Step 1: Categorizing User Needs into 7 Key Groups

• KPIs & Objectives: Create a  list of measurable goals in order to know where you’re starting from. Identify and list major challenges from a business and technical standpoint.
• Product Lifecycle & User Workflow: Design a process map with gaps between current and future needs and a Business Process Management (BPM) Strategy. This allows listing user roles & permissions roles, enrichment, catalog search, and syndication needs.
• Data Model Structure: Develop a strategy that cleanses and enriches data efficiently
• Data Cleansing: Analyze the level of efforts necessary to cleanse your data base from a programmatic standpoint that leverages AI
• Asset Management: Stay at the strategy level to understand if we’re loading these assets from a DAM or an SFTP, and if there’s a need to rename assets.
• Supplier Data Onboarding & Initial Import: Depending on whether you’re a manufacturer or a distributor, this might require some great features and processes to format supplier’s data into your own format.
• Architecture & Connections: Last but not least, connecting your PIM with all your source & destination systems (marketplaces, websites, paper catalogs, POS, etc…).

Step 2: Crafting a Business Case

• Introducing the major challenges
• Current client key user & roles
• A catalog overview
• KPIs & Objectives
• Product Catalog Management Gaps
• Requirements listing for each of the 7 groups above that PIM provider will use to contextualize their demos.

Step 3: PIM Demos with Purpose

Step 4: Contextualized Platform Rating

• Supplier data onboarding
• Manual data import & updates
• Data cleansing
• Data governance
• Data model
• Taxonomy
• Asset management
• Product search
• Enrichment capabilities
• Product lifecycle & workflows
• Analytics
• Translation & Localization management
• Syndication & export
• Paper catalog & advertising solution
• UI & ease of use
• Product catalog performance
• Customization
• System integration
• Implementation costs
• License costs

Step 5: Executive Summary and Decision Time

Benefits Beyond Selection

• Tailored Solutions: Clients choose a platform aligned with their unique needs.
• Efficient Adoption: Accelerated adoption through streamlined workflows.
• Reduced Customization: Minimized reliance on costly customization.
• Optimized Design Costs: A meticulous approach minimizes design costs.

Ready, Set, Implement

AI, a powerful but not magical tool

Expert AI Training

AI as a tool for continuous improvement

But there might be one you’ve missed if you haven’t attended it in the past; and that is Akeneo’s Unlock Conference.

The ultimate gathering of PX experts and enthusiasts, Unlock 2024 will be an inspiring 2 day event where you’ll be able to learn how to provide exceptional and consistent product experiences through dynamic keynote presentations, best practices, customer testimonials, hands on technical workshops and of course, product insights.

We’ve recently released the official jam-packed agendar for Unlock 2024, which you can check out here. But while we’ve got you, let’s dive into the 5 reasons why we think you’ll have a blast at this year’s premiere PX conference.

Check Out Highlights from Unlock Paris 2023!

1. Keynotes and Roundtables on AI: Unveiling the Future of AI

In a world where technology is reshaping the retail landscape, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is at the forefront of innovation. At Unlock 2024, dive into dynamic keynote presentations and engaging roundtable discussions to learn how leading brands and retailers are leveraging AI to revolutionize their approach. Real-life examples will showcase how businesses like yours are finding a better way to navigate the evolving retail landscape.

Featured Session: Demystifying Generative AI: Convincing CEOs to Unlock the Full Potential of AI in PX strategies

In today’s rapidly evolving business landscape, the use of AI in Product Experience strategies has become an imperative for staying competitive and customer-focused. But as AI technologies advance, the challenge often lies in convincing CEOs and top-level decision-makers to fully embrace AI’s transformative power. Join our expert panel of AI pioneers and industry leaders as they demystify ChatGPT and provide actionable insights on how to navigate the AI landscape with confidence.  This engaging discussion will empower you to unlock the untapped potential of AI in your PX strategies.

