The product information database collects records and data stored in an information system or spreadsheet. The product information system or spreadsheet sustains and manages the content in the database.
While businesses have been using Excel spreadsheets for years to manage their data loads, companies are now increasingly moving towards a PIM system as automation has become necessary with the heaps of data that businesses have to manage today.
Cloud security is crucial for businesses to maintain their privacy and confidentiality and they need real-time data editing.
All this wasn’t possible without a PIM system in place. Product information databases are crucial to organizing and retrieving data for business uses today. Your product database is the pillar of your business. When this pillar is solid, you get to sell more, earn more, and grow more.
A weak product database causes communication issues, sales gaps, and delayed distribution processes.
How to create a product database in Excel:
Before opening Office, you need to analyze what your product catalog should look like, how you want to organize your product information, and where you’re going to use your database.
If your goal is to make a database for a virtual store, you’ll need to think from the start about an accessible system that’s easy to edit, update, and export.
- Type in your data into a spreadsheet. Although your data will differ based on product listings, some common attributes are needed for each product. For example, product SKUs, product name, variants, etc. So if you’re using excel, type “SKU” in cell A1, and start listing the SKUs for each product as you go, from cell A2 and onwards. In cell B1, type in “Product Name” and start filling the fields as you did for the SKU. Each SKU should correspond to the relevant product name.
- List the other information relevant to the products in the following columns. For example, list the supplier for that product; name column D “Image URL .” Name column E, “Price,” and list down the prices for each of your products in the relevant cells. Label cell F1 as “Payments Accepted” and list the acceptable payment methods for that product, separating each with a comma, such as Visa, Paypal, etc. The product details required by the website or search engine to which you upload will vary, so consult the specific site to determine what information you need to list in the spreadsheet.
We’ve summed up five weeks of work for you in a few words, and as the number of your products increases, this task becomes more time-consuming and tiresome.
Your time-to-market keeps increasing, and you need to hire more people to start managing that one product data-sheet. Oh, and not to forget the cost of all this: the salaries for the extra employees hired, the opportunity cost, and more.
While Excel spreadsheets are still used by businesses managing a small number of SKUs, they’ve become outdated and unreliable for businesses managing over a hundred SKUs. And how are these businesses managing product data? With a PIM.
You can learn about How to upload products in shopify Here,
PIM Solution: Your Ultimate Product Database
What happens when a spreadsheet creates a duplicate entry? Or a specific field of information is missing for a product? Or when you need to make sure data is optimized for your sales channel? Do you run through hundreds of entries to reconfirm? This is irrational and unachievable.
Companies need an automated cloud system to highlight these issues for them during data entry. And that’s where a PIM comes in.
A PIM is a centralized product database through which companies can:
- Edit, upload, update and manage all their product data in real-time
- Automate product variants and attributes
- Bulk import and export data to sales channels
- Optimize product data for different channels such as Shopify, Amazon, eBay, etc.
With Apimio, you can custom-populate your product variants so you don’t spend hours uploading each product. You can create custom permissions for team members to ensure security and privacy so that each member is only doing tasks that they’re authorized to carry out.
