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Why Proving Digital ROI is More Challenging Than It Seems
At B2B Online Chicago 2025, we tackled a critical but often overlooked topic: How do you prove the ROI of your digital commerce investments?
Kevin Kazenmayer, VP of Strategic Business Enablement, joined Mary Vigil, Digital Commerce Operations Lead, for an engaging discussion on how manufacturers and distributors can build a compelling ROI blueprint to secure executive buy-in, overcome internal skepticism, and accelerate digital growth.
It’s no secret that buyers are moving toward digital purchasing channels like eCommerce storefronts and eProcurement integrations. Yet despite widespread investment in these tools, many organizations struggle to answer a basic question: “What is the return on this investment?”
In fact, an audience poll during the session showed only 5% of attendees fully track digital ROI.
Common roadblocks include:
- Fragmented data sources across sales, finance, and IT departments
- Misaligned metrics that focus on vanity numbers (like web traffic) instead of real business outcomes
- Difficulty translating technical wins into language that resonates with executive leadership
- Underestimation of manual costs like order entry errors, invoice disputes, and processing delays
Bottom line: Without a clear strategy, it’s easy for digital investments to stall out — not because they aren’t delivering value, but because that value isn’t being effectively measured or communicated.
A Practical Framework for Building Your ROI Blueprint
Proving ROI doesn’t start with spreadsheets. It starts with strategy. To move beyond surface-level metrics and build a case that resonates across the business, organizations need a framework rooted in outcomes, not just outputs. Here’s a practical, repeatable approach for turning digital activity into measurable business impact:
1. Start with Strategic Business Goals
Rather than focusing on the technology itself, begin by asking:
- What strategic initiatives are we supporting?
- How will digital tools help us improve efficiency, profitability, and customer satisfaction?
2. Identify Metrics That Matter
During the session, attendees ranked how closely they track various metrics on a scale of 1 to 10. The most commonly tracked metric was clear: revenue growth.
While that’s a critical outcome, you have to dig deeper. To build a full ROI picture, organizations need to measure both top-line impact and the operational drivers that contribute to it. Metrics should connect directly to financial or operational outcomes. Examples include:
- Reduction in manual order processing time
- Increase in order accuracy
- Shortened order-to-cash cycle time
- Improved invoice matching rates
- Revenue growth tied to improved buyer experience
3. Calculate the True Cost of “Business as Usual”
One of the most powerful ways to demonstrate ROI is by showing the cost of not digitizing, including labor inefficiencies, error correction costs, and delayed revenue recognition.
It’s critical to “bring the pain” into the ROI conversation:
“If you don’t show the cost of manual processes, the digital investment looks like an expense rather than a strategic enabler.”
Mary Vigil, Digital Commerce Operations Lead at Waters
4. Build a Story That Resonates with Leadership
Executives are focused on outcomes, not technical details. Your ROI blueprint should:
- Quantify financial benefits clearly
- Tie metrics back to company-wide priorities
- Highlight both short-term wins and long-term strategic advantages
“Don’t just show the numbers. Tell the story of how digital drives growth and competitiveness.”
Kevin Kazenmayer, VP of Strategic Business Enablement at TradeCentric
Lessons Learned: Keys to a Successful ROI Strategy
Organizations that have successfully built strong digital ROI cases:
- Involve finance and leadership early. Their early sponsorship can make or break your initiative.
- Focus on business enablement, not just IT improvements.
- Measure progress continuously. ROI isn’t a one-and-done report — it evolves as adoption grows and processes improve.
- Celebrate quick wins to build momentum while tracking longer-term impact.
Final Thoughts: Digital is a Growth Strategy, Not a Siloed Project
The most successful companies are embracing a critical mindset shift: B2B digital initiatives aren’t standalone IT projects. They’re integral to broader business transformation.
The audience during the session shared a similar perspective, with nearly 90% of the poll respondents categorizing digital as a “growth” channel.
By building a clear, compelling ROI blueprint, organizations can not only justify their investments but unlock the full potential of digital to drive operational excellence, deeper customer relationships, and accelerated revenue growth.
Or, as Mary summarized it perfectly:
“The better you measure and tell your digital story, the bigger your impact will be.”
Mary Vigil, Digital Commerce Operations Lead at Waters
Need help quantifying the value of automation? Check out our ROI Calculator to quickly estimate how integrated digital commerce can drive cost savings, boost efficiency, and accelerate revenue growth.
