What is a B2B Integration Platform and Tool?

What are B2B integrations?

B2B integrations are the automation of business processes, data and communication between two or more organisations.

For instance, a retailer may want to automate their eCommerce orders to notify their suppliers, accounting and distribution partners. Therefore B2B integrations allow organisations to work more efficiently and effectively by automating key business processes.

What is a B2B integration platform?

A B2B integration platform provides tools to help companies build and deploy integrations to tackle their own or their customer’s complex B2B data exchanges. The integration platform has the architecture to digitise information and route it quickly and automatically through a workflow to the corresponding ecosystem.

B2B integration platforms are widely used to help organisations accelerate their integration roadmap and their digital transformation efforts. This is because SaaS businesses often receive integration requests from customers that are outside of their native capabilities.

Using a B2B integration platform means they can expand their integration coverage, build repeated automated integrations and reduce friction in integration delivery. As a result, the load is taken off customers who are no longer sent to third parties, exposed to competitors and integrations can be built by anyone quickly and efficiently with low code tools.

Why is B2B integration important?

With growing customer expectations for speed and digitisation organisations can no longer rely on inefficient and error-prone processes as they are not sustainable in an ever-evolving digitally connected world. Businesses and their customers have a mix of systems and SaaS applications that exchange data. Without integrated processes, this data is siloed within those systems.

Therefore to achieve goals like improving customer experience, increasing revenue and speeding up time to market B2B integrations are required. With the right integration tools, businesses can connect and communicate data quickly and efficiently. This can help them get new features to market, improve customer experience and increase an organisation’s agile processes.

How do you select a B2B integration platform?

A potential B2B integration platform should have the appropriate capabilities that fulfil your organisation’s needs such as:

Key Features and Capabilities

Pre-built and custom connectors
Template and custom integrations
Data mapping
Bulk data processing
Dashboard and reporting tools

Supported data formats (XML, JSON etc.)
API Management
Routing and orchestration
Multi-tenant architecture

Security

Authentication and authorization
Data encryption
Secure and under control
High levels of compliance
Private cloud implementation

Scalability

Must be able to scale quickly to meet your business’s evolving needs.
The B2B integration platform you choose as a small business should be the same and able to also serve your needs as an enterprise.

Usability

User-friendly UI with low code, drag and drop functionality that simplifies complicated integration processes.

Pricing

Pricing is dependent on the size of your business and you’ll want to choose a solution that can deliver a great ROI while offering the tools you need.

What is an example of a B2B integration platform?

Cyclr is an example of a B2B integration platform or embedded iPaaS. An embedded iPaaS that provides users with integration tools to rapidly deliver native integrations, direct to users, from within their own SaaS application.

Using Cyclr as a B2B integration platform means users can transform their integration delivery from a problem to an opportunity. For instance, transforming your API from backend to frontend, from developer-focused to user-focused so you can deliver integrations natively within your own application and add value to your end-users.

In doing so you reduce your support and integration backlog and return to focusing on what you are good at, developing your core product features whilst remaining in control of your integrations.