Why Your Business Needs Product Information Management for Success

Headlines proclaiming that “personal shopping experiences are the future of retail” are everywhere these days. Yet, less often do we see discussions on how brands and retailers can effectively manage their product information to transform the customer journey in this new era.

Forward-thinking brands and retailers who want to stay ahead of the competition understand that mastering product information management is crucial. An effective approach to managing product information and adding metadata to your catalogue ensures that your product data is complete, consistent, and up-to-date at every stage of the process.

When product information on an online store appears inconsistent or incomplete, it’s often due to the challenges of manually managing and tagging all products uniformly. Leveraging technology to automate the tagging and management of product information through a PIM (Product Information Management) system enables you to handle data associated with your product lines efficiently, offering customers a consistently engaging and relevant shopping experience.

Intelligent systems that enrich and manage your product information offer substantial benefits, boosting profitability in today’s competitive consumer and B2B markets.

What is Product Information Management (PIM)?

Product Information Management (PIM) is the process of collecting and managing all necessary information about a product—from descriptions to images—in one central place. Consolidating your product information effectively streamlines every step of the marketing process, saving valuable time.

An intelligent PIM system enhances efficiency in updating existing product information and adding new products to your online platforms and sales channels. It ensures that customers have access to accurate product information whenever they’re ready to purchase, no matter the sales channel.

Why Your Business Needs Effective Product Information Management

Rich product metadata helps your company reach more customers by providing the information they need to make purchasing decisions. Implementing a PIM solution offers five major benefits for managing product information:

1. Establish a Single Source for Product InformationProduct information often originates from various departments and tools. Instead of manually tagging or extracting data from multiple systems and creating cumbersome spreadsheets, a PIM system consolidates raw product specifications, marketing copy, and creative assets. Data can be automatically imported from sources like Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems or added directly into the PIM. Advanced image recognition technology allows you to scan product images, identify items, and assign detailed metadata based on visual attributes.The primary records of your products in the PIM system are then exported to populate your e-commerce website, marketplaces, and social media shops quickly. Any corrections, updates, or adjustments are applied across all product lines and sales channels.
2. Personalise the Shopper ExperienceThe more detailed your product metadata, the better you understand the products your customers interact with. A PIM solution can provide more accurate recommendations compared to traditional personalization engines by focusing on detailed product attributes rather than relying solely on third-party data or “look-alike audiences.” This approach enhances data depth without compromising privacy.
3. Accelerate Your Time to MarketWhether launching a new product or sales channel, your time to market impacts when you start generating revenue. PIM solutions streamline product information management, allowing marketing and e-commerce teams to access data directly from the PIM system rather than waiting on ERP requests. This reduces lengthy email threads and confusion about where to find the most current information. Integrations with other marketing technology systems further reduce busywork.Automating workflows minimises manual data entry, enabling teams to launch and maintain new products and sales channels more quickly.
4. Enhance Quality and Consistency of Product InformationIncorrect or incomplete product information can lead to lost sales and increased returns, significantly impacting profits. PIM solutions enable you to ingest, add, and review product information in one system, improving data quality and consistency. Changes made in the PIM system are published across all e-commerce platforms, helping to build your reputation as a reliable brand.
5. Develop More Effective Marketing StrategiesAccording to Salesforce’s State of Marketing report, 84% of customers say the experience a company provides is as important as its products and services. With today’s customers using multiple channels, providing a unified experience across touchpoints is crucial. A single source for your product information enhances the user experience by ensuring accurate, current information at every stage of the purchasing process.

Get Started with PIM Today

At Selectika, we’ve developed an intelligent auto-tagging system that pulls basic information from your product catalogue and enriches it with additional data. We use image recognition and NLP to add rich attributes to your product information, learning the semantics and expectations of the shoppers engaging with your brand.