How commercial automation can finally fix the forgotten engine of B2B sales

May 08, 2026

sales, marketing and service

Meet Debby. She runs your company – and she's drowning.

Finance is automated. Logistics is lean. Production lines hum along with digital precision. Yet walk into almost any B2B manufacturer or reseller and you'll find the commercial heart of the business running on emails, spreadsheets, and sticky notes. That's where Debby works. And Debby is exhausted.

Felix De Clercq, digital strategist and commercial automation specialist at delaware, has been thinking about Debby for years. Debby is a composite of the thousands of internal sales and customer service professionals keeping B2B businesses alive through sheer memory, improvisation, and force of will. His message is both a diagnosis and a wake-up call: before you build another customer portal, start with the person on the other end of the phone.

The person nobody talks about

In B2B, the conversation about digitalization almost always starts in the same place: the customer experience. Webshops, portals, configurators are all doing good things. But Felix argues we've been building from the wrong end: "External sales chases new clients. Marketing generates leads. And Debby? Debby handles everything else."

Debby’s role is internal sales – also called customer service in many organizations. She converts requests into orders, manages existing accounts, and resolves the endless stream of exceptions that define complex B2B commerce.

In theory, CRM systems, ERPs, and now also AI tools are supposed to make this easier. In practice, Debby still physically walks to the engineering department with her trickiest questions. She still maintains spreadsheets that only she fully understands. And she still carries in her head which client needs next-day delivery no matter what, and which one doesn't mind waiting.

It’s time to give Debby what she needs

The problem isn't that Debby is inefficient. The problem is that the systems around her were never designed for the complex reality she faces every day.

In today’s B2B environment, products are becoming more and more configurable. Every order involves variables: dimensions, materials, lead times, custom pricing agreements, some negotiated years ago by a sales rep who has since left the company.

Each new layer of complexity adds another call to Debby's workload. Felix is blunt: “You can’t expect customers simply to go to the portal and sort it out themselves. Clients will keep calling. They want Debby."

The question is not how to replace Debby. It's how to finally give her the tools she needs.

The question is not how to replace Debby. It's how to finally give her the tools she needs.

Commercial automation puts Debby in the driving seat

The goal is to give Debby – and her clients – genuine visibility and control. That means:

A single, clean view of the customer

No more hunting across five ERP screens to find the right account. No duplicate records, no guesswork.

Fast product configuration and pricing

The ability to build and price a complex order in minutes.

Automated process flows

When a product is out of stock, the system triggers the right communication with production – without Debby having to chase anyone manually.

Visibility for the client

The single most impactful first step, Felix argues, is simply answering the question every B2B client asks dozens of times a week: "Where is my order?"

Reduce those inbound calls, and you immediately free up Debby's time for the interactions that do require human judgment.

Felix calls the solution commercial automation: “That is not another CRM implementation or an AI chatbot. It’s the systematic application of automation to the internal sales process, in the same way manufacturing and logistics were transformed a generation ago.”

The key is sequencing: start with visibility, then build self-service and then full automation. Each step reduces pressure on internal sales while improving the client experience.

Not one size fits all: think in customer segments

One of Felix's most practical insights is that digital transformation in B2B commercial operations is not a single project like a webshop or digital self-service – it's a mix of approaches, tailored to your customer base.

1. High value accounts

The handful of clients who represent a disproportionate share of revenue. They typically don't want a webshop. They want deep integration: EDI connections, dedicated account management, personal relationships. Pushing them to self-service is a risk, not an improvement.

2. Long-tail clients

Smaller accounts, often served through dealers or distributors. They are well-suited to digital self-service. They can be guided there without much friction.

3. The middle segment

is where portals and webshops deliver the most value. The ambition here is elegant: a phone call with a medium-sized client ends with Debby pushing the offer directly to the portal with a single click, where the client can review and sign at their own pace.

The key is sequencing: start with visibility, then build self-service and then full automation. Each step reduces pressure on internal sales while improving the client experience. And each step builds the trust and data quality needed for the next.

The technology is ready – if you build it right

Felix points to a new generation of European B2B commerce platforms, such as Propeller, that are purpose-built for this complexity. Unlike traditional e-commerce platforms adapted from B2C, they are designed around the realities of configurable products, tiered pricing, and multi-channel B2B relationships.

But the architectural principle matters as much as the technology choice. The customer portal, Felix insists, must be a layer on top of the internal sales tool, not the other way around. Build the cockpit for Debby first. The client-facing experience follows naturally from that foundation.

This is precisely the mistake most organizations make: they invest in the customer-facing layer without fixing the operational layer underneath. A beautiful portal sitting on top of messy, disconnected data will frustrate clients and overwhelm internal sales.

A beautiful portal sitting on top of messy, disconnected data will frustrate clients and overwhelm internal sales.

Start with Debby, not with marketing or IT

Felix's closing argument is simple: “Internal sales professionals understand, better than anyone, how the business works. They know the exceptions, the key accounts, the fragile workarounds, and the moments where a human touch is genuinely irreplaceable. Any serious commercial transformation effort should begin by listening to them.”

So, start with Debby, not with marketing or IT. Map her day. Identify the ten things that waste the most time and solve those first. The bigger transformation follows.

B2B commercial teams have waited long enough for the productivity gains that digitalization promised. The tools now exist and the approach is clear. The only thing left is to stop building for the wrong person.