I've been trudging around the manufacturing sector for over thirty years and am just amazed at how profoundly the Internet has impacted it.  I can remember sitting in lobbies next to 'cold-calling' reps holding their widget samples and brochures dug-out of their over-stuffed car trunks, hoping someone, anyone would come out to see them. Then, heading to meet my appointment, I'd enter a sea of customer service reps on the phone and engineers digging through their green Thomas Register® behemoths. Arriving at the over-sized corner office, I'd launch into my website and electronic catalog pitch, only to get the familiar shut-down - "we don't need your electronic catalog product son, our buyers can't wait to see us at trade shows and look for our magazine ads. They want our print catalogs in the mail, to talk to their favorite CSR, and we have countless distributors, manufacturing reps, application engineers, and a huge direct sales force - all selling for us. Why do we need you?"

Fast-forward to 2011 and oh my, has the B2B world changed! Already in 2005, B2C had acquiesced to the Internet as its primary, and in some cases, exclusive business channel. Now it's B2B's turn. Our children made certain of that - whether for fun or for business, their knee-jerk, go to resource is the Internet.  Sprinkle-in social networking, search-engine-optimization (SEO) and of course, Google® and old-school B2B business processes are not just the next Internet victims, they've been pulverized.

Access to global markets and buyer flexibility to manage supplier choices and interactions, are forcing B2B manufacturers to rewrite their business strategies. Today, they need an intelligent business engine to run the whole show - it must be interactive, smart, intuitive and an on-demand information deliverer. It must also encourage and transact new sales orders while providing reliable service and support - tasks far more arduous and complex than the website of yore was ever capable of handling. Did I say website? Now, that's an old chestnut.