28 January 2025 17min.
11 Features Your Medical Supplies B2B Platform Must Have
Is sending an army of sales representatives on a tour across the country the best way to sell medical products? Of course not. We dare to say it is inefficient, unscalable, and, most of all, an expensive solution. So, how can we better sell such products? This is where your own medical supplies B2B platform can help. But what should it be like? Which features should it incorporate?
Article content:
The Medical Supplies Sector in Poland
According to the Polmed report, there are 5,266 entities in Poland that are manufacturers, importers, or distributors of medical products. If you operate (or plan to operate) in this industry, you must work hard to stand out with your offering. After all, the competition is quite significant.
Interestingly, nearly 64% of the demand for medical supplies in Poland comes from public and private healthcare providers. These include clinics, dental offices, and hospitals. The conclusion is clear—most medical supply sales occur in the B2B model.
Why Implement a B2B Platform for Medical Supplies?
Since the dawn of time, trading medical supplies between businesses has operated similarly: a sales representative travels from a health center to a pharmacy and a specialized hospital, trying to sell their company’s products. In the process, they burn through gallons of fuel, spend numerous nights in hotels, and offer multiple discounts. The problem is that this type of trade is not cost-effective, mainly when the representative often drives thousands of kilometers just to input the same orders into the system as the previous month. It’s simply a waste of time and money. But there is a better way.
What? By selling your products through a B2B e-commerce platform.
An online store for medical supplies is worth implementing for several reasons:
- B2B Customers Want to Buy Online
Over 73% of purchasing decisions in the business-to-business sector are made by millennials—a generation practically glued to their smartphones. 89% of B2B researchers use the Internet to search for products and services for their businesses. And 38% of customers in this sector consider the ability to place orders online as an essential criterion when choosing a supplier. These numbers clearly show that operating in the B2B sector requires an online platform for placing orders. After all, today’s B2B customers expect this from their suppliers. - Standardize and Streamline Processes
Say goodbye to discount inconsistencies, system chaos, and disorganized product data. Implementing a well-functioning online store requires you to tidy up your processes. Only this way will your sales platform make sense and function effectively. While designing processes for e-Commerce may seem like extra work, in the long term, this effort will optimize your team’s workflow and help you generate more revenue. - Lower Operational Costs
Selling your medical products through an e-Commerce platform reduces costs associated with order processing and customer service. Your sales representatives no longer need to visit every client since customers can place orders on their own. This saves money on fuel, hotels, food, and other expenses linked to traditional customer service. An additional benefit is that your sales team will have more time. They can focus on acquiring new customers or managing premium partners. - Access to Detailed Sales Data
The traditional sales model relies on the limited information entered into Excel by sales representatives—usually just the number of products ordered, and that’s it. Online sales offer significantly more possibilities in this regard. Every e-Commerce platform provides some level of reporting. Some platforms offer more data than others, but you’ll always find sales information in your admin panel. Additionally, you can integrate your B2B medical supplies platform with external analytics tools such as Google Analytics, HotJar, or Clarity. These tools provide many insights, helping you boost sales and scale your business.
As you can see, a B2B online store can bring you numerous benefits. It’s worth seriously considering its implementation.
What Should a B2B Medical Supplies Platform Be Like?
