Reaching enterprise-level sales volume in your business is a major milestone. It shows you’ve increased sales and built a reputation as a reliable partner in your industry. That growth also brings new logistical challenges.
As your business scales, you’ll need a robust order management system (OMS) to handle incoming products from suppliers and outgoing shipments to buyers. These platforms manage complex payment terms, support multi-location fulfillment, and integrate with your existing tech stack to help meet customer expectations and deliver a top-notch buyer experience.
Business-to-business (B2B) companies use an OMS to manage inventory and fulfillment processes. If you need one, it’s helpful to understand how these systems work and which features to prioritize. Here’s how to choose the best B2B order management platform for your business.
What is B2B order management software?
B2B order management software helps businesses process and track B2B orders. When a B2B order is placed, the software tracks every step, from capturing purchase details to checking stock levels and coordinating warehouse shipments. This technology reduces errors and keeps buyers informed by connecting all parts of the ordering process in one system.
Key takeaways for choosing B2B order management software
B2B order management goes beyond showing a customer’s order status. Buyers can self-serve, sales reps can see previous orders, and supply chain systems can work from shared data to coordinate complex fulfillment. The result: Buyers get shipments on time and in full, without the operational complexity that often comes with legacy systems.
Fast shortlist: Eight capabilities to verify in a demo
To evaluate vendors faster, verify that your shortlisted B2B OMS offers these features:
- Order edits
- Partial shipments
- Inventory allocations and available-to-promise (ATP) accuracy
- Stakeholder approvals
- Invoicing and custom payment terms
- Electronic data interchange (EDI) support, such as advanced shipping notices (ASNs)
- User roles and audit trails
- Integration patterns
Types of B2B order management software
B2B order management software takes three forms:
- Traditional order management software
- Enterprise resource planning (ERP) software
- Unified commerce platforms
Here’s how they compare:
Traditional order management software
Traditional order management software focuses on processing orders and inventory across multiple channels, making it more affordable than other options but often less flexible on integrations. It lets you accept orders from multiple channels, including your website, physical stores, and online B2B marketplaces like Alibaba.
Once orders come in, this software manages the fulfillment process by tracking inventory, creating packing slips, coordinating with shipping carriers, and updating delivery status.
Benefits:
- Affordable for businesses of all sizes with various pricing options
- Straightforward to set up and implement
- Supports multiple sales channels
Drawbacks:
- Limited integration with other business systems
- May require manual data entry in multiple systems
- May not scale well as order complexity increases
Enterprise resource planning (ERP) software
Enterprise resource planning integrates business functions and data in one system, but it requires a significant investment in time, money, and resources. It aggregates data from product design, inventory, customer relationship management (CRM), sales, and marketing.
With ERP software, your sales team can look up how much inventory remains in your warehouses, and your customer service team can find past purchase orders and delivery confirmations.
Many businesses manage their electronic data interchange (EDI) connections through their ERP system. EDI is a standardized digital format used for exchanging business documents like purchase orders, invoices, and shipping notices with suppliers and trading partners.
Benefits:
- Provides a complete, integrated view of all business operations
- Eliminates data silos between departments
- Offers real-time visibility across all business processes
- Automates data flow between different business functions
Drawbacks:
- Cost of purchasing and implementing ERP ecommerce integrations
- Complex setup requiring months of configuration and training
- Often requires business process changes to accommodate the software
- Typically practical only for larger companies
- Requires significant IT resources to maintain
Unified commerce platforms
Unified platforms like Shopify offer a complete solution that integrates B2B and retail operations on one platform, making data easier to manage and providing features for each business model.
Shopify captures purchase details, manages inventory updates, processes payments, coordinates shipping, and handles returns.
Shopify uses a common data model that can be configured to handle both B2B and retail transactions. If you want to integrate inventory, customer data, and orders, Shopify can sync the data automatically across wholesale and retail operations. Alternatively, businesses that require separate inventory management for B2B and DTC can set up dedicated stores with customized configurations.
Having all your sales data in one place makes reporting easier. You can create reports that show just B2B sales, just retail sales, or everything together. Track products from warehouse to delivery, see exactly what's in stock, and manage shipping from one dashboard.
