Professional
Attribute Fulfillment Service (AFS)
Inaccuracies and gaps in manufacturer marketing content are undermining electrical distributor margins and endangering your brand(s) in the distribution channel. Are you satisfied with wasting money and irritating customers? Of course not. Yet, distributors tell us they are not getting the comprehensive marketing content they need to effectively sell your products and compete.
IDEA's Attribute Fulfillment Service (AFS) is a cost-efficient outsourcing option for manufacturers to populate some or all of their standardized product marketing content into the Industry Data Warehouse (IDW), the electrical-industry approved data synchronization platform. With the launch of the Electrical Attribute Schema 2.0, manufacturers have new opportunities to differentiate their products, and enable distributors to accurately price and knowledgeably sell to end-users.
Key benefits:
- Products are promoted more accurately by distributors
- Products are sold more frequently in the distribution channel
- Products are found more easily through search engines
- You build brand loyalty with distributors while helping them increase profits
While investing time to gather, reformat and enter standardized marketing attributes into the IDW results in significant manufacturer ROI, the challenge for many is to complete this project with existing internal resources. The AFS helps you sell more products from the warehouse to the web by populating the IDW with marketing content in less than half the time and at one-third the price compared to using internal resources.* Ask IDEA to provide your company with an upfront and customized ROI analysis to determine your savings before you commit.
* These savings are typical of previous AFS outsourcing engagements
"Our customers are demanding more product information to make buying decisions. Having standardized attributes will make the whole process from manufacturer to end customer more reliable." Jason Archbold
Marketing Catalog Supervisor
Border States Electric Supply
You control the process -- We work directly with you to ensure the marketing information used meets your company requirements in addition to industry data quality standards. You provide, or authorize, sources for IDEA to obtain your marketing content. We will translate it into a standardized format, keeping you informed throughout the process. Our proven methodology delivers sustainable, high-value results based on electrical industry-approved standards. Once the project is complete, you will have a turnkey process in place to maintain it.
Steps in the AFS process:
- 1. Manufacturer provides IDEA with the authorized data sources to collect marketing attributes for products.
- 2. IDEA collects, validates and organizes the data, then delivers it to the manufacturer in a simple format to review for approval.
- 3. Once the data is approved, IDEA populates the IDW with the marketing attributes using the industry-approved Electrical Attribute Schema.
- 4. Authorized Distributors download the standardized marketing content from the IDW to power their business (e.g. web storefronts, ERP systems, etc.).
"I knew the importance of utilizing the Schema and tried to undertake the project internally at first. However, I quickly realized that this was going to take more resources than were available, so I turned to IDEA for support. The team I'm working with is very responsive and has kept me involved throughout the process. The AFS has proven to be valuable for our company; instead of waiting at least another year to reap the benefits of the Schema, we expect to see results by the end of the summer." Randy Shelley
Product Specialist
ILSCO