Key Takeaways:

• • Understand how to get started with AI
  • Collaborate with AI partners to boost innovation
  • Leverage generative AI for product content
  • Enhance visuals with Gen-AI
  • Streamline back-office operations

2. PX Strategy Analysis: Real Stories from Industry Leaders

Unlock 2024 goes beyond theory, offering firsthand insights from industry practitioners and leaders who have successfully elevated their PX Strategy. Gain valuable perspectives from those who have navigated the challenges and opportunities in the rapidly changing retail landscape with real stories and practical examples that illuminate the path to creating a robust and effective PX strategy for your brand.

Featured Session: Leading the Charge: How to Kickstart a Product-Centric Revolution in Your Organization

In the ever-evolving realm of customer interactions, the paradigm is undergoing a significant shift. Instead of trying to pursue customers everywhere, brands are now focusing on attracting customers with compelling product experiences. 

Join our session to explore the transformative journey your organization must embark upon to join the revolution. We’ll hear insights from brands already leading the way and delve into the crucial interplay between people, process, and technology required to place Product Experiences at the core of your operations.

Key Takeaways:

• • Your organization must evolve to realize the full potential of PX 
  • Learnings from other organizations that have successfully adapted people, process, and technology to support the PX revolution

3. Akeneo in Action: Hands-on Workshops and Presentations

Get ready for an immersive experience as Unlock 2024 unfolds the latest from Akeneo Product Cloud. Through hands-on technical workshops and insightful presentations, explore the full PX ecosystem and discover how Akeneo is empowering brands to deliver consistent and exceptional product experiences and real-life examples of the tangible impact of incorporating Akeneo into your workflow.

Featured Session: Spring Product Release Keynote

Get a first view of Akeneo’s 2024 Spring Release. In this session you will discover the latest innovative features and products that will revolutionize the way businesses deliver Product Experience Strategies, all told through the eyes of a B2B Manufacturer.

Key Takeaways:

• • See what the 1st AI powered supplier onboarding solution can do for you: Quickly and easily onboard and enrich supplier provided product information and assets
  • Strengthen the way you work in Akeneo PIM with enhanced workflow capabilities
  • Revolutionize the way your work by easily connecting to ‘monolith’ infrastructure and extend the value of your PIM
  • Get a glimpse of what the future of PX will look like: Product Experience Platform
  • Don’t just use AI for onboarding suppliers – find out how Akeneo is infusing AI across the PIM offering including native generative AI and product matching capabilities

4. Integrate with the PX Community

Unlock 2024 provides a unique opportunity to connect with PX experts, leading industry analysts, and like-minded professionals. Engage in meaningful conversations, seek advice, and build valuable connections that can propel your business forward. We here at Akeneo are passionate about fostering an environment where networking is not just a side activity but a core element of the entire experience.

Featured Event: PXM Champion Awards

Our Annual PXM Champion Awards Ceremony recognizes organizations who are practicing and demonstrating exceptional business growth. In particular, we look to highlight PX success stories about how a strong and healthy foundation of PIM can impact your organization’s people, process and technology while unlocking business growth opportunities.

5. Connect & Speak with Experts

PIM, PXM, DAM, OMS – all the acronyms can make everything feel so robotic. What’s more, remote and hybrid working models mean that most of us have limited face-to-face, or even camera-to-camera, interactions with others in the industry. 

Featured Event: Infamous Unlock Party

Cap off the conference with the renowned Unlock Party—an evening of celebration, networking, and entertainment. Unlock Boston offers up the perfect excuse to get to meet others in person, and gain quality time learning and speaking with each other, forging connections that extend beyond the event itself.

Unlock 2024 is not just a conference; it’s a gateway to unlocking the full potential of your product experiences. With a rich agenda featuring keynotes, strategy analyses, hands-on sessions, networking opportunities, and a legendary party, this event is designed to equip you with the knowledge and connections needed to thrive in the ever-evolving world of retail.

Check out the official agenda here, and make sure to secure your spot at Akeneo’s Unlock 2024—the premier destination for those committed to mastering the art of Product Experience.