For example, The Conran Shop switched from Magento (Adobe Commerce) to Shopify and brought their retail and wholesale businesses together. This cut costs by 50%, increased sales conversions by 54%, and made their order process simpler while still keeping the special features they needed for wholesale.
Benefits:
- Combines B2B and retail operations in a single platform
- Flexible configuration for either integrated or separate inventory management
- Centralized data makes reporting and analysis easier
- More affordable than full ERP systems while offering many similar features
- Shorter implementation and shorter learning curve
- Provides end-to-end order visibility from placement to delivery
Drawbacks:
- Might require add-ons or integrations for complex B2B requirements
How to choose B2B order management software (step-by-step)
With so many B2B OMS options to choose from, it can be difficult to tell which one is worth the investment. Here’s how to evaluate your options:
1. Map the order-to-cash workflow
Before looking at software, document every touchpoint from the moment a lead requests pricing. Your B2B OMS should support every stage in this order-to-cash workflow: Quote → PO → invoice → payment. For example:
- Does it allow a sales rep to turn a negotiated quote into a purchase order (PO) with one click?
- Can it handle partial invoicing and consolidated monthly invoicing for repeat orders?
- Does it support your buyers’ preferred payment methods?
2. List required integrations
Problems start when teams update order data manually. Prevent mistakes and inventory data delays by confirming your shortlisted platform integrates with the tools you’re already using. This includes ERP systems, warehouse management systems (WMS), transport management systems (TMS), CRMs, and accounting tools.
Dig deeper to find out how the integration works. Is it native and bidirectional, or does it require middleware and custom APIs to get your systems in sync? The latter increases total cost of ownership (TCO): you’ll spend extra time maintaining the connection, which sometimes means rewriting code entirely if the OMS updates its software.
Good to know:Shopify has the best TCO in ecommerce, beating competitors by up to 36%, according to a leading independent consulting firm.
3. Validate B2B complexity
Business purchases pass through a chain of command before they’re approved. Validate your B2B OMS can support that complexity with features like:
- Approvals
- Flexible payment terms
- Real-time credit limits
- Multi-entity purchasing
For example, a retailer might have a junior regional manager place a $25,000 order that the OMS automatically pauses because it exceeds that location’s monthly budget threshold. Once approved by the brand’s procurement team, the OMS generates a PO and routes the invoice to the buyer’s AP department.
4. Run a demo scorecard
Rank your most important features, then schedule demos with shortlisted vendors. Set must-pass scenarios—use cases the platform must support—to confirm compatibility.
If you process a high volume of split shipments, for example, ask the vendor to demonstrate an order of 1,000 items in which 500 ship from a third-party logistics provider (3PL), 300 ship from your warehouse, and 200 are back-ordered. If you offer negotiated pricing, have them show a B2B customer portal where two different users see two different prices for the same SKU based on their contract.
5. Plan implementation realities
Launch with one region or customer tier to iron out any teething issues with the new B2B order management system. This phased implementation stress-tests the new platform before you move every order workflow.
To keep the deployment on track, be realistic about timelines. If legacy data is messy—for example, three different formats for the same shipping address or inconsistent SKU naming across multiple warehouses—the OMS won't route orders correctly, leading to expensive manual fixes post-launch.
Also, define who owns the OMS. Is it warehouse operations? IT? Sales? This person has the final say on system settings so departments don’t make unauthorized tweaks that break workflow logic.
Key features of B2B order management software
Order management software can help you build workflows for B2B buyers. Here are five features frequently included in order management platforms:
Purchase order workflows, approvals, and order edits
Purchase orders are legally binding contracts once accepted by the seller. An OMS helps manage these commitments with approval workflows. Instead of a buyer emailing a PDF back and forth with a sales rep, the OMS can automatically trigger notifications based on predefined rules, such as spend thresholds or restricted product categories. The order isn’t processed until the authorized controller signs off.
