CASE STUDY: Enterprise-Grade Open Source PIMAn Important Option for Modern IT

Vik Gundoju

vik@striketru.com

+1 832 303 3257

Kyle Christiansen

kyle@shop.com

+1 816-695-3918

marketamerica | SHOP•COM

Speakers

Agenda

• Why PIM

• The product information challenge

• The enterprise-grade open source option

• Open source software myths and reality

• Akeneo, an enterprise-grade open source PIM

• Case study: SHOP.com

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StrikeTru Overview

StrikeTru provides PIM consulting services and solutions for US companies.

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• Houston, TX

• Industry Experience: • Retail

• Manufacturing

• Distribution

• Energy and other

• Platform:• Akeneo Open Source PIM

• Other Platforms:• Riversand, Innovit, Nuxeo

PIM

Sync To Internal SystemsERP, WMS, AnalyticsSales & Marketing Tools

Aggregate | Manage| Distribute

Product FilesXLS, PDF

Digital Assets

Search Engines

IndustryData Warehouses

Marketplaces

Brand Websites

Agency, Printer

Other DataSources

ERP

Distributors

Resellers

Product Content Syndicators

Mobile Apps

marketamerica | SHOP•COM

• E-commerce retailer

• Worldwide reach• 10 countries/currencies

• 8 languages

• Multi-channel• Catalog website (SHOP.com)

• Desktop + Mobile

• Brand-specific websites (x8)• Desktop + Mobile

• Mobile app

• Re-targeting and Affiliate Marketing

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PIM & Akeneo Overview

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Why PIM

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High quality & consistent product data - lifeblood of commerce today

Customers, partners, consumers, & regulatory bodies want easy access to data

Powers critical online marketing & conversion tools - SEO, re-targeting, site search …

Supports success KPIs across channels – AOVs, profitability, return & abandonment rates ...

Legacy product data operations - high cost/complexity

Modern PIM - best suited to manage rich product data for multi-channel selling

Digital data & interactions speed customer path to purchase

PIM makes it quick and easy to aggregate, enrich, govern, & publish data

Critical capability for digital transformation of sales & marketing

The Product Information Challenge

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Disparate systems, no single source of truth

Inconsistent data, metadata, & quality rules

Significant effort to compile & enrich product data, every time!

Inadequate features – data modeling, management, governance, search, reporting, auditing, integration

Poor support for digital asset management/distribution, print automation, vendor data on-boarding, data sync

Delayed product launches

Poor data quality & compliance

Cross-channel inconsistency

Higher operating costs

Legacy systems

Clunky UI – hard to use

Inflexible - requires a rebuild to modernize

Hampers enterprise agility:

Differentiated merchandizing

Expanded assortment

New distribution channels

The Enterprise-Grade Open Source Option*

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Most successful open source projects affiliated with commercial vendors

Vendors support community & make technology accessible to mainstream enterprises

Stable, secure, & tested

Scalable

Predictable life cycle

Manageable by vendor & 3rd party products

Software Attributes

Software maintenance & support services

Documented software audit trail

Community support & documentation

Professional services, training, & certifications

Promotion of broad ecosystem

Enterprise-grade software can support mission-critical enterprise-scale workloads

* Source: IDC Whitepaper, Enterprise-Grade Open Source: An Imperative for Modern IT, April 2016

Most enterprises use open source software in different ways – network equipment, servers, & modern applications.

Open Source Software Myths and Reality*

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Myth: Constant updates & untested changes make it unreliable & disruptive to critical enterprise apps

Reality: Enterprise-grade open source distributions are stable & support a wide range of mission-critical apps. Certified functionality, backwards compatibility, security fixes, & SLA support throughout product lifecycle.

* Source: IDC Whitepaper, Enterprise-Grade Open Source: An Imperative for Modern IT, April 2016

Myth: Mission-critical workloads need performance & security guaranteed by closed source commercial s/w

Reality: Widely used as embedded enabling technology in many mission-critical solutions. For e.g., Hyper-scale data centers operated by Google, Amazon, Facebook, & others built on an open source software foundation.

Myth: ROI from infrastructure commoditization only

Reality: More ROI benefits due to streamlined deployment, ability to standardize h/w & s/w layers, developer productivity, code quality, & agile code releases.