The importance of post-sales support

Reduce product returns with better product experiences

Incorporate customer support teams into your existing infrastructure for true omnichannel experiences 

Use customer support interactions to sell 

Conclusion 

Big Data, Big Problems

Filling the Gaps

Enter Attribute Enrichment

• • Increase Revenue per Visitor and Average Order Value: With improved product attributes, your entire product discovery offering, including search, recommendations, and quizzes, becomes more relevant. This translates to higher revenue per visitor (RPV) and increased average order value (AOV).
  • Reduce Returns and Refunds: High data quality leads to improved customer satisfaction, as the right products match customers’ preferences in terms of colors, flavors, sizes, and other attributes. 
  • Enhance Operational Efficiencies: Attribute Enrichment automates the process of enhancing product information, saving eCommerce teams time and money, and reducing human error. This newfound efficiency allows your merchandisers to focus on high-value strategic contributions, ultimately improving overall operations. 

• Maintain Control: Don’t blindly trust the AI. Your team has the final say on what attributes are added to the catalog so they can refine and tweak as needed.

• Stay Current with Market Trends: Attribute Enrichment leverages customer behavioral data to support the latest search trends. By creating trending attributes based on actual customer behavior, you can keep your product catalog up-to-date and competitive.

The Power of Composable eCommerce Solutions

What is Site Search?

• Strong filtering capabilities for different categories or groupings, based on the the behavior of your customers and shoppers
• Intelligent recommendations based on past searches and even general site behavior (I.e., shoppers clicking on a product, and recommending another product that would be related in their search)
• Clear and concise search results with the exact information that the shopper would like to see. Don’t make them click into every single result!
• Incorporate user generated reviews, and allow filtering of products based on reviews
• Autocorrect and error correction
• Never allowing a shopper or user to hit a dead end; even if their exact search doesn’t come back with results, suggest something else that could be related.

AI-Powered Site Search

Cleanse & enrich data

Translate & localize content

Personalize the shopping experience

Unlocking the Power of AI for Site Search Success

Whether it’s new digital marketplaces coming onto the scene, social media apps looking to break into eCommerce, or new technology like AI permeating the retail landscape, there seems to be an almost endless stream of new channels that many, if not all, brands and retailers are struggling to keep up with. Why?

Simply put, their eCommerce presence is precariously built on a traditional, monolithic commerce architecture that offers a single solution, from a single vendor, and a single digital experience.

And while this one-size-fits-all approach worked for many years to support standardized experiences and basic eCommerce offerings, the digital marketplace has expanded at such a rapid pace that we’ve quickly outgrown this legacy architecture. It wasn’t built to accommodate all the facets that are now required to produce high-quality product experiences across so many different channels.

Enter composable commerce; the modular approach to eCommerce that enables true omnichannel product experiences.

What is Composable Commerce?

Composable commerce is a development approach that leverages best-of-breed vendors composed together into a singular, custom-built application. This type of architecture model allows teams to create an ecosystem that is customized to meet their organization’s specific business needs, enabling activation of their entire product record across every channel.

Instead of the traditional, monolithic approach, composable commerce software communicates via API, meaning each individual solution can be updated or replaced at any time without disrupting the rest of the system. This creates a flexible, scalable eCommerce stack that can easily be updated or adapted to meet your needs as your organization grows.

What’s the Difference Between Composable Commerce and Traditional Architecture?

A traditional, monolithic approach offers an all-in-one solution from a single vendor, providing the basic capabilities needed to activate an eCommerce site.

For a while, this met a need in the market; everything was stored in the same place, and organizations had everything they needed to provide a singular, standard experience for all their customers.

However, thanks to the impact of both the pandemic and rapid technological innovation, the needs of modern organizations span much farther than the reach of traditional commerce architecture. There are new digital touchpoints emerging constantly that these legacy platforms simply weren’t built to accommodate, not to mention the ever-growing expectations of customers to have a dynamic, cohesive, and engaging experience with your product no matter where they discover or search for you.

At a more granular, technical level, massive monolithic code bases present steep roadblocks; plug-and-play replacements of outdated technology is impossible, extensive knowledge of the code base is required for developers to do any sort of adjustments, and scalability is severely limited. As a result, development speed and time-to-market is simply too slow to keep up with the speed of today’s economy.

