Supply Chain: the importance of data quality

Disruptions to your supply chain can have significantly negative impacts on business¹: increased manpower costs (84.6%¹), lost revenue (77.6%¹), reduced productivity (76.4%¹), and a rise in customer complaints (73.8%¹)…

To optimize your supply chain, it is essential to improve the quality of your data. Optimizing your data will greatly improve your efficiency in dispatching products, shorten delivery times, and boost customer satisfaction…

Read the definition of the supply chain and how data quality can be a lever for optimizing yours.

Supply chain: definition

The supply chain enables the journey of a product towards the end customer. It involves many different intermediaries: producers of raw materials, manufacturers, distributors, suppliers… The challenge for a business is to send the right product, at the right time, and in the correct quantity.

Achieving this requires that all the relevant stakeholders (suppliers, partners, transporters…) have access to the correct information at the right time and can anticipate any problems: 76% of professionals² say that the number of disruptions in their supply chain has risen comparably over the past three years.

Supply chain: the importance of data quality

Optimize operational efficiency

Inaccurate data can disrupt supply chain operations by causing stock shortages, production delays, transport problems… Some of the most frequent problems are disruptions (54%¹) and stock shortages (52%¹).

This is why it is so important to inspect your data, and in particular stock-related data, to ensure that it is reliable, up to date, and error free. This will enable the various stakeholders to anticipate customer needs, optimize stock levels and respond quickly to any disruptions in the supply chain.

When your data is of the highest quality, you can guarantee the implementation of orders and optimize supply chain operations: 79% of businesses³ with a high-performing supply chain increase their revenue more than average.

Improve customer satisfaction

When data is unreliable (means of transport, package weight, delivery times…) and the supply chain is disrupted, it becomes impossible to satisfy customer demands. When this happens, shoppers tend to have « a negative emotional reaction »: 61% of shoppers⁴ feel frustrated, 46%⁴ impatient, 45%⁴ anxious and 34%⁴ angry. Shoppers can also be quick to lose trust in the brand with 47% of shoppers⁵ not repeat buying from a brand if they did not have access to information on their delivery.

To avoid such frustrations, it is crucial to improve your control over data at each stage of the supply chain: customer orders, delivery status, progress of delivery… and to ensure that each customer receives their order within the announced delivery time.

Improve information transparency

Incomplete and/or missing information on the environmental impact of a product and/or its origins negatively impact the overall reliability of the supply chain and consumer satisfaction. 45% of shoppers⁴ will abandon their online cart if they consider the information about a product to be « deficient ».

To avoid these negative feelings it is essential that all those involved (suppliers, partners, transport companies…) exchange data that is complete, consistent, and compliant with the applicable norms and regulations.

This improves the transparency of the supply chain and provides more information to shoppers who wish to ensure that a product is « ecologically and socially sustainable⁶ », as traceability⁷ is one of their key criteria.

Supply chain: the challenges around data quality

Data quality is an essential means of guaranteeing the overall efficiency of your supply chain. However, guaranteeing this quality can be extremely complex. 60% of professionals⁸ see this as one of their biggest challenges.

Far too often, data is scattered across several different systems: ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), CRM (Customer Relationship Management), TMS (Transport Management System)… and managed by different teams. This increases the risk of data errors and means that there is no global view over data. 65% of purchasing managers⁸ have limited or no visibility over data beyond their immediate suppliers.

To meet these challenges, it is vital to use a Product Information Management (PIM) solution which allows you to store and secure all the data involved in the workings of your supply chain. Through this unique database, all those involved in the supply chain can rely on complete, reliable, and up-to-date data at all times. Some PIM solutions have specific features: control over access to supply chain data depending on the different profiles (partners, suppliers, transporters…), detection of stock movements, scoring system to identify incomplete and/or missing information… thus significantly improving overall supply chain performance.

¹ Evans, C. (2023, October 31). 37 Supply Chain Statistics, Trends, and Predictions for 2024. Fictiv.
² Gartner. Benchmark your supply chain with Gartner Supply Chain Benchmarking. gartner.com.
³ Brophy, M., & Simmons, K. (2023, July 6). Supply Chain statistics : Industry trends & turbulence. Fit Small Business.
⁴ Nouasria, M. (2022, June 10). Supply chain au bord de la crise de nerf : 50 statistiques pour comprendre. journaldunet.com.
⁵ Taylor, R. (2019, May 15). How a lack of delivery visibility produces frustrated customers. Digital Commerce 360.
⁶ Chardenon, A. 3 tendances consommateurs qui exigent plus d'informations produit. Salsify.
⁷ Stibo Systems. Optimisez la chaîne d'approvisionnement avec le Master Data Management. stibosystems.com.
⁸ Informatica. 5 défis de la Supply Chain axée sur les données et comment les surmonter. informatica.com.