Business process improvement and implementation of Sales Layer, an off-the-shelf Product Information Management (PIM), now makes life easy for Enware.
Media Statement Released 30 June 2023
With over 5,000 active products and parts, Sydney-based Enware had their hands full finding and using the correct product information within many of their business processes, mainly because their product data was spread across multiple systems, in varying formats, and they were heavily reliant on a few product experts within the company.
According to Ascend 7 CEO, Rox Dawson, this is a common situation for many manufacturers, wholesalers, and retailers, who persevere with their existing product information techniques that don’t quite work effectively.
“We have come across many businesses, large and small, which are collating a large volume of product data, like prices, descriptions, images, and trying to manage it in individualised systems and formats like Excel, an ERP or accounting software. They struggle to keep it all up to date and useful for marketing, sales, accounting, and production, and they don’t know what solutions and new technologies are available to resolve it,” he said.
Perth-based Ascend 7 has just finalised implementing Enware’s new PIM system, which is now providing accurate and consistent product data that will:
support the business’s processes and decisions
minimise errors and re-works
be easily shared with external resellers, designers and installers
enable the business to remain competitive
Enware is a manufacturer and supplier of specialist plumbing and safety equipment to a wide variety of commercial industries, and has design, engineering and wholesaling capabilities.
Product information challenge
Enware recognised they needed a systematic approach to their product data, and a solution that would provide an oversight to see the issues and address what needed rectifying.
Enware’s Marketing and Communications Manager, Avril-Summer Cusack, said one of Enware’s biggest problems was not knowing how poor the quality of their data was.
“There was limited transparency beforehand, product information was being sourced from several different sources, key information was often missing, or it often conflicted across different sources,” she said.
Ascend 7 was engaged to conduct a review of how Enware derived, stored, managed, and used product information across the business, and to determine a solution.
A five stage process to implement a Product Information Management (PIM) system and associated business processes was proposed, which included rigorous process mapping, implementation of the Sales Layer PIM software, and training staff to use the new system.
About Sales Layer
Sales Layer is an off-the-shelf product information management (PIM) platform, delivered as a software-as-a-service (SaaS) subscription.
It has been voted as one of the easiest to learn, most user-friendly PIMs available (#1 in Customer Satisfaction based on 2000+ users in 33 countries).
From a technical perspective, Sales Layer is extremely agile for creating customised product experiences, with workflows allowing product data collaboration between dispersed teams and departments.
It is suitable for up to 300,000 SKUs and 35 users, and it features an extended Digital Assistant Manager (DAM) and extended instant catalogues, among many others.
The results for Enware
Since the new Sales Layer PIM has been operating at Enware, they have reported a dramatic improvement in the access to, and quality of, product information.
Ms Cusack said, "Introducing the Sales Layer PIM has been a game changer for our business, because we have product information in one place, rather than across multiple systems which was time consuming and often difficult to access."
"We are also now able to generate collateral and assets automatically from the data, which is a huge time-saver. All product information is in one place, so our team can access it anywhere, and be confident that it’s all accurate," she said.
Ascend 7’s Mr Dawson said because Sales Layer is so easy to use, Enware is experiencing greater efficiencies and significant time savings as well as less errors in the product data.
“Sales Layer provides a cloud-based single source of product information truth, and now Enware is well positioned to make better product decisions, experience increased sales, and deliver improved customer service,” he said.