Myth: Open source software support skills are hard to find & hard to develop

Reality: Vendors typically offer training & certification. Most new graduates use open source technologies in school & are productive quickly. IT Managers say open source skills not difficult to find.

Akeneo, an Enterprise-Grade Open Source PIM

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Stable

Scalable

Formal release processes

Extensibility

Maintenance & support

Community support & docs

Prof. services, training, certifications

Innovation

Cost of ownership

80+ enterprise customers, 2500+ community users

Manages millions of SKUs

Major, minor, & patch releases – defined frequencies

APIs, marketplace extensions, free source access, connectors

Akeneo & partners

Forums, documentation, cookbooks, videos, etc.

Akeneo & 42 solution partners from 17 countries

Usability, deployability, & integrations

Better cost/value benefits compared to closed source PIMs

Championed by open source veterans from Magento & Oro platforms

Akeneo at SHOP.com

Case Study

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PIM Software at SHOP.com

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Goals

Faster product setup & release to channels

Content flexibility & portability- Across channels, brands, countries, languages, & currencies

Content consistency & control to reduce compliance costs- FDA, Taiwan Dept. of Health, Singapore Source Disclaimer

Web centric, multi-channel retailer

Proprietary, legacy solution ran its course

Not flexible for current & future needs

Faced with a build or buy decision

Chose to go with Akeneo

Why Akeneo

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Met all ourrequirements

User-friendly

Rich features

Affordable

Sophisticated data management

Data and meta-data management Rich data modeling Data inheritance Bulk edit

Audit trail & version control

Audit history, and version rollback A key driver for replacing legacy system Enabled removal of “gated” product release process End user visibility reduced IT support demands Promoted accountability

Open source, easy to customize

Content Automation: Product/SKU titles, digital assets, published prices Custom Kit Price Calculations Alerts: For price or inventory status changes Translation: Connector to Translations.com

Easy to integrate with other systems

APIs: Enabling contextual product page previews Out-of-the-box features to import and export data Integration framework that can be modified easily for specific

requirements

Use Cases

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Common data modelDefined a common data modelPromoted a common understanding of data, & how to use it Introduced a new platform & framework to organize our data and reduce complexity

Rich data modelingMultiple data types including asset & reference typesProducts, SKUs, Kits, RelationshipsData inheritance

Single source of truthCentralized data, meta-data by consolidating 4 systemsData sync’d to 10+ sales & marketing systems, ERP, Inventory

Meta-data management

Hierarchies (merchandizing, reporting)Categories and attributesAttribute schemas (category specific attributes)Relationships (cross-sell, up-sell, etc.)

Reference datamanagement

Multiple lists of valid values – Accounting/Taxation Profiles, Report Categories, Availability Status, Product Type

Simplified product launches to new countries

Use Cases (continued)

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Data GovernanceMultiple roles, role based permissionsAccess controls: by entity, feature, locale, product category, attribute, import/export jobEnrichment and approval workflows

Digital asset managementProduct and SKU images, Videos, WhitepapersAutomatic image URLs and thumbnail previews

Data automation, quality rules

Consistent product titles & asset URLsDigital asset filenames for consistencyContent translationCompleteness checks

Published price management, Alerts

Compute category & country specific published pricesAccount for exchange rates, rounding & other rulesEmail alerts (e.g. on price or inventory status changes)

IntegrationseCommerce websitesMiddleware that feeds product data to other channelsTranslations.com

Big Wins

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Enterprise agilityChanges are fast and easy to implementFaster and more reliable product release to channelsQuicker setup and launch to new countries

Data consistency & portability

Consistent data across channels and product setsProduct sets grouped by countryMultiple SKUs per product with country specific settingsData re-use across channels

Improved productivity

Elimination of significant duplicate data entryCommon data model enabled decoupling of website changes from product

management processes

IT system consolidation

Rolled 4 systems in one PIMProduct Workflow, Categorization, Image, & Translations systems

What’s Next

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Contextual product page previews

Migrating more media/digital assets into Akeneo

Leverage enhanced selling attributes across more web properties

Enrich data to better leverage new features (price calculations)

Deprecate redundant downstream calculations

TWN recycling data

Thank You

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Vik Gundoju

vik@striketru.com

+1 832 303 3257

Kyle Christiansen

kyle@shop.com

+1 816-695-3918

marketamerica | SHOP•COM