Multi-Store front functionality is now in Beta! This addition will be available to all B2B merchants in Q1 of 2023!

B2B Edition is a SaaS application that offers enterprise-level B2B functionality to businesses of all types and sizes. It enables business owners to facilitate their B2B operations online and to provide customers with self-service account capabilities and seamless transactions.

With capabilities that allow users to easily manage front and back-end B2B processes, B2B Edition fits the needs of growing B2B Commerce businesses and can improve the B2B self-service experience for both store owners and their customers.

​Multi-Storefront (MSF) allows you to use a single BigCommerce “store” + a single B2B Edition app to power multiple “storefronts”. Each of these storefronts can have its own unique domain, theme, categories, web pages, social media links, price lists, email templates (coming in 2023 for B2B Edition), and more. The settings and data for each of these storefronts are managed from one BigCommerce control panel + one B2B Edition app.

B2B Edition is an application that overlays BigCommerce to provide additional B2B functionality. This guide assumes you have a base understanding of BigCommerce MSF functionality and B2B Edition. See this guide for more details:

Already on B2B Edition and adding an additional storefront? Then see this guide instead:

The B2B Edition app will be pre-installed in the BigCommerce control panel under "Apps". Only the Bigcommerce store owner can log in to the B2B Edition application when the store is provisioned. Once accessed, the store owner can add additional users. Details on adding additional users are in Step 5 of this guide.

Please add your storefront(s) in BigCommerce first. To do so navigate to Channel Manager inside the BigCommerce control panel. You now have the option to + Add New Storefront. Once a new storefront is successfully added set it to "Active". Please reach out to B2B Edition support via chat in order for us to enable additional storefronts on the B2B Edition side (Beta only).

You can now add your new B2B storefront! Navigate to settings > storefront inside the B2B Edition application and activate your new B2B Storefront!

Note: Additional B2B Storefronts can be purchased through BigCommerce. Please reach out to your Customer Success Manager to Purchase an additional B2B storefront. Once the purchase process is complete we will notify you via email.

B2B Edition includes 6 themes already preconfigured to work with B2B Edition.

Other themes will not work with B2B Edition at this time. Follow the steps to select and apply your new theme!

Note: B2B edition themes are not currently compatible with BigCommerce's page builder. Using page builder can have unintended consequences on the functionality of your theme. Theme edits should be done inside the theme files.

B2B Storefronts can only use a B2B Edition Theme from the included Theme Application and can only be added on stencil storefronts. This requirement is expected to be removed once our new Remote Buyer Portal is launched in 2023. The remote buyer portal will also pave the way for allowing B2B headless storefronts in 2023.

Enabling the B2B Edition checkout is necessary to activate Billing and Shipping Addresses, payment method visibility for each company, and the "Purchase Order" payment method at checkout.

Note: Currently, BigCommerce only allows one checkout to be used across all storefronts, as this setting is not storefront specific. If you have any B2B storefronts, the B2B checkout must be used for all other non-B2B storefronts.

To enable "PO Payments":

Users inside the B2B Edition Application are set globally and are not impacted by a company's storefront assignments. There is no change to adding/managing users inside the B2B Edition application in MSF B2B.

If the new user has a user account inside BigCommerce and single-click app access to B2B Edition:

When the user tries to open the B2B Edition application for the first time, a new B2B Edition account will be automatically created with a "New User Default" role and the user will be signed in automatically and given instant access.

Be sure to change the user role after account creation.

Alternate Method:

When adding new users from your company inside the B2B Edition Application you will be required to assign a role for each new member. B2B Edition gives you a lot of flexibility in the levels of permissions for each new user. There are 4 predefined roles that can be assigned and are already set up inside B2B Edition. These include:

Administrator

Like store owners, store admins also have every permission available inside B2B Edition. A typical use case would be a manager or stakeholder that needs access to all facets of B2B Edition.

Sales Rep

Sales reps are considered members of the "Sales Staff" role, which means they will only be able to view the companies, orders, and quote requests of companies assigned to them.

Accountant

Accountants are members of the team that need view-only access to merchant financial data.

Financial Manager

Financial Managers differ from Accountants in that they take a more active role in managing the company's finances. They require permission to add and edit as well as view financial data.

Not all users set up in the B2B Edition application will fit into a predefined user role. Luckily you can set up your own custom user roles inside B2B Edition!

Companies in B2B Edition are global and cross over all storefronts. Storefront access however is set on the user level. To give a company access to your new storefront, you must add the storefront to its users.

There are 4 ways company accounts are created inside the B2B Edition application. Once a company account is created you can manage their orders, users, addresses, and settings from the Companies area of the B2B Edition dashboard.

2. Create a company account by converting customer groups already created inside BigCommerce. This is the best method when company users have already been added inside BigCommerce but not B2B Edition.

3. Create company accounts in bulk via a CSV import. This is the best method when creating multiple companies at once.

When creating or editing companies in bulk with MSF please include the Channel ID in the import.

4. There is a fourth way in which the B2B merchant can request a B2B account on the front end of the website via the Trade Application Form. Once approved the company is auto-created inside B2B Edition.

