Chances are you have a corporate website at least; for many of us this represents only the starting position, the foundation upon which we build as broad a digital presence as possible, reaching out and appealing to as many consumers, clients, potential clients, investors, even job seekers, as we can. You can then draw people to your website through social media, digital advertising, email marketing etc.

But what about transacting online, e-commerce? I’m too old (only slightly!) to be classed as a Millennial but even I have a hard time thinking of interactions as a consumer or customer in my personal life where I don’t go to the internet as my first, and likely only, port of call: banking, TV/satellite, utilities, insurance, holiday booking, even taxis, takeaways, grocery shopping; there is very little I need or want to buy that can’t be taken care of online.

Considering the ever-growing Millennials, and now Generation Z, consumer demographic, the case for liquid gas and oil distributors offering a strong, dependable, online transaction portal to their client base looks irrefutable. These two demographic cohorts have grown up in the information age; they’re very comfortable with technology and they expect to be able to do everything online pretty much instantly – I share my home with two Generation Z individuals though I’m not certain of what they look like since their faces are always obscured by smart phones or a tablet, usually both at once! – Of course, providing facilities for customers to interact with us face to face and over the telephone remains important in our portfolio of engagement options; however without an online portal which allows consumers to order and pay for product online and for repeat customers to view their account, order history, any outstanding debt/credit etc. there is a risk of alienating an important segment of the client base.

For well over a decade, fuels distributors using CODAS Online have been able to transact with their customers through the internet. Customers can view their account, place orders and pay their bills through the account portal, with all transactions then running through CODAS back office automatically. Consumers can do this anytime they wish; with CODAS Online, fuel distributors are immediately able to offer these services on a 24/7 basis. Most of our CODAS Online users embed the portal into their corporate website under a ‘My Account’ button; their customers simply login securely and away they go.

For our CODAS-IQO subscribers, consumers can view prices and order product whether they are returning customers or not. Without the requirement to login to an account, a potential customer can visit your Company’s CODAS-IQO page, fill out a form including their postcode, desired product, quantity and any vehicle restriction if necessary (all selectable from drop down menus) and CODAS-IQO returns a price and delivery window for the consumer to select; all available prices and delivery time windows are submitted and controlled by you. Secure payment and automatic processing of the order into your CODAS back office system follows, with CODAS matching existing, repeat customers to their account if it can or creating a suspense account for manual intervention later if not. CODAS-IQO is mobile device responsive so it looks great no matter what device is being used to access the service, PC, smart phone or tablet. For even more convenience, CODAS-IQO is 24/7 available and cloud based; for existing CODAS users, once signed up the service is available to use straight away.

CODAS is also available with interfaces to fuels price comparison websites, such as BoilerJuice or the Oil Club providing another option for automated 24/7 sales pipelines.

If you’ve been putting it off or waiting for the right moment and you’d like to increase your Company’s appeal to existing and next generation consumers whilst simultaneously opening up a 24/7 sales pipeline, give us a call, send us an email or check out our Facebook and LinkedIn pages; we’d love to hear from you.