Beyond the initial purchase, a B2B OMS lets buyers adjust their orders before fulfillment without forcing them to restart the entire procurement process, including:
- Updating a shipping address
- Swapping a SKU
- Adjusting product quantities
Payment terms, invoicing, and credit controls
Order management software ensures B2B buyers see their negotiated prices everywhere on your site. When wholesale clients log in, they'll see their specific contract prices on all pages, from search results to product pages to checkout. This keeps pricing consistent even when you update your base prices. Each business client sees exactly what they should pay, including net payment terms.
EDI readiness and ASN support
Electronic data interchange (EDI) is the standardized format that large retailers, distributors, and manufacturers use to exchange documents like POs and invoices. Instead of emails and spreadsheets, an OMS helps you become EDI-ready if it can store these files and translate them into orders.
Advanced shipping notices (ASNs) also fall under this remit. They’re electronic documents sent when an order leaves your warehouse, including exactly what’s in the shipment with real-time tracking numbers. Buyers cross-check receiving inventory against the ASN when it arrives.
Customer communications and order visibility
Make the customer experience as friction-free as possible with an OMS that automatically notifies customers when there’s an update on their order:
- Order confirmations: Automatic confirmations to customers and the seller’s sales team after a purchase. These confirmations may include order numbers, estimated shipping costs, and any sales tax due.
- Shipping confirmation: A notification to the buyer when their item ships. A B2B OMS can also inform you, the seller, when your products leave your warehouse (or a dropshipper’s warehouse).
- Order tracking: Fetch shipping data from delivery services like USPS, FedEx, and UPS and display shipping updates from third-party websites so buyers can track orders from your B2B portal.
Inventory, allocation/ATP, and fulfillment routing
B2B order management software creates a single, global view of stock across warehouses, stores, and 3PLs. It uses this to calculate available to promise (ATP) inventory in real time, factoring in incoming shipments and safety buffers so buyers only see what they can actually buy.
Protect high-value contracts with inventory allocation features that reserve stock for wholesale buyers. It prevents a surge of small DTC orders from accidentally depleting the inventory promised to a wholesale partner.
Some order management software can also help with fulfillment routing by automatically selecting the best path for an order. The main priority might be lower shipping costs or faster delivery times. In either case, the B2B OMS evaluates stock levels, buyer proximity, and real-time carrier rates to fulfill the order.
Five factors to consider when choosing B2B order management software
As you research order management software for your B2B sales operations, you’ll find many options with various prices and features. Narrow your search by focusing on these five key factors:
Integration with other software
The best order management software integrates with your current software tools, including accounting software for financial management and customer relationship management software that manages customer data.
If you choose ERP software, you get a system that integrates all your software applications and databases. ERP systems can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, though they can provide cost savings over the lifetime of your business.
Ease of use
Order management software is only helpful if your team members know how to use it. Your IT department might oversee its initial integration, but everyone in your organization must be able to use it. This means sales reps can look up order data for their customers and warehouse managers can monitor inventory levels. Choose software everyone on your team can learn quickly.
Scalability
Your OMS must be able to scale as your business grows. A truly scalable system includes:
- Modular architecture that allows you to add new features without disrupting existing operations
- Cloud-based infrastructure that can automatically allocate more resources during order surges
- Easy integration with new sales channels or third-party services
Your OMS should adapt to changing business models, whether you're expanding from online-only to physical stores, entering new markets, or accommodating seasonal demand fluctuations. The right OMS provides this adaptability without requiring a complete system replacement, saving you significant time and resources as your business evolves.
Range of capabilities
Take time to think about what your business really needs so you can choose an OMS that works well now and as you grow. If you work with dropshippers, you may only need an OMS to process customer orders. If you ship your own products, you need order management software that handles the logistics behind each purchase order, from shipping to inventory management.
Price
B2B order management software prices vary based on features, user count, and the number of orders the platform processes each month. Many platforms offer tiered pricing, which lets you match your subscription to the size of your business. This software is typically sold as a monthly subscription. Consider choosing the most robust software suite you can afford and upgrading over time.
