Marketing automation and inbound marketing are hot topics for marketing. People are concentrating in content production, and automation provides content to potential customers right when and where needed. The marketing automation system replaces ten separate systems and significantly reduces manual work. But can basic marketing automation handle all the publishing in all channels? In my own experience, it is worth exploring options for automating multi-channel publishing, especially if the offering contains a lot of products.
Like all other content, product content should also address its readers correctly and be targeted at each phase of the purchasing path.
Why then is the product content publishing so burdensome? Like all other content, product content should also address its readers correctly and be targeted at each phase of the purchasing path. This need leads to a huge amount of product information.
For example, if you take running shoes, the content for the purchasing path can go like this. First of all, interest in running and getting shoes is inspired by inspirational running pictures in social media. Once there is an interest in the topic, the potential customer may be interested in tips for shoe selection. This can be followed by a comparable sports shoe test of different shoe options. Eventually, one gets to the product page of a shoe from where one buys online or alternatively the shoes are bought from the nearest store.
If we consider that the range of this company includes a hundred shoe models with variations, we are suddenly talking about managing the release of tens of thousands of product information.
When counting the number of separate pieces of product information for this single customer’s purchase path for this single product, it is likely that there will be more than a dozen individual pieces of product information including all the images, texts, feature data, store materials, and articles, not to mention the user recommendations. If we consider that the range of this company includes a hundred shoe models with variations, we are suddenly talking about managing the release of tens of thousands of product information. It is clearly impossible to manage such a quantity without any assistance from automation.
When you publish content to only one channel, it is likely that it is better to do the publishing through the channel’s own content management. As soon as the same content is published to multiple channels, you should consider centralized publishing.
So what’s the solution? As a rule of thumb you could say that when you publish content to only one channel, it is likely that it is better to do the publishing through the channel’s own content management. As soon as the same content is published to multiple channels, you should consider centralized publishing and associated product information- and digital asset management. This will save you from overlapping work.
If you think about the content of that earlier sports shoe example, it would probably be best to publish the content for the early phases of the purchasing path via a marketing automation system. Publishing of product-related product information to web pages, online store and potential merchandising materials such as posters, shelf labels, and other sales promotion material in the store, is not usually possible with marketing automation systems.
Publishing automation systems can be used to define publishing channels for each product information field, and to handle the actual publishing at the touch of a button.
Fortunately, there are also solutions that are just for this purpose. Publishing automation systems can be used to define publishing channels for each product information field, and to handle the actual publishing at the touch of a button.
Automation takes care of all the routine work and it is possible to make full use of the people where they are at their best.
What kind of marketing systems does a company with many products need, in addition to the marketing automation system and publishing platforms? I personally feel that a good product information- and a digital asset management system and the accompanying publishing automation module are often sufficient. In this way, automation takes care of all the routine work and it is possible to make full use of the people where they are at their best: in analysing, planning and in goal-oriented content production.
Tips for an e-commerce project
/in Blog/by Katri KoskentaloLearn from the mistakes of others – Nine tips for a successful e-commerce project
1. Know what you want and be prepared to measure your success
2. If you are not yourself an expert, hire a reliable consultant
3. Buying a pre-fabricated ‘turnkey’ solution does not mean that you don’t have to do any work yourself
4. Have a solid foundation
5. Invite bids
6. Choose your partner carefully
7. Demand documentation
8. Testing, testing and more testing
9. When the project is completed, take good care of maintenance processes and internal role assignments
Canter Launches Next Generation PIM Solution
/in News/by CanterResearch shows that businesses lose up to 3.5% of sales each year due to product information being poorly managed or inadequately utilized in sales channels. “We have noticed that on average it takes companies four weeks to release new products into sales channels. This is largely caused by inefficient and error-sensitive product information management. Delays in bringing products to market result in missed sales opportunities, but good product information management allows products to be released to market in under a week. This has a direct positive effect on sales”, says Canter’s CEO, Patrik Palatz. “Our client, Oy Perkko, increased sales by 74% using a catalogue that would have been impossible to create without functional product information management”, Palatz continues.
