In B2B distribution, there’s an ongoing disconnect I see time and again—the great divide. On one side are the business teams – sales, marketing, customer service – who live closest to the customer relationship. On the other side are the technology teams – IT, digital, developers – who own the systems and delivery of ecommerce experiences.

Both sides care deeply about the customer, but they speak different languages. Business leaders talk about growth, retention, and relationships. Technology leaders talk about platforms, integrations, and features. The result? A digital experience that often fails to reflect the real customer journey.

When distributors ask me why their ecommerce site isn’t producing adoption, conversion, or revenue, the answer is rarely the platform itself. The real problem is this divide between business intent and digital execution.

So how do we close it? Modern product management frameworks, particularly when applied in a B2B commerce context, provide the bridge.

Historically, ecommerce was treated as a “project.” Business outlined requirements, technology executed, and a launch date was circled on the calendar. The problem with that model is that it assumes success happens at launch. But in reality, ecommerce success depends on constant iteration, guided by real customer behavior.

B2B buying journeys are too complex, multi-touch, and multi-decision-maker for a one-and-done project mindset. When business teams hand over requirements without continuous involvement—or when IT builds features without business context—the result is a site that may look modern, but doesn’t meet the real jobs customers are trying to get done.

This is where product management steps in. Instead of treating ecommerce as a project, it reframes it as a product—one that serves customers, evolves over time, and creates measurable business outcomes.

Three elements of modern product management frameworks are especially powerful for closing the business–technology divide:

1. Jobs to Be Done (JTBD) as the Common Language

Business and technology teams often clash because they’re working from different assumptions. JTBD creates a shared lens by asking: What is the customer really trying to accomplish, and how do we help them succeed?

For example, an operations manager at a manufacturing plant isn’t “buying gaskets.” They’re trying to avoid downtime. When teams align around that job, it changes how search is prioritized, how product data is structured, and how availability and lead times are displayed.

JTBD grounds both sides in the customer’s reality—cutting through business jargon and technical detail to focus on outcomes.

2. Continuous Discovery and Iteration

Modern product frameworks emphasize ongoing discovery, experimentation, and iteration. This means business leaders don’t just throw requirements over the wall—they stay engaged, validating assumptions, testing workflows, and adapting strategy based on evidence.

Technology leaders, in turn, stop seeing themselves as order-takers and start seeing themselves as enablers of business value. They become partners in learning rather than executors of tasks.

The result is a cadence where customer insights drive backlog priorities, and every release moves the experience closer to solving real buyer problems.

3. Cross-Functional Product Teams

The product management model works best when cross-functional teams—business, design, and technology—own outcomes together. Instead of business owning “what” and technology owning “how,” they jointly own both the problem and the solution.

This requires shifts in mindset and governance: sales and marketing leaders agreeing to allocate real time to discovery; IT leaders agreeing to prioritize experiments over perfection; executives agreeing to measure ecommerce success not just in revenue, but in adoption, engagement, and customer satisfaction.

For distributors, the digital divide shows up in very specific ways:

• Business teams complain that customers “can’t find products,” but don’t provide structured feedback that tech teams can use.
• Technology teams deliver robust features, but adoption is low because workflows don’t reflect how buyers actually reorder or approve purchases.
• Sales teams resist ecommerce because they weren’t involved in shaping how it supports (rather than replaces) their role.

Applying product frameworks starts small: create a cross-functional ecommerce squad, map the buyer’s JTBD, and commit to biweekly discovery sessions. Instead of debating features, debate evidence from customers. Instead of measuring launch, measure engagement.

Over time, the “divide” stops being a gap and starts being a collaboration.

The digital divide in B2B ecommerce isn’t about lack of technology—it’s about lack of alignment. When business owns the customer but technology owns the delivery, the experience ends up fragmented.

Modern product management frameworks—JTBD, continuous discovery, cross-functional product teams—offer the bridge. They give business and technology leaders a shared way of working that puts the customer at the center and makes ecommerce a driver of growth, not just a channel to maintain.

The most successful ecommerce programs aren’t the ones with the fanciest platforms or the biggest budgets. They’re the ones where business and technology come together as true partners, guided by product thinking, prioritizing needs, to deliver outcomes that matter to customers.