Top five B2B order management tools
Here are five B2B order management platforms worth considering:
| B2B order management software | Best for | G2 rating | Pricing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Shopify Plus | Omnichannel brands who sell DTC | 4.4 out of 5 stars | From $2,300/month |
| Cin7 Omni | Smaller B2B brands who also sell on marketplaces | 3.8 out of 5 stars | From $749/month |
| Brightpearl | Brightpearl ERP users | 4.5 out of 5 stars | Free to install; pricing is custom |
| Pipe17 | Midmarket B2B brands using multiple commerce platforms | 4.6 out of 5 stars | From $24,000/year |
| SparkLayer | B2B brands who accept manual orders | Not available | From $49/month |
1. Shopify
Who it's for: Omnichannel B2B brands who also sell DTC
Shopify is a unified commerce solution that can simplify your B2B and business-to-consumer (B2C) order management. Shopify can power your checkout (online and in person), order processing, email confirmations, fulfillment, and follow-up customer service.
B2B on Shopify offers custom company profiles that handle multiple buyers and locations with different access levels, giving each B2B buyer a personalized experience. Set up wholesale accounts with tailored product catalogs, pricing, order quantities, bulk discounts, payment terms, and self-service options. This helps you create complete buying experiences while making operations easier to manage with bulk-ordering and account management tools.
Key features:
With Shopify as your B2B OMS, you can automate the entire order lifecycle with automated workflows, centralize inventory management across channels, and access order tracking capabilities. The platform supports:
- Complex workflows, including order modifications, back orders, and partial fulfillments
- Self-serve buying experiences where buyers can place their own orders, manage their accounts, and review and track order history within your online store
- Automation through Shopify Flow to handle repetitive fulfillment workflows
You can also use Shopify to import B2B orders from non-Shopify platforms, centralizing all your order data in a single, intuitive admin experience that allows teams to create and analyze reports.
Take it from Russell Hendrix, Canada’s largest food service equipment supplier.
“Processing orders in the admin helps our sales team bypass so many steps we used to have to go through before,” says Paul Roy, director of ecommerce and marketing. “It's probably five times faster than using our ERP.”
Integrations: Shopify integrates with a variety of third-party tools like ERPs, email marketing platforms, and customer relationship management systems, with these integrations available in the Shopify App Store.
Pricing: The Shopify Plus plan starts at $2,300 a month for standard setups and integrations on a three-year term, or $2,500 per month for a one-year term.
2. Cin7 Omni
Who it's for: Smaller B2B brands that also sell on wholesale marketplaces
Cin7 Omni is a multichannel order and inventory management system. Features include inventory and warehouse management, retail operations and point-of-sale (POS) services, invoicing, payments, and shipping logistics.
Key features:
- Cloud-based wholesale inventory management
- Purchase order syncing
- Multi-currency support
- Contact and supplier management
Integrations: Cin7 Omni integrates with Shopify, 3PL partners, and marketplaces like Walmart and Amazon.
Pricing: Pricing starts at $749 per month and can accommodate businesses ranging from a simple B2C ecommerce operation to a multinational distribution service.
3. Brightpearl
Who it's for: Brightpearl ERP users
Brightpearl by Sage is a retail operating system. It includes the features of B2B order management software, including inventory and order management, shipping and fulfillment, warehouse management, and CRM tools.
Key features:
- Automated order routing
- Smart sales forecasting
- Advanced retail analytics
- Multi-location inventory management
Integrations: Brightpearl integrates with many third-party sales platforms, including Shopify, and offers customer support to help you get more value from your subscription.
Pricing: Free to install; pricing is provided by Brightpearl based on requirements.
4. Pipe17
Who it's for: Midmarket B2B brands using multiple commerce platforms
Pipe17 is an integration platform for businesses managing both B2B and DTC sales channels, connecting Shopify with ERPs, marketplaces, and fulfillment centers. It automatically syncs inventory, routes orders, and manages data flow between connected systems in real time through a user-friendly dashboard, without requiring technical expertise.
Key features:
- Order splitting
- Kit management
- Multi-location fulfillment
- Real-time ERP updates
Integrations: Pipe17 integrates with Shopify and the ERP system NetSuite.
Pricing: At $24,000 per year for the standard plan, it’s positioned for midmarket and enterprise sellers processing up to 4,000 orders monthly across up to five connected platforms.
