The rapidly evolving state of eCommerce has affected every part of the supply chain. Everyone including sellers, manufacturers, retailers, distributors, every part of the supply chain; all have had to adapt. B2B ecommerce is expected to account for 17% of all B2B sales in the US by 2023, reaching $1.8 trillion.
eCommerce has perhaps impacted legacy distribution companies the most. With the rise of marketplaces like Amazon and eBay, and everyone selling directly to customers (making the role of the middleman redundant) it’s not hard to see why. New customer behaviors like the desire for convenience, fast shipping, seamless experiences across multichannel platforms are basic expectations from brands.
Another challenge faced by older distribution companies are their expansive and complicated inventories with a vast range of product types and volumes of catalogs. With all this messy product data in their hands, it’s a big challenge to transform raw data into attractive content that is ready to be published on sales channels. Inventory management using an ERP is not enough when dealing with large SKU counts and fast-changing trends. Distributors need to be able to react quickly to market needs without having to deal with issues like siloed content, waste warehouse costs and out of stock issues that lead to bad customer experiences. In fact, 66% B2B leaders now believe ecommerce solutions are essential, up from 48% pre-COVID.
Distributors need a robust PIM solution that integrates smoothly with their existing ERP systems to address all these challenges easily. To optimize for multichannel eCommerce, distributors need to consider specific channel requirements so data formats can be automatically optimized, manage inventory as per demand, add customer service value at every stage of the buying process, and create a seamless process across internal systems and external channels.
PIM is essential for Distributors looking to win the digital shelf and boost their eCommerce success with a strong online presence and great product experiences. A PIM system like TruPIM (powered by Akeneo PIM), is a strong, scalable and affordable solution for Distributors who are looking for professional end to end ‘PIM for eCommerce’ services.
Advantages of PIM for Distributors:
- Increase product data accuracy and integrity, minimize time spent on de-duping product data manually, onboard large number of SKUs and product data attributes
- Efficient onboarding, management and distribution of rich product content to all sales channels
- Grow SKU counts by integrating data from content partners like Affiliated Distributors (AD), Trade Service, Unilog, IDEA, ORS, Essendant, SMO, Orgill, etc.
- Increase time to market, create a strong digital presence, and omnichannel consistency
- Increase website use, traffic, and customer satisfaction with high quality, granular content curated in Akeneo or Syndigo (Riversand) PIM
- Open new distribution channels via marketplaces, and retailer and custom branded websites
- Increase online leads and sales by improving support for your search-engine and web marketing efforts and delivering a great digital strategy
- Improve customer experience via cross-channel consistency – product selection, content, pricing, etc.
- Improve collaboration and efficiency between teams, remove silos and bottlenecks by providing real-time visibility into data flows
- Lower content operations cost and complexity by modernizing IT
- Expert deployment and customer support services from StrikeTru
Want to know more? Get a copy of our PIM for Distributors insights that outlines the top data management challenges faced by distributors and how PIM can help overcome them.
In the meantime, check our TruPIM pricing page for more details.