Canter and its key personnel have been engaged in product information management for over ten years. Diverse experience of the needs of Finnish customers and a passion for developing a technically superior product have led to the next generation Adeona PIM system, which can be scaled to meet varied product information management needs without extra tailoring. Goals have been set high throughout the development process. “We decided to create the most user-friendly PIM system on the market, allowing companies to benefit from positively standing out through their customer-driven product contents — both in electronic and print channels”, says Canter’s CTO, Janne Costiander.
However, the software alone is not enough to boost efficiency or remove errors from product data. Upon deployment of the software, the entire process of product information management, as well as its related information flows, will be explained and updated to match the needs of rapidly changing markets. “A sensible product information model and centrally managed product information provide businesses with the ability to make fast changes in direction, for example by opening a new online store or expanding into new market areas”, says Janne Costiander.
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Additional information:
Patrik Palatz
CEO
Tel: +358 40 774 1200
Canter is a software and services company with a tight focus in Product Information Management and publishing automation. We design and deliver solutions based on modern technologies which help our clients to grow the value of their digital capital, improve their operational performance, provide consistent product experiences and succeed in multi-channel commerce.
How to create consistent product experiences
/in /by CanterI guess it is very natural that this should happen. After all, companies are usually organised in such a way that different people (and quite often different functions) oversee product experiences in different channels, even within sales and marketing: an ad agency creates content for social media, marketing creates product content for the website, product organisation creates product data sheets and the sales make their own PowerPoint presentations. In this setup, it is very unlikely that the product experience will be consistent across all the sales channels.
I believe the reason why consistency is not appreciated so much in companies is humane. First, consistency sounds boring and secondly, it requires a process that people from different sides of the organisation are willing to stick to. In other words, it requires management. Luckily, there is a technology that can help us there. It is called Product Information Management, PIM in short.
In Product Information Management people from different sides of the organisation maintain all the product related information in a common system called PIM. From PIM, the product information is published to all the sales channels that need it. The product master data in PIM may come from ERP or other such system which is used in internal processes, but PIM is used as a common platform to enrich product data to be used in all the customer touchpoints.
In PIM: ad agencies can add the copy text to promote the products, marketing can add product marketing texts, product organisation can maintain all the technical details and sales can bring in their input from the field. This is beginning to sound like collaboration, isn’t it? And the outcome of this way of working is consistent customer experience. Worth a try, don’t you think?
And as for being boring, I would argue that too. I can think of nothing more boring than copy-pasting content from one place to another. With PIM you can get rid of that altogether. Once you have shared your product information in PIM, it is available for automated publishing in all the sales channels that might need it without any copy-pasting.
A good search generates business
/in /by Janne CostianderWhat does a good search look like?
A good site search function consists of several things. First, the search function should be easily available for users to use it. Use should be easy, logical and fast.
It is worth using suggestive logic in the search field. Suggestive search works by the service suggesting suitable products when the user has only entered part of the search term. Further typing focuses the search and narrows suggested options. Another much talked-about approach is semantic searching, where the search engine attempts to recognize the user’s intentions and context, thus producing more relevant search results. For the search ‘Men’s work pants 50 black’, for example, the search engine can pinpoint what products the user is looking for – instead of showing all products for men and all work pants.
Faceted classification uses product property information to categorize search results, allowing the user to easily filter products based on their features. A good search engine will offer faceted categories and make using them easy and quick.
It is always worth using product images in searches. The impact of a product image in product presentation and conversion creation generally is very big. When an image is already displayed in the search results, the customer quickly gets a reliable understanding of the product. Product images should also not be forgotten in suggestive searching.
Utilizing searches in product range management and targeting
Site searches should also be saved and analyzed. For example, product contents and keywords, as well as the range of products, can be developed by analyzing how users interact with the search. Search analysis can also be used to support other marketing channels, and results exploited for targeting or personalization of marketing, for example.
