In customer engagement, B2C sales stands as an outlier. Service, support, and B2B sales have modernized with technology, virtualizing large portions of their operations. B2C sales has not.
Digitization focused on e-commerce: web first, then social networks. In the US, e-commerce captures just 15 percent of retail sales. Physical stores, branches, and in-store channels still dominate. Live chat and social messaging only added minimal human assistance, leaving most online sales unassisted, effective mainly for simple, self-service products. Telesales and virtual sales remained limited to direct response and mass campaigns.
B2C sales has relied on a patchwork of point solutions and technologies leveraged from call centers (e.g. dialers), B2B sales (e.g. conversation intelligence), and e-commerce (e.g. chat). It works for relatively simple engagement models using a few acquisition channels.
Many businesses have hit the ceiling of what unassisted e-commerce can achieve. Meanwhile, the rise of virtual selling in B2B and the COVID shift proved that far more B2C selling can occur virtually.
The next frontier enables sales of complex or high-stakes products like health insurance, financial plans, or kitchen remodeling, where financial or emotional factors make human guidance essential to address questions or provide reassurance.
Fast forward to today. The landscape is very different, with both the number and sophistication of buying journeys expanding significantly:
Inbound inquiries arrive via any channel: web, chat, phone, or social networks. They originate directly from customers or through affiliated brands and third-party lead providers. Many require near-instant response, creating a speed-to-lead imperative.
Outbound prospecting has become multi-channel, blending human calling and automated outreach via SMS and messaging, all under a web of privacy and do-not-call regulations.
Nurturing allows leads that don’t convert immediately to be re-engaged in new ways through conversational engagement before being passed to human sellers.
Onboarding has become critical. Sales of sophisticated products like mortgages or banking services are only complete once the application process finishes. They rely on digitized workflows with proactive exception handling. Step-by-step guidance maximizes adoption and product value, often requiring targeted seller involvement at key moments.
Upselling opportunities arise during or after customer service interactions, requiring either equipped service reps or seamless transfers to sellers.
Renewals and subscriptions drive B2C sales in bite-sized increments, where timely re-engagement drives revenue.
The result: most B2C businesses must now execute and optimize a broad range of sales motions for acquiring, upselling, and retaining customers.
Gaps in B2C sales technology became visible when COVID forced all industries to go virtual. While significant investments were made in e-commerce and B2B sales over the past decade, B2C sales had been left behind in the digitization movement.
This is why B2C businesses are now investing in modernizing their human-assisted sales motions and why revenue generation has become a priority for contact centers. McKinsey found that one-third of contact centers now prioritize revenue generation, up from less than 5% in 2016.
These developments have accelerated over the past few years. Vendors are sharpening their focus and/or expanding support for B2C sales motions. The momentum in Forrester’s 2024 inaugural Wave on real-time revenue execution platforms reinforces this trajectory. It signals the dawn of B2C sales software as its own category.
In the second part of this series, I will explore the requirements and core building blocks of a B2C sales system.