What is a customer portal? And why does my organisation need one?

Before we start, some context:

What is a customer portal?

A customer portal is an online environment in which customers, by logging in, can securely access their information, purchase products or services from the supplier, or arrange matters. So it is a personal digital environment and not a public one.

How does a customer portal work?

A customer portal is often reachable through the supplier's website, where a log-in button has been added. The supplier creates new customers in the portal's Content Management System (CMS). It is possible to give a customer different management roles so that some people have more functions and permissions than others. That prevents just anyone from being able to place orders with a supplier, for example. After logging in, a customer's personal details are displayed. That can be retrieved from an ERP system or entered manually. Think of discounts, projects, service contracts and product documentation.

Why a customer portal?

A customer portal is different from a webshop. The latter is publicly accessible. Many companies do not want everyone to be able to see their prices. That is why it is useful to develop a customer portal. A customer portal can also work well for arranging unique service processes within an organisation digitally. Specific project documentation and the exchange of information between customer and supplier often happens in a customer portal. 

Who uses a customer portal?

A customer portal can in principle be used by all staff within the customer organisation, as long as you think carefully about the roles of different users. By assigning permissions to roles, some users can do more than others.

What kinds of customer portals are there?

There are several customer portals. There are portals for service, sales, information, projects and communication. We name the most important ones:

1. B2B e-commerce customer portal: This is essentially a webshop, but for companies that would rather not reveal their prices to everyone, or because there are many different price agreements with customers. Those companies also want to make their sales processes more efficient.

2. B2B service portal: You can see this as the digital mirror of the company. Here customers can go for contracts, outstanding invoices, SLAs, maintenance questions or service requests. 

3. B2C customer portal: Almost everyone knows this one. You may just never have looked at it this way. A B2C customer portal is the environment you are in after buying a product in a webshop and logging in to check the status of your order. 

4. Portals for non-profits and government: Foundations, non-profits and public bodies have many digital processes. Registrations for schemes, subsidies or benefits. All of that has to happen securely and behind closed doors. That is why a customer portal is often the chosen route. 

What is the essence?

The most important thing is that you first consider for yourself whether you currently have processes that could be smarter, easier or more user-friendly. For yourself of course, but more importantly: for your customer. The essence of a customer portal is not that it has to take over processes entirely. It can also play a supporting role. These are questions you can ask yourself: 

• Am I currently sending customers a lot of emails with contracts, lost invoices, answers to service requests or contact details for other departments?
• Do customers often buy products from me that they could easily order online as well? 
• Am I dealing with registration processes that currently run on paper and are therefore error-prone and time-consuming?
• How can I make my customer's information even clearer for them?

The do's and don'ts for a customer portal

You now know what a customer portal is, which kinds exist, and you have considered for yourself whether a customer portal could work for your organisation. Perhaps you are considering having one developed. Here we tell you what to look out for when you prepare for developing a customer portal. 

1. End user first!

You never build a customer portal primarily for yourself, and often not for the entrepreneur on the other side of the table either. No, you build a customer portal for the end user. Those are usually employees or managers at your customer's organisation. Think of the administrative assistant or project manager at your customer. Each of them has their own usage requirements and information needs. It is important not to build the customer portal on the assumption that it solves your problems. It has to solve your customer's problems first and foremost, and will then automatically make your own work easier too. 

2. Connected, preferably.

A customer portal should be an addition to existing systems. In the digital world an ERP or accounting system is often the leading one. That means it is the data source for your entire organisation. It is not smart to decentralise that. So it is wise to build a connection with your ERP system. Most ERP systems offer that option. The customer portal retrieves all the information already known about your customers. In the customer portal you can enrich that with specific information about your customer, such as volume discounts or specific project information. Orders can also be pushed back from the customer portal to the ERP system. That means fewer manual steps. 

3. Fast and without a manual.

Make sure your customer portal is intuitive and conceived from a strong UX perspective. The user's experience should be such that the design effectively 'shows the way'. There must be no ambiguity in it and the customer must be able to get going quickly. At the start the customer may still have to get used to the new way of working. First impressions are then essential for continued use of the application. 

4. A personal approach.

Yes, because look: your customer is already in their own environment. So why not add that extra personal touch as well. Customers love being approached personally. Start your customer portal with a personal welcome message or congratulate the user on their birthday. All the data you have can be applied in a pleasant and user-friendly way. "Be creative!"

Convinced? Developing a customer portal! Where to start?

Are you convinced? Can you picture it? Then a good start is half the work. Before you approach an agency, make sure you have thought about the following. The 6 first steps towards a customer portal:

1. Set an objective. And make it realistic. You can always develop further on an existing application, but it is a waste to build parts you end up not using. 
2. Who is the end user? Think about your audience. Yes of course, that is your customer. But go a step further. Whose problem specifically are you going to solve? Talk to your customers and ask which problems they experience. What could you as a supplier do better?
3. Write a user story. A user story is the path your customer walks if they were to move through your new customer portal. What do they do first, what next and what after that? What can they all do and what does it solve?
4. Make a wish list. Write down every idea you have. However wild! It does not matter at this point. You may well go further than the first product you actually need. This brainstorm of ideas helps you determine the "end game" for your customer portal. Where is the customer portal in five years if it is a real success? The answer to that question forms your backlog. That is essentially a long list of wishes. From it, prioritise the most important ones and the nice-to-haves. Together they form your list of requirements, with which you can approach an agency.

The seed has been planted! You see a wealth of ideas and now look at the current processes in your organisation in a completely different way. If your company suddenly strikes you as old-fashioned, we would be glad to talk. And if you have no idea yet whether you need a customer portal, we are happy to advise you too.