Searches and product information are firmly interlinked
Product information, its scope, and its quality significantly affect how site searches work and how relevant results they deliver. The structure of product information, level of classification, and atomicity determine, among other things, what kind of faceted categorization can be created. The search “Show all products from brand X” provides a simple example – searching by brand is not possible without classified product information.
Product information can be fetched automatically from background systems through interfaces. A product information system can also offer the entire search engine as part of a product information interface, which means everything to do with online store searches, for example, does not need to be done within the online store.
In summary, it is worth investing in good search functions. Today’s technology offers appropriate solutions which make constructing a search that benefits all parties effortless. For designing the search logic itself, it is worth consulting someone with experience in building functional searches. Even small actions can significantly improve user experiences and data utilizability.
Five tips for product communications
/in /by CanterOver the last few years, the markets have become clearly more customer-oriented. It can be said that in commerce the power has shifted to the customer. This applies in B2C just as it does in B2B. Customers buy what, where and when they like. This leaves the role of the seller to offer what the customer needs, where and when they need it.
In order to serve their customers, companies have to listen to the wishes of the buyers and identify the quiet signals of the markets in time. In order to cope in the competition, you must be able to react in an agile way to changing needs and meet the customers at the right time in the right channels, with the right contents. Indeed, it’s possible to say that with the help of product communications we want to create even more effective multi-channel product experiences at all meeting points.
So how are these effective multi-channel product experiences created? Here are five tips:
1. Centralising product information management
The favourite saying of data consultants “you put rubbish in, you get rubbish out” is also true with regard to product contents. Good product communications experiences are based on quality content. When there are many distribution channels, it is impossible to produce channel-specific content management with a high level of quality. In many channels, we come up against rubbish or at least product information that is imprecise or out of date. When product information management is centralised in one place from which all contents are produced for all distribution channels, content management becomes significantly easier. Of course it’s still important that only high-quality contents are entered into the centralised product information management, but good work done once is available for use straightaway in all distribution channels, without forgetting about the channels of the future, for which the contents are already ‘in the bank’.
2. Agreeing on the ownership of information
It’s important that a company has a consistent way of managing the product contents needed in the business. Everyone has to be able to rely on the quality of the information that is available and that it is up to date. It is good to define clearly both ownership of information and the responsibility for its upkeep. Who is responsible for technical product information, who for images, who for product information texts and who for prices? Usually the owners are fairly self-evident, but if ownership has not been agreed on mutually, it’s difficult to rely on all information types and their updating having been taken care of. By specifying ownerships, the risk of ‘rubbish’ ending up in some distribution channel can be minimised.
3. Connecting systems to each other
Marketing and communications are fascinating and full of new possibilities. Every day, we come across new handy, often almost free tools with which we can reach our potential customers with our product messages more effectively than before. The number of marketing systems has been said to have increased twentyfold during the last six years. However, underuse of systems is a common challenge in companies. This is understandable if the systems are disconnected and producing content for each one has to be done separately. So, it’s worth thinking about the architecture of marketing systems as a whole. That is, how the systems can be made to utilise shared data sources and how product information that has been enriched in one place can be used in all channels.
4. Making use of publishing automation tools
Marketing automation is a concept that is familiar to everyone, but less is spoken about publishing automation. In principle, it too is automation of marketing and communications. Publishing automation allows the synchronisation of information from one centralised system into all electronic distribution channels. Also related to publishing automation, there are the tools of sales, with which all the required sales materials from offers, customer-specific price lists and sales outlet materials are created. Correspondingly, the tools of marketing can be employed to automatedly fold product cards, data sheets and even catalogues containing thousands of products. Centralised product information management is utilised behind all of these too.
5. Involvement and facilitation
We are living through the rise of employee advocacy. Employees, partners and even customers are made use of more and more strongly in brand-building and communications. This requires easiness in order to succeed. People are happy to talk about a good product, as long as the necessary contents and channels are available to be used without effort.
All product contents with their language versions can be managed in a centralised way and provided for the use of interest groups, for example to be shared in the social media.
