A white label integration platform (or white labeled integration platform) is a tool that lets a B2B SaaS company build integrations between its product and the other apps its customers use – all without its customers being able to tell from the UI that the company is reliant on a third-party tool to build, deploy, and manage those integrations.
Other terms for a white label integration platform are embedded integration platform and embedded iPaaS. In addition, the integrations supported by these platforms may be referred to as white label integrations or white label API integrations.
White label integration platforms often include connectors to standard APIs and other built-in functionality to make creating integrations more accessible to non-technical users. As a result, these platforms often include low-code designers (for non-devs) but should also enable devs to write integration code in their favorite IDEs. Regardless of how they are created, the integrations are deployed to the platform and made accessible to the B2B SaaS company's customers.
What are the benefits of white labeling integrations?
In an ideal world, you and your team would build all of your integration tooling, infrastructure, and processes yourselves. After all, this would give you maximum control over absolutely everything integration related.
But, increasingly, that's not a workable solution. One big reason is that doing everything internally makes it very difficult to scale. In essence, you'd have to build an entire B2B SaaS integration platform to support your customers and the integrations they need.
This is where white label integrations come into their own. You can leverage all of the work and expertise of a third-party vendor who has built a platform that's dedicated to your use case: providing integrations that connect your product with the other apps your customers use.
And using a white label integration platform, you can incorporate that platform into your product so that your customers don't even know it is there. Everything from logos and colors to fonts and terms can be aligned with the rest of your app.
Some tools that attempt to address the B2B SaaS integration market are notably lacking.
For example, with Zapier, the end user customer sets up a Zapier account, interacts with Zapier-branded screens, and contacts Zapier support for integration issues. As a result, the business relationship is between the customer and Zapier rather than between the customer and you.
Other integration platforms that use the term white label only allow you to change the most basic UI details (such as logos and colors) but stop short of giving you the flexibility to create a true white label UX for your customers.
How customizable are white labeled integration platforms?
White labeled integration platforms that are done well are fully customizable. However, there are many layers to customization, and not all platforms support all of these layers.
At the most superficial level, you might want to white-label the domain so your team members and customers can accesshttps://integrations.acmesaas.com instead of https://app.prismatic.io.
From there, you should be able to set the logo and adjust colors for various screen elements. Here's an example showing many of those options in our white label integration platform.
Beyond this, a white labeled integration platform should allow you to specify fonts. In addition, you should be able to change the names of various screens, forms, etc., in menus and headings to match the terms you and your customers use.
Finally, a white labeled integration platform should support internationalization, sometimes called i18n. This allows for the use of different terminology based on the location/language of the users.
How do you choose the best integration platform?
In addition to a white label integration platform, other platforms are used for building SaaS integrations. Let's briefly look at each one and compare it to a white label integration platform.
Enterprise iPaaS
An increasing number of companies use enterprise iPaaS (integration platform as a service) to build internal SaaS integrations. Enterprise iPaaS platforms include standard API connectors to many common SaaS apps, allowing developers and non-developers to create internal SaaS integrations more quickly than the old way of coding from scratch.
An enterprise iPaaS can substantially increase the efficiency of data transfers within an organization. However, an enterprise iPaaS lacks specific tools that a white label iPaaS includes (specifically around the marketplace and customer experience) which are essential for B2B SaaS integrations.
Unified API
A unified (or universal) API combines access to multiple APIs within a software category, such as CRM or Accounting). This API abstracts the complexity of connecting to many systems into a single set of rules for connecting to one API, thereby simplifying the process of building integrations with those systems.
Universal APIs can save B2B SaaS teams significant time and resources when building numerous similar integrations. However, unified APIs lack the flexibility that white label integration platforms have for connecting with niche applications, regardless of the market vertical.
Workflow automation
A workflow automation tool, such as Zapier, provides many connectors for common applications used by average business users. This allows non-technical users of every sort to quickly go into Zapier and connect their Outlook to Slack or Marketo to Salesforce to streamline their day-to-day business workflows.
As a result, workflow automations are well suited for the simple integrations many consumers need. That said, Zapier doesn't work for the scenarios that a white label integration platform can handle. When hundreds of your customers need a two-way data exchange with your product and several niche apps that don't have standard APIs or connectors, a workflow automation tool won't handle that scenario.
White label integration platform
More and more B2B SaaS companies use white label integration platforms to create customer integrations. These platforms often include standard API connectors for common SaaS apps, streamlining the integration build process.
However, unlike an enterprise iPaaS, a white label integration platform is optimized for working with B2B SaaS integrations, ensuring that integrations and processes can scale with customer growth.
And, unlike unified APIs, white label integration platforms support the configurability and complexity required to build integrations with any apps your customers use, regardless of market sector.
In addition to the low-code integration designer, a white label integration platform allows devs to write whatever code is needed. This might be code for a custom connector or an entire integration written in code (no low-code designer in sight). It's entirely up to the integration team to figure out what approach works best.
White label integration platform FAQs
Question: Does everyone mean the same thing by white labeling?
Answer: No. An integration platform vendor may claim something is white labeled when only the most superficial items (colors and logo) can be changed to match your app. Proper white labeling needs to go much deeper than this, to the point where your customers have trouble finding where your app stops and the white label integration platform starts. This includes even changing the names of screens and functions to match the terms you and your customers use.
Question: Couldn't my devs build an in-house integration platform instead of using a third-party white label integration platform?
Answer: Sure. Given sufficient time and resources, your devs could build anything. Perhaps a better question would be, "Should they?" However, a white label integration platform is a force multiplier for your integrations. As you probably wouldn't create your own calendaring or payment processing system, using a white label integration platform purpose-built for B2B SaaS products makes sense.
Question: Why should I care that a white label integration platform lets devs write integrations completely in code?
Answer: Low-code integration designers have their place. With pre-built and custom connectors, your non-devs can assemble integrations and then configure and deploy them – all without dev help. But sometimes, it's better to build integrations in code using your favorite IDE. Maybe you've got dev bandwidth, but your non-devs aren't available. Or, you may be trying to solve a particularly challenging integration scenario, and writing an integration in code instead of using a low-code designer gives you the needed flexibility to get it done. Whatever the case, having both a low-code designer and the ability to write integrations in code (what we call a code native integration experience) should be part of the white label integration platform.
Keep your customers in your app
A white label integration platform lets you create a scalable integration process that supports your customers, whether you have 5 or 500. Because the platform enables you to do so much more with the integration team you already have, you don't need to add headcount to stay current with your customers' integration requests.
And, since a white label integration platform is seamlessly incorporated into your app, your customers stay in your environment and work with your teams. You completely own the customer relationship while the white label integration platform sits in the background and helps your team build, deploy, and manage integrations better.
If you are interested in what a white label integration platform can do for your integration team, schedule a demo, and we'll be glad to show you how everything fits together.
