How business buyers use a supplier's website
A business purchase is rarely one person's decision. Someone is asked to find options and builds a shortlist. A technical colleague checks whether each supplier can really do the work. A manager or a finance lead signs off. All of them look at your website, at different moments, with different questions, and usually before anyone speaks to you.
| Visitor | Their question | What answers it |
|---|---|---|
| The researcher | Do they do this, for companies like ours? | Specific service and industry pages |
| The technical evaluator | Can they really deliver it? | Process, methods, detailed examples, documentation |
| The approver | Are they credible and low risk? | Company information, proof, clear terms |
| The returning buyer | How do I reach the right person now? | Contact routes on every page |
A site built only for the first visitor produces shortlists that go nowhere. The features below serve all four.
Pages that answer the buyer's questions
- One page per service. A single page listing everything you do cannot rank for, or answer, a specific need. Each service deserves its own page that says what is included, who it suits and what the buyer receives.
- Pages by industry or use. Buyers look for evidence that you understand their sector. A page that speaks their language, with their typical problems, does more than a list of logos.
- How you work. Steps, timings in general terms, who is involved and what you need from the client. This is what the technical evaluator reads.
- Proof that can be checked. Case studies with enough detail to be believed, named standards you follow, real photographs of your team and premises. Leave out anything you could not substantiate if asked.
- Answers to the awkward questions. Minimum order, regions served, lead times in general terms, what you do not do. Stating limits saves both sides an unproductive call.
Every one of these pages will be forwarded by email to someone who has not seen the rest of the site. Each should make sense alone and carry its own route to contact.
Offer more than one route to contact
Buyers arrive at different stages of readiness. A single contact form serves only one of them.
| Route | Suits a buyer who | What it needs |
|---|---|---|
| Short enquiry form | Has a question and wants a reply | Few fields, a clear promise of what happens next |
| Request for quotation | Knows what they want and has a specification | File upload, quantities, delivery details |
| Book a call | Wants to talk and dislikes waiting | A calendar with real availability |
| Direct email and phone | Prefers their own tools, or is in a hurry | Visible, clickable, answered |
| Messaging such as WhatsApp | Works in a market where that is normal for business | A staffed number and agreed hours |
Place the main route on every page, not only on a contact page. A buyer who has just read a service page should not have to navigate elsewhere to ask about it.
Forms that people finish
- 01
Ask only for what you will use
Name, work email, company and the message are enough to start most conversations. Each extra required field loses some enquiries. Qualifying questions can follow in the reply.
- 02
Let the question carry context
Fill in the page or service the buyer came from automatically, so they do not have to explain where they were.
- 03
Say what happens next
State who will reply and roughly when. Then make sure that is true.
- 04
Confirm on screen and by email
A clear confirmation with a copy of what was sent reassures the buyer that the message arrived.
- 05
Block spam without blocking people
Prefer quiet checks to puzzles. Test the form on a phone, with a company email address, from outside your network.
- 06
Handle consent properly
Say how the details will be used and link to the privacy policy. Do not add people to marketing lists unless they asked.
What happens after the form matters most
The feature that most affects B2B enquiries is not on the website. It is the speed and quality of the reply. A site can deliver a good enquiry into a shared inbox where it waits until the buyer has signed with someone else.
Route each enquiry to a named owner, record it in your CRM with its source, send an alert and track the time to first response. Our guide to connecting a website to your CRM covers the mechanics. Review the numbers monthly: how many enquiries, from which pages, how quickly answered and how many became opportunities.
A worked example
An industrial coatings supplier reviews its website
This example is invented to show how the features connect. A coatings supplier receives few enquiries from a website that has one services page and one contact form.
- PagesThe single services page is split into five, one per coating type, and three industry pages are added for marine, construction and food processing. Each states what is supplied, typical applications and the standards followed.
- RoutesA quotation form with file upload is added for buyers with a specification, alongside the short form. Phone and email appear in the header of every page.
- FormsThe short form drops from eleven fields to four. The page the buyer was reading is recorded automatically.
- Follow-upEnquiries now create a record in the CRM, assigned by product line, with an alert to the owner. The sales manager reviews response times each Monday.
The supplier can now see which pages produce enquiries and how quickly they are answered. The first monthly review shows that quotation requests arrive mostly from the industry pages, which decides where the next content effort goes.
Features that help, and features that get in the way
Helps a buyer act
- A contact route visible on every page
- Specific pages for each service and sector
- Downloadable specifications without a form
- Real names and faces for the people who reply
- Pages that load quickly on a phone
Gets in the way
- Pop-ups that cover the page on arrival
- Brochures locked behind long forms
- A chat window nobody is answering
- Auto-playing video with sound
- A contact page as the only place to get in touch
B2B enquiry checklist
B2B enquiry readiness checklist
0 of 10 checkedWhat to do next
Send a test enquiry through your own site from a phone, using an address your colleagues do not recognize, and time the reply. Then read one service page as if a colleague had forwarded it to you. Those two tests usually set the priorities.
If the findings point to a larger piece of work, our website redesign page explains how we approach it, and the website project brief builder will help you describe what you need. You can also talk to us directly.
Common questions
Should a B2B website show prices?
Where prices are standard, showing them filters out poor fits and builds trust. Where each project is scoped individually, explain how pricing works and what drives it, instead of inventing a figure. Buyers mainly want to know whether you are in their range and how a quote is produced. Silence on the subject sends some of them elsewhere.
Should brochures and specifications sit behind a form?
Technical documents that a buyer needs in order to evaluate you are best left open, because the evaluator who cannot get them simply moves on. A form can be reasonable for substantial material such as a detailed report. Ask yourself whether the contact details are worth more than the buyers who leave at the form.
Is live chat worth adding to a corporate website?
Only if someone will answer it during the hours shown. A staffed chat suits buyers with quick questions and can shorten the path to a call. An unstaffed one, or an automated assistant that cannot answer real questions, damages confidence. Start with direct phone and email done well, then add chat if you can resource it.
How many fields should an enquiry form have?
As few as you need to reply usefully, which for most first contacts is four or five. If you require more to route the enquiry, make the extra fields optional or use a second step. For quotation requests a longer form is accepted, because the buyer expects to give detail in exchange for a price.
How do we know which pages generate enquiries?
Record the page and the source with every form submission, and pass them into your CRM. Analytics tools can then report enquiries by page, and the CRM can show which of those became business. Keep personal details out of analytics tools themselves. Without this link, decisions about the website rest on impressions.