The product communications of today and the creation of more effective product experiences done with it, are easier than before by making use of technology. In fact, the key to success lies in how the technology is used. Even a good system does not help if people are not able to use it in accordance with the needs of the company. In this too, it’s worth turning to the experts. There’s no reason to reinvent the wheel and it’s worth making use of practices that have been found to be good.
Publishing automation in Finland
/in Blog, Blog, Blog, Blog/by Patrik PalatzI have been working with database publishing and publishing automation for little over 10 years now, usually as a part of process development of our clients’ sales and marketing needs. Here are some of my thoughts in regards to the state of publishing automation in Finland currently.
First it’s good to note that despite long-standing transaction printing being based on mostly the same concepts and principles (data from multiple sources to one printer), I will not consider it a part of publishing automation here. Personally I see publishing automation in regards to how the (product) content is being published from one source to multiple channels or medias automatically. Read more on how Canter covers publishing automation here.
High quality data opens new opportunities for full-scale utilization of publishing automation
The use of publishing automation is Finland is very fragmented, and many applications with publishing process automation which could have lots of potential uses within companies do exist. The technology is constantly developing and making new and more modern solutions available.
In my view, the single biggest slowdown in spreading the solutions and getting the best out of the systems within companies is the poor quality of the data available. Typically this is the result of undeveloped information management practices and tools. Many of these companies still lack the understanding on how important a well-organized information management actually is. Luckily the digital tsunami has made many companies and management teams to understand how data and the quality of it are important for the entire business. Publishing automation is also based on high quality structured information, regardless of the channel it’s being used for.
Efficiency via publishing automation
I have noticed that in Finland many small companies have taken the process automation really far, which is quite natural when the business is being developed with small resources and efficiency is always in the center of everything. On the other hand there are also companies which do not think of these things at all, because the knowledge of technical solutions is lacking, or because a third party has always been in hired to supply printed catalogs and similar materials. Fortunately for SMEs, the range of solutions and expertise in the market has become more diverse. Solutions can be found in many price ranges, and every singe euro invested in the development will turn profits faster than before.
Renovation of information logistics is the lifeblood
Medium-sized companies are a mixed bag. There are companies which are still just starting up, and companies which have taken process automation really far. Industry-specific differences can also be significant. For example, many importers and wholesalers have found that maintaining information logistics is their lifeblood with intensifying and globalizing competition. The change in value chains can also be seen in how these companies have had to wake up to the development of information management and publishing automation.
Among the manufacturing industry I still see much work left to do with these things. With export-oriented businesses language version management is a common challenge, which in itself often serves as a powerful driver for optimizing and automating content and publishing processes.
Many of the greatest domestic growth tales involve an aspect where stopping and thinking of internal processes and procedures did simply not happen because all the focus, energy and hands had been caught up in business development and growth control. And at some point it was seen that the scaling and stretching of people was no longer possible or rational.
Publishing automation as a continuation to product information management
At Canter we think that the source of the information in publishing automation is irrelevant, as modern solutions are able to access information from multiple sources. Quality and structure still largely dictate whether automation is rational, what level of automation could be realistic to achieve and what kind of outcome could be achieved. For this reason I see publishing automation as a continuation to product information management (PIM).
Typically the PIM system acts as a centralized publishing database, but sometimes it may also be justified to make separate intermediate storage for different channels and publishing processes. If necessary the information can also be obtained from the company’s partners’ systems. PIM is usually a part of other operative systems, such as enterprise resource planning systems, which provide data that can be further processed and enriched in the PIM system for distribution and publishing. In some instances the product process could be built in such a way that PIM serves as a source of information and as a so-called product master that distributes data controlledly to all systems in use.
Let’s use data from where it already exists
Customer information, as well as other customizable content and variable data needed for printing are not typically replicated to PIM, but are usually read directly from their own sources and connected to the process before printing.
Customization in B2B environments, such as the production of customer-specific contract pricing lists, is usually based on the content of the PIM and ERP systems – sometimes also in the CRM content. For example this includes customer specific product information, price information and contractual or customized product information.
