Manage Your Products

The PUMA Product Information Manger (PIM) and Product API were redeveloped and upgraded to enable improvements and enhancements to PUMA’s product marketing initiatives.

Challenge: Simplify, Centralize, Standardize and Enrich Product Information

PUMA needed to update their product information management assets. Legacy IT systems had been designed for print catalogs and had minimal interfaces for marketing and ecommerce information. Every region has its own marketing and an ecommerce department which meant that each product had two sets of interfaces for each region. There was no digital management for product images, so marketing campaigns were assembled “manually” from emailed graphics and copy.

PUMA needed to simplify, centralize, standardize and enrich access to product information.

Approach: Make Products the Focus

The initial phase of Cantina’s engagement began with a strategic assessment, including stakeholder interviews, a user experience audit and technical reviews. Deficiencies were identified such as the lack of bulk editing for product information. The pre-existing Grails app and Solr web service were reviewed, and analysis of the existing domain model was conducted.

Cantina determined that it was necessary to adapt the existing technologies to new purposes, making PUMA’s products the focus of the app. Wireframes were developed to model significant changes to the user interface. Once consensus was achieved on new directions and features Cantina began development of the needed technologies.

Results: Game-Changing Infrastructure

The PUMA product management system consists of two parts: the Product Information Manager (PIM) and the Product API. The Product API is used to serve information about PUMA products both internally and to partners. PIM is used for internal management and enrichment of product information which is then pushed out to the Product API for broader consumption by global marketing and ecommerce stakeholders.

PIM and the Product API drive all product information on PUMA.com. This powerful new technology has dramatically improved the way PUMA works:

• Marketing staff can enrich product data autonomously without IT assistance
• Cross-channel promotions are much easier to produce
• Greater flexibility in product presentation enables product-to-microsite targeting
• Unlimited localization of product data
• Regionalized product marketing campaign support
• Full control of how and where products are presented
• Enables seasonal and regional marketing

Cantina’s PIM and Product API development support has continued beyond the initial engagement, including Grails-based feature and functionality enhancements.