Alibaba.com has made empowering US B2B businesses with tools, information, and community to fuel digital adoption and unlock the cross-border opportunity a focus. Manufacturers are a small, but powerful, driver of the US economy, and 98.6% of them are small businesses with fewer than 500 employees, according to SCORE, a nationwide network of business mentors. Last year, manufacturing accounted for 11.4% of US economic output and employed 8.5% of the US workforce, or 12.8 million workers, according to the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM).

According to an Alibaba.com U.S. B2B Small and Medium Business Survey, the pandemic has accelerated the adoption of online sourcing and selling tools by American manufacturers. Online B2B trade grew at twice the rate of the overall industry average since the pandemic and is tied with retail as the sectors with the most digital growth. This is a noticeable change from the previous survey in January, which showed that US manufacturers’ online trade volume lagged all other industries, except construction.

“Our research finds that digitization is no longer a nice-to-have, but a must-have for companies in every industry to bridge from surviving to thriving in the next era of business,” said Caplan.

SMBs pivoted to digital. Some 93% of B2B companies are now conducting some portion of their business online, up from 90% in December, and 43% are using e-commerce, an 8% increase over the same time period.

B2B companies are staffing up to support their e-commerce operations. Some 56% hired and retained new staff to support their e-commerce operations since the start of the pandemic.

SMBs are finding opportunities internationally. Even with supply chain disruptions during the pandemic, 63% of B2B companies report conducting some amount of cross-border B2B trade, up from 59% in December.

The shift to digital is helping drive more cross-border trade. Cross-border business has increased in importance for B2B companies, with international trade now making up an average of 25% of their business—an 8% increase from 17% in December. And B2B companies identified key benefits of e-commerce as helping SMBs access international markets (24%) and built-in translation services that help communicate with trading partners in different languages (16%).

Following the success of Alibaba’s Go Digital, Go Global online trade show and the unveiling of freight and payment programs, the Chinese juggernaut is doubling down its focus on supporting US B2B businesses.