Shoppers today look all over for the best deals as there are many more opportunities than there used to be for product research.
According to a Statista report, the top destination for online shoppers to search for inspiration is Amazon. Thus, it behooves retailers to have consistent product information across all touchpoints within the service.
It’s also a boon to your back-office through data governance, as it provides advantages through standardization of product data and streamlined processes of distributing it across channels.
Reduced manual data entry.
A PIM reduces manual data entry by taking in data from other systems, then pushing out product information to your ecommerce store and online sales channels. This means you only have to enter information once, reducing the potential for data entry errors or inconsistencies.
Plus, when you change or update product information, you’ll only have to do it once — and that change will be synced across all your channels and systems.
With a full-featured PIM software system, you can potentially reduce your workload by a significant amount, letting you spend more time on the creative parts of your product presence.
Precise information.
Pull data and information about your products directly from your suppliers’ databases.
You’ll need to make some edits to descriptions, headlines and product titles to make them more emotionally compelling, but having the technical info straight from the data source will reduce error and inconsistency that can harm the customer’s product experience.
Additionally, accurate product information can lead to fewer returns, saving your time and money on unneeded expenses.
Central database.
With just one central database, you have a single source of truth for product information. This is much simpler and easier to manage than maintaining multiple databases, especially when you need to make updates and changes.
All sales channels will source product info from the central location to ensure the latest and greatest product information is surfaced.
Scalability.
With a PIM, it will be much easier to scale your business. Without one, you’ll find yourself doing duplicative work, leading to data inconsistencies and errors. If you don’t have an efficient way to send accurate information across channels, you’ll be wasting time and money.
If you want to grow your business, it is critical to have a back-end infrastructure that can handle the increase.
Omnichannel efficiency.
The added scalability you’ll get through a solid PIM implementation will likely support your omnichannel and multichannel efforts.
When you can export product data easily to social channels, marketplaces and more, you can streamline expansion to new sales channels while ensuring all data is correct and consistent — reinforcing your strong brand across channels.
Improved marketing campaigns.
Marketing departments typically gain advantages from your PIM as well.
With a centralized database, they can tailor marketing campaigns quickly — based on all the latest product information — to meet the dynamic demand of omnichannel shopping.