First and foremost, your platform should be as customer-oriented as possible. Those placing orders for medical supplies often represent medical facilities, and many are doctors. Before practicing independently, doctors undergo six years of medical school, followed by several years of internships and specialization. As a result, they often begin their careers around 35. It’s not a surprise that the average age of doctors is about 55. This makes for a relatively mature clientele who may not be highly tech-savvy. It’s crucial to consider this when designing the user interface of your sales system, ensuring it is accessible and user-friendly, even for older users.
Secondly, your B2B platform must be quick and efficient. Doctors in our country often work up to 300 hours a month, leaving them little time to replenish supplies. Your online store should enable them to make purchases quickly and easily. This can be achieved through various methods, such as optimizing the website for faster loading times, shortening the purchasing path, and offering features like reordering previously placed orders. These are just a few ways to make shopping on your B2B platform seamless and hassle-free.
Thirdly, your store must offer the proper range of safe and fully certified products. Medical products are sensitive items often used to save lives and health, so they must meet the highest quality standards. In this sector, price is of secondary importance; safety is paramount. Therefore, include all relevant information, brochures, and certifications on the product pages, enabling customers to verify the items they are ordering.
Fourthly, your e-commerce platform must inspire trust—not just in terms of the website’s and data transmission security(although this is crucial) but also in the relationships you build with customers. As mentioned earlier, B2B customers purchasing medical supplies are often pressed for time and prefer not to search for new suppliers repeatedly. If your e-Commerce platform fosters trust and you approach customers as partners, you stand a good chance of retaining them for years.
Fifthly, customer support on your B2B medical supplies platform should be of the highest standard regarding speed and expertise. In this industry, choosing the right product is critical, and customers often contact support teams for additional information. Investing in knowledgeable customer service representatives who truly understand the products can make a significant difference. Additionally, streamline customer service operations by implementing tools like an FAQ section, automation, or a chatbot on the website. Numerous solutions can help improve this aspect of your platform.
What Features Should a Good B2B Platform for the Medical Industry Have?
It depends—on your customers’ needs, the specifics of your business, and the budget you can spend. It’s impossible to definitively say that a platform with features A, B, and C is good, while one with features A, C, and D is not. E-Commerce is not a black-and-white matter (fortunately or unfortunately).
Therefore, we can’t provide you with a definitive list of functionalities you must implement in your B2B medical supplies store to guarantee success. However, we can share a list of features implemented by one of our clients, Meringer, on their B2B platform, which resulted in a remarkable financial outcome (+230% year-over-year sales growth).
Here’s the list of those features:
Mobile Version of the Store
According to the report “E-Commerce in Poland 2024,” as many as 75% of internet users shop online using smartphones. Therefore, an online store’s user-friendly and well-functioning mobile version is necessary for sales to end customers and B2B transactions. There are three popular approaches to creating a mobile-friendly e-Commerce platform:
- Responsive Web Design (RWD) – This involves designing separate views of the sales platform specifically for mobile devices. This version will be displayed when a user visits your store on a smartphone. It is the most popular option in m-Commerce.
- Mobile App – A fully dedicated standalone app installed directly on the user’s device. This solution is generally suited for more prominent players due to the high development and maintenance costs.
- Progressive Web App (PWA) – A modern approach that designs the website to offer an experience comparable to using a native app without creating entirely separate systems for each operating system.
In Meringer’s case, we opted for the last approach. Any user visiting sklep.meringer.pl on a mobile device can install a web app on their phone, enabling them to conveniently access all the features of the purchasing platform, just as if they were using a dedicated native app.

