Essential steps for improving the quality of product information

Product information is an essential element of your sales strategy. If this information is of poor quality it can have a negative impact¹ on sales: product returns, cart abandons, customer discontentment…

To avoid this, it is essential to implement effective processes for managing product information: checking data quality, contextualization, enrichment, proofreading and validation… This working process improves the quality of product information and can increase a company's sales by 6 to 36%².

Discover the steps for improving the quality of your product information and boosting sales.

Step 1: Consolidate

On an eCommerce site, shoppers attach great importance to product information with 66% of them³ checking out a product's technical features before purchasing. This information is essential and yet nearly 30% of product information² contains errors and/or is incomplete.

Businesses tend to use several different systems for managing their product information: ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning), CRM (Customer Relationship Management), files in various formats (Excel, XML, Json…) … This multiplication in information sources reduces the productivity of Product and Marketing teams and increases the risk of error in your product information (data duplicates, input errors, inconsistencies...).

To avoid these pitfalls, it is important to gather all product related data (supplier data, technical data, logistics data, marketing data…), to categorize it and to check its accuracy. It is also essential to focus on incorrect and/or inaccurate data to improve its quality: organize, correct, find, and delete any data duplicates…

Step 2: Enrich

Shoppers are increasingly drawn towards digital media and 78% of them⁴ want to see more images on product pages. They also want to have access to rich and comprehensive content with 27% of shoppers³ willing to pay more for a product if this content is available.

To meet these expectations, it is important to set up efficient collaborative processes allowing several teams (Marketing, SEO, eCommerce, Product…) to enrich product information integrate a video and/or image, complete a product description, add a new product category and/or family… It is also important that the teams be able to quickly identify the product information in need of enrichment and to closely monitor its completeness before distribution.

Step 3: Guarantee consistency

These days, shoppers expect brands to provide product information adapted⁵ to their chosen shopping channel. They also expect to find the same product information on eCommerce sites and in stores with 69% of shoppers⁶ preferring brands guaranteeing this consistency.

This means that Product and Marketing teams must have easy access to the product data they need to be able to adapt it to the demands of each selling channel: size and format of images, correspondence to classifications, text length… When product data needs to be updated (price change, launch of new range, additional category…), they must also be able to quickly update this data on all selling channels.

Step 4: Contextualize

Shoppers expect brands to provide product information in their own language with 56.2% of shoppers⁷ considering this to be even more important than the price of the product. They also expect brands to take their specific context into consideration with 92.2%⁸ preferring to buy from an eCommerce site displaying prices in their own currency.

In answer to this, Product and Marketing teams must adapt their product information to each context: country, language, local regulations… This adaptation must be systematic and requires a full understanding of the translation process for contents and product related data (currencies, taxes, shipping costs…). Product and Marketing teams must also be able to store and quickly deliver the relevant product information to each selling channel: eCommerce sites, Marketplaces, mobile apps…

PIM: for optimal quality in product information

Guaranteeing the quality of product information involves thorough and ongoing work on data. When working with numerous references managed over different selling channels, handling this data can quickly become complex.

PIM (Product Information Management) solutions allow you to control the entire process of managing product information. By centralizing all product data, the PIM becomes the company's unique product reference source. At any time, the Product and Marketing teams can access this reference source containing reliable, complete, and updated data.

They can use this unique data base serenely to prepare product information before distribution: enrichment, adaptation to each country and target, translations… Its multi-user management features also allow for effective collaboration between contributors and depending on their user rights, each participant can contribute to the enrichment of product information.

PIM also greatly increases efficiency and productivity in the product information validation process. Through its workflow engine, Product and Marketing teams can oversee the progression of data completion and ensure that data reaches the expected level of quality before distribution to all selling channels: eCommerce, mobile, print, point of sales…

¹ Durieux, A. D. (2019, January 9). L'information produit, la clé de l'engagement du consommateur. journaldunet.com.
² Deschamps, T. D. (2021, May 6). Soigner l'information produit pour proposer la meilleure expérience client. hubinstitute.com. ³ Tricoire, M. T. (2020, June 18). S'appuyer sur l'information produit pour améliorer l'expérience client. hubinstitute.com.
⁴ Henault, J. H. (2020, April 9). 50 faits incontournables pour une stratégie E-commerce en 2020. semrush.com.
⁵ LSA. Pour des expériences d'achat uniques. lsa-conso.fr.
⁶ Morgan, B. M. (2019, September 24). 50 Stats That Prove The Value Of Customer Experience. forbes.com.
⁷ Chotard, L. C. (2018, January 4). 3 conseils pour réussir la localisation de ses fiches produits à l'international. textmaster.com.
⁸ Osman, M. O. (2021, June 10). Ecommerce Statistics for 2022 – Chatbots, Voice, Omni-Channel Marketing. kinsta.com.