To conclude, there are a number of companies in our country that make use of the publishing automation systems, thus gaining a significant competitive advantage. With publishing automation it is possible to significantly improve marketing processes and improve multi-channel customer experience. There are even more companies that have not yet made use of the opportunities offered by the publishing automation systems for their businesses. As part of marketing automation the use of publishing automation will surely grow in the next few years.
Salesman as graphic designer – when everyone gets annoyed
/in /by Katri KoskentaloOften sales personnel spend a lot of their work time creating all sorts of discount leaflets and other product information catalogs. For example they might create or compile price lists, product cards or customer-specific listings as an attachment to offers, because the marketing department doesn’t have the time or the skills to help. The sales personnel get annoyed because this takes up lots of their time and because it is boring copy paste job they wouldn’t really have the time, know-how or correct tools for.
On the other hand the marketing department might receive requests from the sales department to create personalized price lists or lists – which should be ready preferably the same day, or at the very least tomorrow because the offer needs to be sent to the client. Or they get asked to tune the self-made, copy-and-paste leaflets because they didn’t turn out visually appealing. The marketing department gets annoyed because this creates more work than they are able to deal with, because of how boring it is and because the sales personnel do not consider the brand uniformity at all when they create the leaflets.
If everyone gets annoyed, the outcome at worst can be visually appalling and content-wise lacking leaflets which take up lots of work time. If the sales personnel start working as graphic designers, does it make any sense to begin with?
Luckily, there is a solution. Sales Tool creates good looking product information leaflets automatically, allowing the sales personnel to personalize them a bit – and then Sales Tool handles the rest. The end result is a ready, brand-related offer leaflet which even the marketing department is pleased with. And now everyone is happier.
According to customer feedback, the use of Sales Tool has helped many of our clients to achieve better results. For example IKH resellers sent us the following message:
In the video below you can see how IKH uses Sales Tool to create their price tags.
You can have a look at other customer solutions from here.
Should you also free your sales personnel back to sellin? Contact us!
PIM! Customer satisfaction and profits
/in /by CanterRecently I ran across a Donald Duck pocketbook with a cover where Donald is staring at a chicken, eyes wide. The name of the book was “PIM! Hypnosis, mentalists and nonsense”. As much as I do believe in the power of meditation and even hypnosis, that is not what PIM stands for me. For me PIM is the exact opposite of all that: real information when needed, where needed.
PIM is the side of marketing automation which is usually not talked about. According to Aberdeen Group it increases customer satisfaction by 45%, and adds the same to the profit margin, so this should really be something that every company should be interested in. And they are. A study conducted by RNR Market Research shows that product information market will triple in size over the next five years.
So what does PIM mean, really? PIM means tools and processes which are used to manage the product information for sales and marketing purposes. It’s different from Product Data Management (PDM) or Master Data Management (MDM), in essence the continuation for these two. It’s the step in product information management which guarantees great visibility and first-class purchasing experience.
While PIM is also used to give customers better service, it also adds to the employee experience. Study done by ATKearney shows that each year companies use 25 minutes per sales unit (SKU) to fix product information and creating better harmony within their channels. With PIM this need can be eradicated, since all the information can be sourced from one, centralized location. Employees generally do not enjoy fixing the same thing over and over in different channels.
But are there really that many different channels? Yes there are. I have seen a map with 130 different channels, with new ones coming in constantly. Consider where your company publishes all the product information: on product data sheets, on social media, on advertisements, on websites, on discussion forums, in customer reviews, in user manuals, in purchase systems, in QR-codes, in customer service, in shelf labels, in invoices, in training material… And I didn’t even mention the web store.
PIM is profitable, and even fun once you get into it. And there’s a drop of magic in there as well. When you launch a new product, you input all the relevant information into the product information management system and PIM! All the information shows up correctly and uniformly in dozens of channels.
Read more about PIM product information management here.
What should be automated in marketing?