Integration with a PIM System
Although it’s not a feature your B2B customers will notice in your online store, integrating with a PIM (Product Information Management) system can significantly simplify running your e-business. As we’ve mentioned before, medical products are particular. Their composition and properties are crucial, and providing information about certifications and compliance with standards is necessary, not just a nice-to-have. In such cases, efficient and error-free product data management is essential. However, managing this directly through an e-Commerce platform can be cumbersome—especially if you sell through multiple sales channels. This is where a PIM system comes in, making the task much more manageable.
With a PIM, you can create, edit, catalog, and distribute all product information—from descriptions and images to ingredients, certifications, and associated labels.
We won’t delve too deeply into the capabilities and benefits of PIM systems here, as we’ve already written extensively about them on our blog (just type “PIM” into the search bar on our website, and you’ll find all our content on product information management). However, we want to emphasize that with a PIM tool, you can manage your e-Commerce more effectively without worrying about errors or inconsistencies in product data.

Tiered Pricing
One of the defining characteristics of B2B trade is the purchase of large quantities of the same product. It’s likely that when selling offline, your sales representatives offer discounts to clients who buy in bulk. You can replicate this strategy on your B2B platform by implementing a functionality that allows you to display different prices depending on the quantity of products ordered.
In this case, it’s a good idea to establish specific thresholds and carefully calculate pricing that remains profitable for your business.

Not all e-Commerce platforms offer this capability, so it’s essential to consider this when choosing a system for your online store. Meringer utilized the Magento platform, which allowed for the necessary customization to support their tiered pricing strategy. However, even without such customizations, Magento includes a built-in discount module based on larger purchase quantities. This makes it a solid choice for companies operating in the B2B sector.
Product Variants
Medical supplies often come in multiple versions and variations. Gloves, for example, are essential items in all medical facilities. Every manufacturer offers at least several sizes of them. You’ll create a logistical nightmare if you list each size as a separate product in your online store. Why?
First, you would have to manage each size individually. This means that if a brand’s gloves are available in five sizes, you must make updates five times (once for each size).
Second, customers must sift through your entire glove catalog to find the needed sizes. As we mentioned earlier, your clients don’t have much time to spare. They may end up calling or emailing your customer service team—or worse, they might turn to your competitors.
Creating variant products is an excellent way to solve this problem. Your customers can view all sizes on a single product page and add the ones they need to their cart directly from there. This functionality not only streamlines the purchasing process for your clients but also reduces the number of inquiries to your customer service team. It’s a classic win-win.

Most Frequently Purchased Products
Business purchases, including those in the medical field, are often repetitive. Clinics, hospitals, and dental offices consistently need the same products. Since most of these items are single-use, their supplies are regularly depleted, requiring customers to repurchase the same products. It’s worth implementing a feature that allows customers to easily and quickly reorder their previous purchases to simplify this process.
This is precisely what we did when developing the store for Meringer. Upon logging into sklep.meringer.pl, we designed a feature that provides each user with a personalized list of their most frequently purchased products. This allows them to reorder items they often add to their cart effortlessly. It’s an incredibly convenient solution that Meringer’s customers greatly appreciate (and your customers will love it, too! 😉).

Advanced Search Functionality
The larger your product catalog, the harder it becomes to find specific items. That’s why a robust search engine is a critical feature for any B2B platform, including those dealing with medical supplies. It shouldn’t be an essential tool that fails to return results due to a typo. Instead, it should be a high-quality tool that automatically suggests completions as customers type, recommends products based on previous visits, and allows them to add items to their cart directly from the search results without visiting the product page.
A customer who cannot find the product they need will not sift through thousands of items in your catalog. Nobody has the patience for that, especially not medical professionals. If your customer cannot quickly locate what they’re looking for, they will go elsewhere to make their purchase. You must ensure your B2B store has a robust and efficient search engine to prevent this.
A search engine that allows you to define searchable attributes or modify its algorithm, such as enabling 100% query matching or flexible search, is an excellent solution for stores with extensive product catalogs.

Backorder Functionality
The ability to place orders for products currently out of stock is a handy feature for medical facilities (and others). Why? Because these customers often add numerous items to their shopping carts. It’s entirely possible that out of the 50 products they want to purchase, one is not currently available.
In an ideal world, your customer would shrug it off, purchase the available items, and return later for the rest. However, the world is far from perfect, and a medical facility that cannot find a specific product in your inventory will eventually have to order it elsewhere. This creates two potential scenarios:
- The customer cannot complete their entire order and abandons their cart, opting to shop with your competitor instead.
- The customer buys the available items from you but sources the missing products from another supplier. But what if they find the competitor’s experience better? They might place their future orders entirely with them.
To eliminate such situations, we implemented a backorder function for Meringer. With this feature, customers can order out-of-stock products. In doing so, they specify the desired delivery timeframe, shipping, and payment method. This way, the customer no longer has to look for alternative suppliers, and Meringer can retain its clients without worrying about them switching to competitors.

