Whitepapers
One-Stop Product Content Experience –
The foundation for successful marketing
In today’s world, consumers are constantly flooded with offers and information allowing them to place orders easily and almost instantly through apps, online stores or marketplaces. As a result, it is no longer the product, but the product experience that is the key factor in making a purchase decision. Businesses are now facing the challenge of adapting their product communication to the expectations of the modern customer – and creating genuine product experiences. Learn more about the key factors in our new headsUp white paper, which was developed in cooperation with The Group of Analysts. In this blog article, we summarize the key insights from the whitepaper for you.
One-Stop Product Content Experience
Especially in e-commerce, where seconds matter, companies need to ensure that their products and offers are not just seen, but also recognized and engaged with. It requires the right product information and media content – carefully coordinated and merged into a single unit – called product content. But creating effective product content is only half the battle. The content must be distributed to all possible communication channels available to a company and adapted to the respective channel and its specific target audience. At the same time, a personalized and customized approach to customers is needed at every touchpoint, as this will strengthen the impact of the product content experience.
Nowadays, businesses compete for the attention and favor of consumers. However, it is not only the quality and impact of the product content that is important. Speed also plays a key role. Companies must be faster than their competitors and be able to react to changes in the market in real time. To accomplish this, a system landscape that integrates Product Information Management (PIM) and Digital Asset Management (DAM) is essential. Only with fully integrated product information and media content can real product experiences be created in the shortest possible time and for every output channel and touchpoint.
The building blocks for excellent product content management
PIM – for efficient management and use of product information
Successful product communication requires high-quality product information – not just the basic product master data, i.e. attributes such as material, size, color, etc., but also descriptive product texts tailored to the various output channels, target groups and customers, as well as everything else that can be categorized as rich product content (marketing texts, product features, user manuals, customer reviews, etc.). Product information must be managed in a meaningful way in order to achieve the required quality, and this is where PIM truly delivers.
What is a PIM system?
A PIM system is a software solution for managing, maintaining and enriching product information. The system keeps product information centralized, standardized and structured and, as a single source of truth, ensures high and consistent data quality. The software also provides tools that can be used to refine and enrich product data, and helps to keep the use of resources to a minimum by automating processes.
What do I need to watch out for in Product Information Management?
The data model, which defines how products and information are structured, i.e. stored in the system and linked with one another, is crucial for the successful use of a PIM system. In general, the data structure should be tailored to the company and industry-specific requirements, as this is the only way to achieve and maintain the desired data quality. In addition, the data model should allow for adjustments and extensions at any time. It is therefore advisable, especially with regard to product content management, to rely on a generic data model that allows this freedom.
Depending on the industry, classification structures also represent an important part of the data model and product data maintenance, as these form the basis for enriching products and as a result enable product-related analyses based on synonyms, classes or relationships. Industry-specific standards have been well established for the classification of product data, such as TecDoc (EU) and AUTOCARE (USA) for the automotive aftermarket or ETIM, ECLASS, UNSPSC or GPC.
DAM – for efficient management and use of digital assets
Successful product communication requires not only high-quality product information, but also media content that enriches the product presentation with an experience component. Pure text content, even if it is well formulated and provides comprehensive information about a product, does not create a product content experience – and would simply be lost in the mass of offers. For optimal media use, companies must ultimately have a wide range of digital content up their sleeve and align it with the respective contexts – and this is precisely where DAM comes in.
What is a DAM system?
A DAM system is a software solution for managing and delivering digital content such as image, audio, video or graphic files in different formats and versions. The system holds the files centrally and in a media-neutral manner, and enables individual assets or entire structures to be tagged, so that created or purchased media content can be easily retrieved and repeatedly momentarized – for maximum return on investment.
What should I look for in digital asset management?
Standardization of storage and archiving processes is crucial for the successful use of a DAM system, as a result of which redundant content in the system or multiple purchases and time-consuming searches can be avoided. For this purpose, DAM systems offer the option of keywording, whereby the keywords are intended to summarize the contents of the files briefly and concisely. Automated and AI-supported smart tagging is a particularly convenient solution for organizing and categorizing files in the system.
Since a whole range of people are often involved in the creation, editing and distribution of media content, role and rights management is another important aspect in the context of DAM. As a result, photographers and other content creators, agencies and marketing managers should be able to work together efficiently and smoothly, and access to the centrally stored files should be regulated by approval levels.
Channel management (CM) is another fundamental component of successful product content management since product content does not create added value on its own. To do so, it has to be directed along the customer journey.
CM – for targeted distribution of product content
In the omnichannel age, every company has the task of supplying existing and potential customers with product and brand messages across all channels, with the respective touchpoints not being used in isolation, but rather as a unit. Due to the increasing number of channels, more and more businesses are turning to channel management systems to help them manage their distribution processes.
What is a CM system?
A CM system is a software solution for the coordination and control of individual marketing and sales channels. It bundles all systems required for product content creation, as well as all relevant information and output channels, and automates the channel-specific output of content. As a result, CM systems not only help to minimize time-to-market, but also ensure content quality and consistency across all touchpoints.
What do I need to watch out for in channel management?
Successful channel management requires centralized control of all touchpoints, so that all communication channels can be used in a targeted manner and in the shortest possible time. The goal is to establish customer loyalty to the brand in a continuous process and to guide them step by step to the point of sale. Print, online, mobile, social media, and stationary touchpoints no longer run side by side, but are brought together as part of omnichannel publishing to form a holistic customer approach.
Since product content must meet the specific requirements of the various output channels, syndication of content also plays a role in CM which should not be underestimated. For this purpose, data management systems such as PIM and DAM typically provide a product content syndication function which allows product data to be integrated into a central product data feed and placed in predefined structures, regardless of format and source. With automated product content syndication, companies can easily maintain the quality and consistency of their product communication across all channels, even at a fast pace.
Finally, another important aspect is the flexibility of the respective CM system. A Channel Management system must be adaptable enough to handle all future channels. It should also be able to provide statistical evaluations to ensure transparency at all times in terms of determining the contribution of each touchpoint to value creation.
In addition to product information management, digital asset management and channel management, integrations that support the product content life cycle in any way play a crucial role in successful product content management.
Integrations
The principle of not considering a software solution as an isolated piece of technology, but rather thinking in terms of its interaction with other systems, applies to Product Content Management in particular. After all, every single integration that supports the product content life cycle ensures that companies can communicate faster, in a more targeted manner and more successfully giving them a competitive advantage. Basic integrations in the context of PCM include ERP, CMS and e-commerce systems, but also creative programs such as Adobe InDesign and Photos-hop or Microsoft Office applications, to name a few.
mediacockpit – for a true one-stop product content experience
Modern product communication therefore requires a systemic overall solution for product content management, including the creation, management, maintenance and output of product content. mediacockpit provides such a solution by uniting the areas of PIM and DAM in a single platform, enabling close integration of the relevant data. In the PIM, product information is maintained, enriched and made available centrally. The associated channel-specific media content is stored in the DAM. This one-stop system architecture enables product experiences from a single source – which not only has a positive effect on the quality of product communication, but also, in conjunction with CM and other integrations, ensures an optimal time-to-market with minimal use of resources.
Highlighted Whitepaper
Manifest: One-Stop Product Content Experience
With One-stop Product Content Experience we help our customers shape their individual future in the market in a sustainable and secure way.
Accomplish more together
We believe in the value of collaboration and exchange. This applies both to our customer projects, from which we generate many valuable insights for our product development, and to our growing partner network, with an extensive range of which we support our customers in their digitization.