5. SparkLayer
Who it's for: B2B brands who accept manual orders
SparkLayer is a B2B wholesale solution that turns existing Shopify stores into wholesale websites, offering customer-specific pricing, quotes, invoicing, and team collaboration. It’s rated 4.9 out of 5 by Shopify App Store users.
The platform allows both customers and sales representatives to place orders, integrates seamlessly with existing Shopify themes, and supports multi-language and multi-currency selling to international businesses.
Key features:
- Flexible pricing controls
- Self-serve B2B ordering portal
- AI-powered order builder
- Quotes, preorders, and backorders
Integrations: SparkLayer integrates with Shopify and the Brightpearl ERP system.
Pricing: SparkLayer provides tiered pricing starting at $49 per month for up to 50 orders. There’s a 14-day free trial available.
Benefits of a B2B order management system
Increase efficiency
A B2B OMS helps your business work smarter and faster by cutting out unnecessary steps and putting all your information in one place. It automates routine tasks, creates consistent processes, and grows with your business so your team can handle more orders without hiring more people.
Here are some key ways it makes your team more efficient:
- Shows your inventory levels across all sales channels in real time
- Speeds up order approvals so orders don't get stuck waiting for signatures
- Makes payment processing faster and easier to track
- Lets customers place orders and check status themselves without calling you
- Replaces paper forms with digital records that are easy to find
- Processes many orders at once instead of one at a time
With these efficiency improvements, your team can focus on serving high-value wholesale accounts, negotiating better supplier terms, and expanding your distribution network instead of getting bogged down in manual order processing.
Improve cash flow
When your order data lives in one system, you get real-time inventory visibility and access to metrics like order values, payment status, and customer credit limits. This enables more accurate cash-flow forecasting and helps identify high-margin customer segments. You can also track payment patterns across your B2B customer base to refine credit policies and reduce days sales outstanding (DSO).
Automate complex supply chain processes
A B2B order management system automatically routes orders to the right fulfillment centers based on inventory levels, customer location, and delivery requirements.
Less manual coordination between B2B supply chain departments like procurement, warehouse, and finance results in higher operational efficiency. You’ll have better visibility into inventory costs and can optimize working capital by maintaining appropriate stock levels.
Manage your B2B and wholesale orders with Shopify
Whether you’re dealing with B2B buyers directly or collaborating with distributors, you need a solution that centralizes sales orders, tracks shipments, and improves operational efficiency. Without this centralization, wholesale businesses struggle with order errors, inventory discrepancies, and inefficient manual processes that limit growth.
Grow and run your wholesale business on Shopify with tools optimized for flexibility and customization, for all your buyers. The unified commerce platform manages both B2B and DTC operations under one core data model, no patchy integrations or custom middleware required.
B2B order management software FAQ
What is the difference between OMS and CRM?
CRM stands for customer relationship management. CRM software focuses on managing relationships with current and prospective buyers, tracking everything from account data to order history. Order management software focuses on the operational workflows around purchase orders.
Can B2B order management software integrate with existing ERP and CRM systems?
The best B2B order management software platforms integrate with ERP and CRM systems.
Does B2B OMS support EDI and ASNs (850/855/856/810)?
A specialized B2B OMS can support the full EDI lifecycle, including purchase orders (850), acknowledgments (855), shipping notices (856), and invoices (810). This automation helps your system exchange the standardized documents used by enterprise retailers and global supply chain partners.
How does OMS handle approvals, payment terms, and credit limits?
An enterprise OMS can handle automated approvals and pause B2B orders that exceed a specific dollar threshold or discount percentage. It can also run a real-time sync with your ERP to monitor credit limits and payment terms as orders come in, for example, automatically placing a hold on new orders if a customer has reached a spending cap or has unpaid invoices.
What security/compliance items belong on an OMS checklist?
Important security and compliance features to check when evaluating an OMS include:
- Data encryption (both at rest and in transit)
- Multifactor authentication
- SOC 2 Type II compliance
- Role-based access control
- PCI DSS compliance
- GDPR/CCPA readiness
- Audit logs and version control
Is B2B order management software scalable to accommodate business growth?
Most B2B order management platforms are scalable and allow you to upgrade to higher tiers as your company reaches enterprise-level order volumes.
