalog?
Punchout catalogs, or just punchout, as it’s most commonly referred to, is not a system or a product, but a B2B industry-standard protocol that allows sellers to integrate B2B eCommerce store platforms like OroCommerce, with their customer’s procurement systems like those offered by Coupa, SAP Ariba, Workday, Oracle, Jaggaer and Tradeshift, among others. Punchout also supports B2B transactions like purchase orders, ship notices, and invoices over the web.
Do I Need a Punchout Catalog?
B2C shoppers can just access Amazon or any other online store and order with a single click. But B2B purchases that originate from procurement systems are much more complex and require using the punchout ordering process.
In the punchout ordering process, before an order can be placed, the procurement system user needs to create a shopping cart in the B2B eCommerce store, then add its contents to their procurement system’s shopping cart, which is then sent to the procurement system’s approval workflow. Approval workflow confirms that the potential order is compliant with corporate purchasing policies and supplier agreements regarding price, quantity, delivery, and other attributes, and also allows the buyer’s superior to sign off on, i.e. approve the final purchase. Only after the shopping cart is approved, is the purchase order sent to the supplier’s B2B eCommerce store.
Note also that your customer’s procurement system ROI (return on investment) is based on ALL purchases originating from the procurement system, so allowing their users to place orders directly from your B2B eCommerce store using a browser is prohibited.
So, if you want to sell to businesses using procurement systems, your B2B eCommerce store needs to support the punchout ordering process.
Who is Vurbis?
Founded in 2015, with offices in USA, Europe, and Australia, Vurbis offers cloud-based B2B eCommerce integration solutions for both sellers and buyers. Vurbis customers worldwide use the Vurbis PunchOut Plugin™ to support the punchout ordering process from their B2B eCommerce stores inexpensively and non-invasively.
Vurbis and OroCommerce
Vurbis and OroCommerce share a mission of making B2B eCommerce easy and accessible to any business with innovative and futureproof products designed to address the daily challenges of online buying and selling. Under that premise, the companies have collaborated to create the Vurbis PunchOut Plugin for Oro Commerce, making supporting the punchout ordering process easy for any Oro customer.
How does the Vurbis PunchOut Plugin for OroCommerce work?
The Vurbis PunchOut Plugin lets you support the punchout ordering process right from your OroCommerce store, without modifications, allowing your customers to take advantage of the advanced B2B features and functionality offered by OroCommerce right from their procurement systems.
And because you are helping your customer reach their procurement ROI goals, customer satisfaction, and possibly sales, will increase as well.
The Vurbis PunchOut Plugin can support the punchout ordering process for any e-procurement or ERP system. Key features include:
- Supports global punchout protocols (cXML, OCI, EDI for eCommerce, UBL, xCBL, and more)
- Supports B2B Transactions (POs, Advanced Shipping Notice & Invoices)
- Flexible workflow and data mapping engine
- Built-in error tracking and notification system
- Business Intelligence dashboard
- Fixed, annual pricing includes implementation, operation, support, upgrades
How to install Vurbis in OroCommerce
After downloading and installing the Vurbis PunchOut Plugin from the Oro App Marketplace, Vurbis will configure a buyer profile in the Vurbis Cloud for your customer, enabling you to support the punchout ordering process right from your OroCommerce store.
Head over to the Oro Marketplace page to find out what you need to get the OroCommerce Vurbis PunchOut Plugin up and running.
