Since customers cannot physically touch the product in the e-shop, product descriptions and other details are particularly important. Each product has a name, pictures, description, and price. The physical characteristics of each product, such as volume, parameters, weight or color, must also be added. Managing product information becomes even more complex for multilingual platforms or stores with different pricing or delivery conditions.Â
But there is a solution to this. What is PIM, which merchant needs it and what functionality does it offer? These are the questions we will answer in the following blog post.
Demand for e-commerce PIM solutions has grown significantly over the past two years. This is driven by retailers seeking to reduce the complexity of product information in one or more systems (usually e-commerce platforms and ERP).
The problem with traditional data management systems was that data from different sources was not consistent. This problem is solved today by PIMs, which are designed to manage complex product information. With PIM, all company departments, suppliers and marketing channel managers have up-to-date information about product data.
Product information management (PIM) software helps to effectively manage the product information of a trading company to ensure accurate, uniform and up-to-date product data for all parties.
What is the main benefit of PIM?
PIM helps to update all the changes that need to be made in a single move across different stores and ensures data integrity across all systems and environments.
PIM can be interfaced with various company and supplier business systems such as warehouse, ERP, analytics and e-commerce platforms using APIs.
PIM is like a product information central station, a single source of truth (SSOT) from which data is sent to different systems.
Which Merchant Needs PIM Software?
Companies that sell a large number of products will benefit the most from using PIM software. PIM is useful for those who sell many variations of the same products, such as clothing in different colors and sizes. PIM should be considered by merchants who have:
- 10,000+ products
- Different marketing channels for products
- Multilingual product information
- Frequently changing product selection
What makes PIM different from product management software?
PIM is more comprehensive and offers more than just data enrichment (adding an image or description in different languages).
PIM collects data in different formats from multiple data sources and combines them into a single source of truth, can identify and fix problematic data, and makes the data available to all distributors.
Why use PIM?
- Smoother cooperation with suppliers/owners of product information.
- Better product data quality and consistency across channels.
- One source of truth about products and a unified product experience across all channels.
What are the main features of PIM software?
- The ability to aggregate product information from multiple sources, including all types of databases, software such as ERP or e-commerce and files, Excel spreadsheets.
- Customizable workflows and processes. For example, specifying users who can publish or update product information and users who can approve changes.
- Filters and search options to help you quickly find products using criteria such as product physical characteristics (size, color or weight), price, name or description.
- Ability to bulk update product information, which can be useful when users need to change a large number of products. For example, changing the description of all products in a product category in one action, instead of changing each product individually.
- Manage different types of files such as PDFs, images or videos.
- Companies with more complex needs often also need the ability to allow partners such as resellers and distributors to access PIM and use product information on their websites or e-shops.
Who are the employees who use PIM software on a daily basis?
- Product managers and e-commerce managers use PIM to define and track products and product categories. PIM also helps manage relationships between products. For example, some products may be sold together as a set. Similar products can also be defined in PIM, which can replace other products if necessary.
- The company’s marketing department can use PIM software to create both print and online catalogs and advertising campaigns, as they require product information and images.
- Manufacturing companies use PIM to sell their products through multiple channels, such as websites, e-commerce, or buy-sell platforms like Amazon and eBay. Manufacturers can also use PIM to transfer product information to other systems, such as ERP or PLM (product lifecycle management software).
What are the trends related to PIM software?
One important trend is the teaching and use of AI. Artificial intelligence has great potential to improve data management of large amounts of product information and assist users with complex tasks.
Another important trend is the increasing focus of PIM on customer experience and not directly on products. The consumer is becoming more and more demanding, and brands and stores must constantly adapt their products to the changing market demand. With many companies selling similar products at similar prices, their main differentiator can only be a great customer experience.
Possible problems with PIM software
PIM software can be difficult to use and maintain, especially if the system is installed on its own server and the merchant is responsible for the necessary IT infrastructure. Even cloud-hosted PIM software can be complex if delivered as separate solutions that are not tightly integrated.
Integration with other solutions such as ERP or e-commerce software is crucial for companies using PIM software. The way product information is communicated between PIM systems and other software can have a significant impact on sales and revenue. An ideal data migration should be fully automated. However, this is not always the case, and thus errors can occur.
Which PIM software is the best?
There are various PIM software providers available and the market can be seen to be growing. We have used the PimCore solution.
But PIM doesn’t necessarily have to be a specific application. It is important to have a principle and a set of tools that allow product information to be managed through a convenient and central system, from which the correct information is reflected across all channels. For example, an e-shop engine or an ERP system can also be used as a PIM.