As consumer behaviors continue to rapidly shift and digital touchpoints continue to expand, more and more organizations are beginning to move away from a traditional model and towards a composable commerce model that decouples the frontend user experience from the backend logistics. This offers organizations the flexibility to customize their tech stack to their specific business needs.

With composable commerce, brands are able to:

• Create compelling, coherent, and consistent product experiences across every channel, regardless of their specific personalizations.
• Accelerate time-to–market and expand into new territories, products, and markets more seamlessly than ever before.
• Leverage best-of-breed technology solutions to ensure that you’re utilizing the most up-to-date and efficient processes.
• Scale your tech stack with your company by replacing technologies as you continue to grow and take on new challenges.

Tenets of Composable Commerce

Composable commerce architecture has been growing in popularity as more and more organizations continue to search for a more scalable and flexible model. But what does that actually look like in practice? Let’s take a look at three of the defining features of this modern commerce architecture.

1. Modular

Arguably the most important aspect of composable commerce approach is its modular nature. Every component of your tech stack is replaceable, and therefore scalable. Changing, adding, or removing one aspect of your tech stack will no longer crumble your entire ecosystem like a fragile Jenga tower.

What does this mean? Accelerated time-to-market, increased eCommerce conversions, eliminated redundant technology costs, and stronger omnichannel customer experiences.

2. Open Ecosystem

An open ecosystem essentially means that your organization isn’t tied to one specific vendor; you are free to select the software that best serves each individual business need, ensuring that you’re receiving world-class SaaS products across the board. This is a particularly useful aspect as it allows your team to easily swap out technology if a piece of software isn’t performing the way you intended it to, it’s been changed, or it becomes obsolete due to changed internal processes.

This open ecosystem also encourages simple integrations and deep customization capabilities, allowing your team to essentially build the perfect system for your commerce tech stack.

3. Flexible

The scalability and flexibility of a composable commerce architecture is one of the biggest reasons so many organizations are beginning to transition. Whether it’s adapting to meet the needs of new customer markets, new global locations, new products, or new eCommerce channels, composable commerce offers the flexibility to meet your organization’s needs that a traditional approach can’t compete with.

Benefits of Composable Commerce

So we’ve covered the basics of composable commerce, and how this architecture framework often provides greater agility and control to brands and retailers. But now let’s dive into the specific benefits that an organization can reap from migrating to a composable commerce architecture.

Create truly omnichannel experiences. 

Mobile, print, web, social media, retailer sites, even newer channels like voice search and TikTok. All of these existing touchpoints, and those of tomorrow, are potential places where your customers could discover you, but showing up on these channels requires a strong technological foundation to syndicate product information and listings. Monolithic architectures are often too rigid to adapt quickly to these rapid market changes.

Reduce vendor risk. 

Swap in and out components of your tech stack as needed, allowing your ecosystem to scale to meet your needs. Whether you need to replace an old piece of technology, incorporate a new software tool, or upgrade existing functionality and capacity, you can do so freely with this type of plug-and-play architecture.

Reduce operational costs. 

By increasing internal operational efficiencies and leveraging modern technology stacks, your organization is able to save time and money. Plus, you’re customizing your tech stack to what works best for your team, so you aren’t paying for features or solutions you don’t use.

Remove heavy reliance on IT. 

The user-friendly aspect of composable commerce means that managing and operating within this commerce approach doesn’t require in-depth technical skills from developers. Unlike the traditional model, composable commerce allows non-technical employees to perform necessary tasks.

 Deliver highly differentiated, personalized experiences that win against your competition.

More channels than ever before means more competition than ever before; the product experience that you offer to your customers needs to stack up or you risk losing their loyalty. By utilizing best-of-breed technologies and allowing your organization to scale, you’re able to provide your consumers with the personalized experience they’re looking for.

Future-proof your Business with Composable Commerce

Future-proofing your business means that you need to be able to create compelling and consistent product experiences across all your owned and unowned channels, and that is significantly more simple when you’ve implemented a composable approach that allows you to plug-and-play technologies as you scale.