/in Blog, Blog, Blog, Blog, Blog/by CanterMarketing automation and inbound marketing are hot topics for marketing. People are concentrating in content production, and automation provides content to potential customers right when and where needed. The marketing automation system replaces ten separate systems and significantly reduces manual work. But can basic marketing automation handle all the publishing in all channels? In my own experience, it is worth exploring options for automating multi-channel publishing, especially if the offering contains a lot of products.
Why then is the product content publishing so burdensome? Like all other content, product content should also address its readers correctly and be targeted at each phase of the purchasing path. This need leads to a huge amount of product information.
For example, if you take running shoes, the content for the purchasing path can go like this. First of all, interest in running and getting shoes is inspired by inspirational running pictures in social media. Once there is an interest in the topic, the potential customer may be interested in tips for shoe selection. This can be followed by a comparable sports shoe test of different shoe options. Eventually, one gets to the product page of a shoe from where one buys online or alternatively the shoes are bought from the nearest store.
When counting the number of separate pieces of product information for this single customer’s purchase path for this single product, it is likely that there will be more than a dozen individual pieces of product information including all the images, texts, feature data, store materials, and articles, not to mention the user recommendations. If we consider that the range of this company includes a hundred shoe models with variations, we are suddenly talking about managing the release of tens of thousands of product information. It is clearly impossible to manage such a quantity without any assistance from automation.
So what’s the solution? As a rule of thumb you could say that when you publish content to only one channel, it is likely that it is better to do the publishing through the channel’s own content management. As soon as the same content is published to multiple channels, you should consider centralized publishing and associated product information- and digital asset management. This will save you from overlapping work.
If you think about the content of that earlier sports shoe example, it would probably be best to publish the content for the early phases of the purchasing path via a marketing automation system. Publishing of product-related product information to web pages, online store and potential merchandising materials such as posters, shelf labels, and other sales promotion material in the store, is not usually possible with marketing automation systems.
Fortunately, there are also solutions that are just for this purpose. Publishing automation systems can be used to define publishing channels for each product information field, and to handle the actual publishing at the touch of a button.
What kind of marketing systems does a company with many products need, in addition to the marketing automation system and publishing platforms? I personally feel that a good product information- and a digital asset management system and the accompanying publishing automation module are often sufficient. In this way, automation takes care of all the routine work and it is possible to make full use of the people where they are at their best: in analysing, planning and in goal-oriented content production.
Adeona PIM 2017
/in /by CanterWe are currently developing a next generation Adeona PIM system, and while the foundation will be familiar, many things will be changing. Over the years we have learned a lot from PIM in general as well as from our clients, and we are using these insights in the development of a new product version.
Adedona PIM 2017 – highlights:
1. Architecture
The architecture has been updated to match growing needs and to adapt to different environments in the best ways possible. It’s scalable and supports larger amounts of data, and is available for deployment both as a cloud based service as well as on-premise/private cloud service.
2. Information model
The information model of Adeona has been updated, and while most of the features remain the same, we are introducing some new ones as well. Based on the customer feedback, we have developed upgraded features and information models that support business needs better. Related workshops still continue.
3. REST API
Everything works via a single interface, and the REST API is available for both internal system use as well as for external systems and developers. All the data within the system is available via uniform interface, which will help with e.g., integration and building data-driven applications.
4. Searchability
Search functionality and finding relevant information are key features in systems with a lot of data, and this is one thing we have really focused on. All the information saved in the system can be fetches swiftly and easily by using the Elasticsearch search engine which indexes all the information in real time. For example, a web store can use the PIM system as a search engine, streamlining the whole project.
5. User interface and usability
All admin access is web browser based, and the new user interface is fast and straightforward. The powerful search feature is used in many ways, and managing especially large amounts of data was taken into consideration during the planning of the user interface.
We are developing the product together with our clients, and the workshops related to the new version were held in March. We gathered together with our clients to go through some key uses of the system, and got familiar with the user interface and the functionalities.
Workshops will continue in the fall, so feel free to join us!