When the Trade Professional Application is used to apply for a new company account on a storefront, the admin user included in the application will only have permissions for the storefront the application originated from. Additional storefronts can be added to this user inside the B2B Edition application via Companies > Company Detail > Company Users.

Note: Don't forget to set up notifications to receive emails when trade applications are submitted! You can also set these applications to be automatically approved and created with default payment methods and price lists.

The Company address book is global and all company addresses will be visible on every storefront!

Storefront Access is set on the user level. The section covers how to add storefronts to company users inside the B2B Edition application.

Adding a new storefront to multiple users at once using the company export/import will be supported in a future release. This will allow for quicker bulk edits!

Integrating any other systems with BigCommerce and B2B Edition? Then understanding how company data flows between BigCommerce and B2B Edition is essential! Reading this document will help you plan for your integrations with BigCommerce B2B edition.

Offer wholesale pricing? Special discounts? Do you have a complex pricing schedule that is customer-dependent? Price lists set the pricing structure of companies inside B2B Edition. A price list can be applied to each company created in B2B Edition which defines the pricing structure assigned to that company.

Creating a Price List in BigCommerce (Products > Price Lists)

Once a new company is added you can now enable a price list for each storefront under company detail > basic information. All available B2B storefronts will show up under the price list assignment module. However if no company users are assigned to a specific storefront, there is no need to apply a price list in its entry.

Once you’ve created company accounts for your customers, you’ll want to establish Super Admins to act as liaisons between your business and theirs.

The Super Admin feature is useful for members of your sales staff that regularly assist customers with their purchases. Super admins are typically used by merchants for sales reps that are assigned multiple companies to manage. A super admin is a member that can use the masquerade function to create orders, quotes, and manage invoices for companies on the front end of the website.

Super admins are similar to sales staff in function. However, they access and manage companies differently. Super admins manage companies on the front end of the website by using an account that can inject them as an admin into the company account to temporarily act on behalf of the company. Sales staff manage companies on the back end. Both can only access companies they are assigned to. The main difference in functionality is that only Super Admins can place orders on behalf of a company while only Sales Staff can quote a customer. A user can be both a member of the sales staff and a super admin.

Super Admins are storefront specific and will only have access to manage companies on the storefronts it has been assigned.

On the Super admin tab inside the B2B control panel, you are able to view and manage storefront assignments for Super Admins!

To view storefront assignments click the dropdown arrow in the storefronts section of the desired user.

To edit these assignments click "Edit" on the desired Super Admin user.

All B2B buyer-side features are located within the front end and are therefore storefront specific.

Add Admins, Senior Buyers, and Junior Buyers to company accounts. When adding new company users via the front end. These users will only be assigned to the storefront on which they are added. Additional storefronts can be added to this user inside the B2B Edition application via Companies > Company Detail > Company Users.

When the Trade Professional Application is used to apply for a new company account on a storefront, the admin user included in the application will only have permissions for the storefront the application originated from. Additional storefronts can be added to this user inside the B2B Edition application via Companies > Company Detail > Company Users.

The Orders menu lists all current B2B orders and tracks their status. This gives you quick and easy access to manage all of your B2B orders in one convenient location.

You can filter and manage your B2B orders by storefront via the orders tab inside the B2B Edition control panel.

Note: The only orders that are included in this list are for the companies set up in the B2B Edition application. For B2C orders please see the BigCommerce order menu.

With the quoting feature, you can build a quote from scratch to offer customer-specific discounts or negotiate offer details with the buyers. You can also manage a quote request submitted from a company's storefront account.

There are three ways to create quotes inside B2B Edition.

Creating New Quotes inside the B2B Edition Dashboard

Quotes are storefront specific and can only be viewed, added, and purchased on the storefront they are assigned.

When creating a new quote, first select the company, and then the storefront.

Note: If you change the storefront mid-quote it will delete all product data, as this varies by storefront. It is essential to proceed with the correct storefront from the beginning to prevent data loss.

Storefronts share your store’s catalog. You can choose which products appear on which storefronts inside BigCommerce. When you enable a new storefront, product categories and therefore product visibility is not added by default. You must have products assigned to a storefront in order to add them to a quote.

Once the quote is complete, preview and submit it!

Once a quote has been created there is an in-quote messaging system to communicate and negotiate between parties. When both parties are satisfied, the buyer can self-service checkout inside BigCommerce or the Sales Rep can convert the quote into a BigCommerce Order.

Managing Quotes

You can now filter and manage your B2B quotes in one convenient dashboard via the quotes tab inside the B2B Edition control panel.

Don't forget to head over to the settings section to set up quote-specific settings! All settings pages are global, however, you will see select storefront-specific settings being added over the coming months!

Invoices are storefront specific and can only be viewed, created, and purchased on the storefront from which the original order originated.

An invoice allows for PO terms and partial/additional payments. They can be created for a single order, and each can include whichever products on the order you specify. The merchant is able to create or view all the orders with an invoice and review which invoices have been paid. They can also record any external payments, such as checks and cash. Alternatively, the B2B user can make payments with their credit card from the front end of the website.

Don't forget to head over to the settings section to set up invoice-specific settings! All settings pages are global, however, you will see select storefront-specific settings being added over the coming months!