The inherently modular nature of the architecture, coupled with the flexibility and scalability it offers, means that a composable commerce approach is the one of the most efficient way brands and retailers can activate their product story across each and every channel, regardless of if it’s owned by them or not. By streamlining internal operations and relying on best-of-breed technology, composable commerce enables organizations to deliver unique, personalized product experiences to their consumers at every stage.

Interested in learning more about how to migrate to a composable commerce model? Request a demo of Akeneo today to see how our MACH-certified PIM can help.

Then along came the digital transformation.

First there was dial-up internet and chat rooms. Then came along Amazon, social media, Yelp reviews. Before you knew it, you barely existed if your business didn’t at least have a Google listing.

Each of these new creations became more than a fad. They became channels through which potential buyers learned about your products. But businesses faced the challenge of managing these multiple channels at once, and two dominating strategies emerged: omnichannel eCommerce and multichannel eCommece.

What exactly is difference between omnichannel vs. multichannel, and how can one or the other impact your business? Let’s dive in.

What is multichannel eCommerce?

Multichannel eCommerce is short for “multiple channels.” It simply means that you sell your products on more than one channel. Many retailers have both a physical store and an online presence, selling on social media, eCommerce sites, marketplaces, and other platforms. For manufacturers, multichannel eCommerce has been truly revolutionary, allowing them to sell direct-to-consumer rather than having to rely on third parties and catalogs. 

Businesses following a multichannel approach focus on building out individual channels while ensuring product information is accurate and consistent. They tailor strategies to each channel and track results, but each channel acts as a “solo act” rather than a player in an orchestra.

Benefits of multichannel eCommerce

Because of the digital transformation, even the most old-school retailers and manufacturers typically have a basic website or social media presence by now, making them multichannel by definition.

For some, this simple strategy can bring rewards like:

• Reaching more customers and new audiences
• Reaching shoppers when and where they are most likely to buy
• Increasing incremental sales and total sales volume
• Increasing awareness of your brand
• Driving higher average order value
• Growing your online presence and sales
• Providing a more consistent and rewarding shopping experience

Drawbacks of multichannel eCommerce

So why the debate between multichannel eCommerce vs. omnichannel?

Those who have operated under a multichannel eCommerce framework will know the struggles well, such as:

• Implementing new infrastructure and processes needed for fulfillment, shipping, logistics, etc.
• Increased costs due to new requirements
• Greater demands on the supply chain
• Channels and data becoming siloed
• Inconsistent product information, branding, and customer experiences

New business plans can typically fix the first three issues. However, the last two points are the reason why multichannel vs. omnichannel eCommerce remains a problem, so let’s dive into omnichannel.

What is omnichannel eCommerce?

Omnichannel eCommerce combines all customer channels for brand interaction into one strategy, going beyond multichannel approach. Instead of working separately, all your channels collaborate, communicate, and influence each other. This creates a harmonious “orchestra” that guides your customers throughout their purchasing process.

What’s the difference between omnichannel vs. multichannel?

The biggest difference between omnichannel and multichannel eCommerce is that while omnichannel is people-focused, multichannel is product-focused; while omnichannel is customer-centric, multichannel is channel-centric. Multichannel eCommerce is all about moving inventory as efficiently as possible through various channels. Omnichannel takes a more holistic approach, aiming to provide a seamless experience throughout the entire customer journey. 

Both strategies have data at their core, but even then, there’s a difference: The foundation of multichannel eCommerce is product data. The foundation of omnichannel eCommerce is both product and customer data. 

Multichannel presents your products on various channels and allows your customers to purchase them or otherwise communicate with you. You’ll collect data on what’s selling, when, and how quickly, but not on customer behavior and preferences. And while you’ll be able to see individual channel performance, you won’t be able to see how all the channels work together.

Omnichannel retail is an integrated experience. Data is shared between channels to target and retarget buyers, providing seamless experiences. Buyers can continue where they left off, even if it was on a different channel. Each interaction builds upon the last, fulfilling the customer’s needs as they progress through the buying journey. 

