Leveraging Product Information to Generate Sales

In times of economic crisis and decreasing margins, many companies are streamlining their sales processes. Greg Wong, President and CEO of Heiler Software Corporation, explains why high quality product data is a key competitive advantage.

“Organizations that are leveraging their data wisely are not only managing their own data, but also managing their competitors' data by cross-referencing their own products”
-Greg Wong, Heiler Software Corporation

Customers are demanding more and better information from suppliers all the time. They want that information available to them at all times and in many different ways, including print, such as catalogs and sales flyers, electronic means through the internet and now mobile commerce through smart-phones.

This poses significant complexity to retailers and distributors that have to manage all of this product data and provide it instantaneously to consumers in all of these different ways. This is especially true when you consider that most companies manage their data today in several different systems that are each focused on one output channel. It is typical that there is an ecommerce system and team that supports a company’s website and then a marketing and graphic artist team that supports catalogs and sales flyers. There is also a sales team that supports larger enterprise or B2B customers.

Integrated Product Information Management (PIM) solutions are the key to success. They provide the combination of processes and technology to manage product data in one central hub and then synchronize it across the organization and supply chain. The goal of a PIM solution is to streamline the data acquisition process from suppliers and internal organizations, centrally manage and enrich that data, and then communicate that information in all required distribution channels in order to generate sales and market products.

PIM systems cross internal organizational boundaries, providing a common view of data and a central point of truth. It enables all groups within an organization to access the same data and ensure that all customer communications, whether through the web, mobile phone or printed catalog deliver the same message. This provides consistency and a better customer experience for consumers.

Organizations that are leading the way in product information management understand the power of maintaining high quality data and product references such as up-sell and cross-sell relationships. Extending the data management process between products is enabling companies to generate not only more sales, but higher margin sales.

Leading companies like Fastenal, Coca Cola and Rubbermaid count on product information management software. Findings of a new US-market research study show that Heiler is the leading provider of integrated PIM solutions and boasts the best project experience and consulting quality. In December 2007, Heiler also reached the top of the same market research in Europe.

One customer mentioned that after using the Heiler PIM suite, they were able to increase the sale of their most profitable hammers by 200 percent by simply providing its sales staff with the margin information and the advantages of one hammer versus another. Organizations that are leveraging their data wisely are not only managing their own data, but also managing their competitor’s data by cross-referencing their own products. This is enabling them to capture sales from competitors and increase market share.

PIM systems are also enabling organizations to reach new customers by automating the data exchange process to various other platforms. Over the last few years, auction platforms such as eBay, online stores such as amazon.com and other aggregator or community sites such as CNET, Buy.com and shopzilla have grown at exponential rates. All of these sales channels support an automated data exchange that can be integrated into a PIM system so that all of your products can not only be listed on your own website, but also on various other sites at no additional cost.

Customers are also looking for their vendors to carry more products, often in the millions instead of thousands. This is good for distributors because the top selling products typically have the lowest margins while niche products or non-stocked items secure better margins. That means the more products that an organization can sell, the higher the average margin.

An effective maintenance of product information will increase sales, by catalog printing with a press of a button or electronic customer specific catalogs.