PIM, the ultimate solution in a multi-brand context

75. That's the number of brands in the LVMH group, a nice score if ever there was one! Although not all companies have 75 different brands, many of them operate in a multi-brand context within the same group. Whatever the history that leads to this context - historical marketing strategy or successive acquisitions and investments - this often results in teams with disparate methodologies and tools coexisting.

But in order to accelerate the distribution of products from the same group's brands and gain internal efficiency, unifying product information is an essential and virtuous prerequisite. And that also means unifying methodologies and tools. What are the steps to follow to correctly anticipate these changes? How can PIM support companies in managing multi-brand products and teams?

Collect and centralise multi-brand product data

Suppliers generally vary by brand and product. This is especially true in the case of an acquisition, since the companies involved are unlikely to have common processes. Each supplier usually sends flat Excel files that are then integrated by the brands, each of which has an ERP and an IS of their own. The effort to streamline these processes can then seem insurmountable: changing an entire information system is a considerable investment that proves too heavy for many companies. Instead, the solution is to invest in a single product content management platform, the Product Information Management (PIM) to which each team will be able to converge its information. The data will then be collected and centralized in a single, reliable tool. The role of PIM will be to integrate its data and make it compliant in order to unify the processes and supplier information used within the group, regardless of the brand.

Organising the work of the teams

Once the collection of supplier information has been automated, it is time to consider their enrichment and the organization of the work between the different marketing, product or e-commerce teams. However, a multi-brand context generally means teams split by brand, or even by product, sometimes followed at group level by departments which are themselves multi-brand. The advantage of PIM is that it allows you to manage user rights according to the needs of each entity: for example, an employee can be given editing rights to enrich only the products of his or her brand, but will be able to view all the other product sheets to draw inspiration from them. The administrator, on the other hand, will have access to the validation of all the content of the brands he manages. This way, each brand can keep its own processes and organization, while ensuring the overall consistency of the content produced at the group level.

Create a multi-brand dashboard

Content is integrated, each team is assigned its own work: it's time to start monitoring! To monitor the status and progress of your content production at a global level, a complete and clear dashboard is the key. Thanks to PIM, you can define your own dashboard with, for example, a "common core" of indicators shared by all the brands while maintaining specific indicators according to the needs of each of them (practical or even essential when the sectors or the end customers diverge).

Monitoring the quality of product data, anticipating deadlines and organising the day-to-day work of your teams becomes easier. Reports can be viewed by brand, country, distribution channel and even by cross criteria (by country by brand). At a glance, you and your employees know exactly where you stand!

Each brand has its own omnichannel sales strategy

Does your sales and marketing strategy differ from brand to brand or even from country to country? No problem for PIM, which allows you to connect different on and offline sales channels in a differentiated way for each brand. Once a channel is connected, you can choose to open it for another brand whenever you want: if you distribute your sofas on the La Redoute marketplace, it will only take a few clicks to supply the retailer with your bedding brand's products. The PIM becomes a distribution hub for all your products and all your brands. All you have to do is to control it!

Conclusion

Historic umbrella brands, start-up acquisitions, diversification opportunities: there are many ways for a company to manage a multi-brand portfolio. Unifying the management of product information related to this portfolio is a step that must be managed intelligently to optimize the company's processes while keeping employees involved. The PIM is the ideal tool to federate data and teams around the same issue: quality content distributed on the right channels. Managers and employees see their daily life simplified around unified processes. Each brand and each product can deploy its own identity while being fully connected to the global strategy of the group. Managing a multi-brand portfolio has never been easier!