Essentially, omnichannel takes multiple channels and synchronizes them, while multichannel leaves them separated and siloed. Thus, all omnichannel eCommerce is multichannel, but not all multichannel is omnichannel.

So why isn’t everyone doing omnichannel?

When you look at omnichannel vs. multichannel, it seems obvious to say that omnichannel is better. Multichannel is a more siloed approach, and whether you’re in retail, manufacturing, or distribution, the digital transformation has paved the way forward for holistic, omnichannel eCommerce. 

So why aren’t more companies focused on omnichannel?

The truth is that omnichannel strategies typically require a large investment of resources, especially in the beginning. If you operate out of a brick-and-mortar store or warehouse using a catalog or third-party partnership model, creating even a multichannel strategy means you’ll need to build a website, leverage marketplaces, learn about social media, and start advertising.

To reach true omnichannel status, you’ll also need to syndicate your product data, optimize your tech stack, synchronize your customer data, and then use analytics to segment and target and deliver personalized content at every touchpoint.

When business are instead offered a simple, straightforward multichannel strategy that can still increase sales in the short-term, it can be tempting to not make a further investment in omnichannel. But that’s a mistake.

Omnichannel vs. multichannel eCommerce is ultimately about a long-term vs. short-term approach. The fact is that the digital transformation is turning the world toward omnichannel experiences. You can either build an omnichannel commerce strategy now and get ahead of your competition—or you can be left behind. 

Luckily, many of the differences between omnichannel vs. multichannel can be mitigated with the right technology and partners. While a multichannel strategy will use separate and disparate technologies, like eCommerce platforms for selling, customer relationship management (CRM) systems, or customer data platforms (CDPs), composable technology allows you to orchestrate and scale your tech stack as your challenges and goals expand.

Best-of-breed Product information management (PIM) systems are a great place to start implementing an omnichannel strategy. A PIM provides a central database for your product information, allowing you to distribute consistent, accurate data to all of your channels while also conforming to their rules — and a composable PIM means that it connects seamlessly with your existing technology, and plays nicely with new systems introduced down the road.

Ready to learn more about best-of-breed technology can help you implement and support an omnichannel strategy? Book your demo today to see the benefits for yourself.

1. Data-Driven, Hyper-Personalized Shopping Journeys

2. Transparent Supply Chains & Business Practices

3. Incorporation of AI to Enhance Customer & Employee Experience

• Generate & enrich product content: Quickly and easily generate ready-to-edit content, including product descriptions and product page copy that aligns with your business’s tone of voice, product keywords, and character limits.
• Collect & cleanse product data: Leverage AI to accurately clean and enrich any product data including de-duplication, data extraction, and product categorization & classification, at scale and in a centralized way. Relieve your teams from lengthy manual data work by leveraging the power of AI.
• Enhance work automation: Remove lengthy manual tasks and increase operational efficiency, elevating employee job satisfaction and productivity
• Unburden & support customer service: AI can help unburden support teams and make them highly efficient by intelligently routing specific requests or questions to specific people or departments, encouraging higher customer and employee satisfaction
• Personalize content to new markets and geographies: Automatically translate product content to quickly and efficiently deliver product experiences at scale and in any language with AI

4. Seamless Experiences Across Digital, Social, and Physical Channels

5. Growth in Demand for a Circular Economy

• Increase Store Traffic: Customers are increasingly drawn to stores that offer drop-off points for their pre-loved items.
• Reduce Return Rates: By extending the lifespan of products through resale or refurbishment, retailers can significantly reduce the number of returns, cutting down on waste and saving money.
• Communicate a Shared Passion and Commitment: Participating in the circular economy sends a strong message that your brand cares about the environment, which can foster customer loyalty and attract like-minded consumers.
• Improve Upsell and Cross-Sell Opportunities: When customers bring in products for resale or recycling, retailers have an opportunity to upsell new items or cross-sell related products, increasing revenue.

To 2024 and Beyond

1. Offer Hybrid Shopping Options

2. Ensure Cohesive Product Information Across All Channels

3. Localize Product Content

4. Incorporate Innovative Technologies

Navigating the Omnichannel Future of Black Friday