Shopping Lists
Shopping lists are handy, particularly for extensive medical facilities with multiple specializations. Each department determines the demand for specific medical supplies separately in such cases. The gynecology department has its own list of needs; surgery has another, and orthopedics is yet another. However, the final order is usually consolidated into a single purchase. Each department prepares its list, often in an Excel file, and passes it to the person responsible for placing the entire facility’s order.
This creates a problem: someone has to input all that information into the purchasing platform manually. An alternative approach is for each department to have access to the e-Commerce platform and add their required items to the cart. However, managing such a large order in this way can become chaotic.
Shopping lists solve this problem. With this functionality, individual departments can create dedicated wishlists, name them appropriately, and add the needed products. Once their list is complete, they can add all the items from their shopping list to the cart with a single click.
This is a significant improvement that makes the purchasing process much more efficient. We implemented this feature on the B2B platform for Meringer, and trust us, this distributor’s customers absolutely love it.

Substitute Product Offers
No medical facility can afford to run out of essential supplies—after all, lives and health are at stake. A doctor can’t tell a patient to wait a week for surgery because they’ve run out of intubation tubes.
This is why consistent product availability is so critical in this industry. However, there are times when a product might not reach your warehouse on time for one reason or another. In such cases, offering your customers substitutes for the products they are looking for is beneficial. Who hasn’t heard the phrase in a pharmacy, “We don’t have this medication, but we have a substitute with the same ingredients”? This is standard practice in the medical supplies industry, and it’s worth translating this approach into functionality on your B2B platform. How?
On Meringer’s B2B platform, we implemented a feature that suggests substitute products on the product page. This functionality is handy when a product is out of stock, and customers are looking for more affordable alternatives. In our opinion, every medical supplies distributor should include such a feature in their system.

Retrieving Data from GUS
Purchasing medical supplies on a B2B platform almost always requires creating an account. This makes sense, as many products in this category are regulated. Not everyone can purchase 1,000 scalpels or 100 packages of prescription medication. However, filling out multiple fields in a registration form can be tedious.
To simplify this process for Meringer’s customers, we designed a registration page as part of the checkout process. After entering their VAT (NIP) number, the remaining details—such as the company name and headquarters address—are automatically retrieved. We highly recommend implementing a similar solution. It significantly speeds up account creation and purchasing, which your “medical” clients will surely appreciate.

Individual Discounts
As you know, B2B commerce, including the medical industry, relies heavily on relationships, often built through negotiated discounts. Individual pricing terms are standard in business-to-business transactions. If your sales representatives offer discounts to their clients, it’s essential to extend this practice to your online B2B e-commerce platform as well. Without this, convincing your customers to use your B2B e-commerce platform will be challenging.
Contrary to your opinion, transferring individual pricing to an online store isn’t overly complicated. Of course, the complexity depends on the technology your sales platform is built on, but implementing such a feature is entirely possible on most engines designed for B2B commerce.
For example, Magento natively includes a feature that assigns price lists to customers based on their group. This simple and free functionality is available on the platform from the start. For Meringer, however, we approached individual pricing differently. We developed a custom “price per customer” module for calculating individual user and product prices. This means that Meringer can set discounts on specific products for each client individually. And it works pretty well.

Summary
Selling medical supplies online is no easy task. Not only is it a tightly regulated and specialized industry, but it is also deeply rooted in the traditional sales model, relying heavily on sales representatives. However, this doesn’t mean medical products cannot be sold online. Numerous examples, such as Meringer, demonstrate that it’s possible to succeed in e-Commerce with such products. The key lies in creating a B2B e-commerce platform that meets the needs of medical facilities while preserving the benefits (and discounts 😉) they’ve negotiated over the years.
The eleven features discussed in this article are just a few options that have proven successful for sklep.meringer.pl. However, this is not an exhaustive list. There are many possibilities in this area. Remember, though, to carefully choose the engine for your e-Commerce platform. The engine you select will determine the features you can implement in your online store.