When orders come in by phone
For many distributors, the day starts on the phone. A customer dictates an order, a sales rep writes it down, then someone re-enters it into the management software. Other order slips arrive by WhatsApp or as photos, and every re-entry adds a risk of error.
A B2B ordering platform is a private portal, reserved for your business customers. It plugs into your management software, which remains the single source of truth.
SADIS, a Moroccan company with its registered office in Laâyoune and an operational office in Casablanca, designed and operates a platform of this kind for Konipa, a Casablanca-based automotive parts distributor.
What a distributor expects
A reseller or distributor portal must let your customers order at any hour, on the terms negotiated with you.
- A reliable catalogue Items and availability come from the management software, with no copy kept up to date by hand.
- Each customer's terms Negotiated prices, discounts by product family, authorised credit limit: each customer sees only their own.
- Ordering without calling A basket, reordering from a past order or importing a list of part numbers.
- Tracking without chasing Picking, shipping, ready for collection: the status is displayed without tying up a sales rep.
- A searchable history Invoices, credit notes and outstanding balances remain accessible, which reduces calls to the accounts department.
- Controlled permissions Account opening, blocking when the credit limit is exceeded, restricted catalogue: you decide who sees what.
- Multiple warehouses The availability shown depends on the warehouse that will serve the customer, according to your fallback rules.
Finding the right part
A mechanic looks for a specific part for a specific vehicle.
- By part number Search tolerates input variations (spaces, hyphens, prefixes) and suggests cross-references between manufacturers.
- By chassis number The number identifies the model, engine and year, then points to compatible parts. This feature is in production on the platform we operate.
- By registration number Its feasibility depends on the data available for the target vehicle fleet; it is assessed during scoping.
Compatibility is checked before the order is placed, which reduces returns and disputes.
What changes for your teams
The portal relieves sales reps of the work that was never selling: dictated orders, availability checks, invoices to resend. They visit their customers, follow up with those who order less and open new accounts. They also see who orders, how often and what has been viewed.
The warehouse receives written, structured orders; a dispute is settled by checking the original order. Management tracks the day's orders, outstanding balances and fast-moving items in real time, without an Excel sheet filled in by hand.
Sales reps open the accounts and present the portal during visits; the most eager customers start first.
Connected to your sales management software
Sage, Odoo or another ERP remains the reference for items, prices, stock and customers. We deploy, configure and integrate these packages, without being an official partner or reseller of Sage or Odoo.
Our connectors move data in both directions. The management software sends the portal items, prices and terms per customer, availability per warehouse, outstanding balances and credit limits; the portal sends back confirmed orders, new customer accounts and special requests, with no re-entry.
The method depends on your software (ready-made services, structured file exchanges, database access) and is chosen at the start of the project, based on your actual system.
Insist on two guarantees from any provider. Resilience to outages: if the management software is unavailable, the portal keeps taking orders and forwards them later, with no loss or duplicates. Traceability: every exchange leaves a record that can be consulted.
A platform in production
Case study
Konipa, an automotive spare parts distributor in Casablanca, has its business customers (garages and resellers) place their orders on a platform that we designed and operate: konipa-b2b.ma. Parts are searched by part number, by vehicle or by VIN, in the TecDoc catalogue. We also built its website, konipa.ma.
Each customer logs in to their account and searches for a part by part number or chassis number. They build their order and track its processing in real time. Connected to the distributor's sales management software, which runs on Sage 100, the platform forwards orders for picking; stock, prices and orders are synchronised in real time, in both directions.
It eliminates orders dictated over the phone and double entry, without replacing the distributor's management software or its teams.
A tablet app extends the portal to sales reps in the field: customer and sales rep see the same stock and the same prices, and an order taken during a visit reaches the sales management software without being re-entered. The assignment is described on our References page.
Beyond automotive parts
Automotive parts are a demanding case: tens of thousands of part numbers, compatibility by vehicle, cross-references between manufacturers. The same logic applies to building materials, the food industry, industrial supplies, medical equipment and textiles. Only the business rules change: sales units, packaging, batches, expiry dates, contract prices.
Taking over an existing platform
If your portal was built by a provider who no longer responds, or by an employee who has left, the takeover follows this order.
- Recover what belongs to you Access to hosting and the domain name, source code, database, backups, documentation.
- Check the rights Depending on the original contract, the rights to the code may have remained with the original provider.
- Audit State of the code, data consistency, obvious vulnerabilities, causes of slowdowns or outages.
- Stabilise before rebuilding Secure what exists, put backups back in place, fix what gets in the way day to day.
We only propose a complete rebuild if the audit justifies it; otherwise, the takeover is done in stages, with the portal still running. For a showcase website or an online shop, see the websites and web applications page; for an internal management tool, see the custom management software page.
Code ownership, hosting and reversibility
Three questions to ask any provider, ourselves included, before starting.
- Who owns the code? With us, the contract assigns to the client the rights to what is developed for them: source code, database schemas and documentation.
- Who holds the access credentials? Hosting, domain name, certificates and technical accounts are opened in the client's name. If the relationship ends, you have nothing to negotiate.
- How do you leave? Versioned and delivered source code, data exportable in open formats, up-to-date operating documentation: another team can take over the system without starting from scratch.
The founders spent six years on freelance assignments within large French industrial groups before founding SADIS in Morocco. It is fair to ask whether a provider will still be around in three years: the contract answers that question.
How a project runs
- Scoping Product families, pricing logic, warehouses, approvals and existing software; the search method and the connection to existing systems are decided at this stage.
- Mock-ups Search, basket and order tracking are validated with future users.
- Step-by-step development Versions shown regularly, with a connection tested on real data.
- Data migration Accounts, pricing terms and history are checked before launch.
- Pilot A few volunteer customers test the portal before it opens to all.
- Launch and operation Training, customer support, then maintenance and enhancements.
