There is no one-size-fits-all solution to fast-tracking the path to becoming the leading brand or business in an industry. However, one universal element is essential to getting there: product experience.
Product experience is about more than just high-quality products. It delves into the emotional and practical aspects a customer encounters when buying a product. It involves the entire journey, from the initial discovery to the final decision to purchase, influenced by detailed product descriptions, high-quality images, and the overall presentation. These nuances create a compelling narrative that can significantly impact the buyer's confidence and decision. Product Experience Management (PXM) is pivotal in orchestrating these elements to deliver a cohesive and satisfying experience.
Product Experience Management (PXM) is a method that turns product information into real-time, engaging experiences that meet customer expectations. It transforms PIM systems into engines that deliver personalized, context-sensitive product content using Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) for analysis, personalization, and optimization. This strategy ensures dynamic, targeted communication across all platforms, building an emotional bond with customers by tailoring to their specific needs, locale, and channels.
Why is Product Experience Management (PXM) so important?
The quality of the product experience significantly shapes a customer's view of a brand, impacting their buying decisions and loyalty. This experience affects customer retention rates, product reviews, and word-of-mouth promotion. Research has shown that customers with superior past experiences with a product or brand are likely to spend 140% more than those with negative experiences.
Additionally, consumer choices are abundant due to digitalization. Delivering an exceptional product experience becomes even more critical to standing out from the competition and building a dedicated and loyal customer base. A Salesforce survey of over 6,000 consumers revealed that 66% expect companies to understand their needs and expectations. At the same time, another report cites that 82% anticipate that businesses will accommodate their preferences and meet their expectations. This leaves little room for error in terms of sales, marketing, and customer service strategies.
Advancements in technology, particularly the rise of AI, have significantly heightened customer expectations for personalized experiences. According to the same Salesforce report, 73% of respondents expressed a desire for complete customization, asserting that new technology should facilitate tailored experiences.
As the significance of PXM becomes more apparent, understanding how it fulfills its promise of enhancing product experiences, boosting sales and revenue, fostering customer loyalty, and improving product offerings is just as crucial. It’s essential to recognize the key components that constitute an effective PXM.
What are the key elements of a winning PXM?
The key elements integral to PXM play a significant role in shaping a compelling product experience. Recognizing these components is crucial for improving the customer journey, enhancing engagement and satisfaction, and ultimately contributing to business success.
- Product data management — Product data management is at the core of building a robust product experience, which hinges on effectively gathering, enriching, and disseminating product data in various formats from multiple sources. This process ensures that all product-related content, including descriptions, pricing, and multimedia, is readily available and consistent across online and offline channels. Such consistency streamlines team workflow and fosters customer trust through uniformity in all channels.
- Contextualization — An effective PXM strategy focuses on aligning product information with the unique circumstances of the customer's journey, including location, language, and past interactions. This contextualization is essential for boosting customer satisfaction and loyalty, leading to brand advocacy and customer acquisition. A key element of PXM is having a system that supports this contextualization through seamless integrations, removing obstacles across all channels to deliver a coherent and personalized customer experience.
- Content personalization — McKinsey & Company reports that businesses that excel at personalization generate 40% more revenue than their less adept competitors, particularly in the US. Personalization allows businesses to target customers individually rather than in segments, leveraging various touchpoints for a customized shopping experience. It facilitates product alignment with customer preferences across different channels and regions, enhancing product recommendations and building meaningful customer relationships.
- Real-time customer experience management — A survey conducted by Gartner found that 89% of the participants stated that they intend to compete based on customer experience alone. This goes to show how customer experience is an integral part of product experience management. However, customer experience management alone is no longer enough. It must be relevant, so it needs to be real-time.
- Artificial Intelligence — The AI software market, projected to hit $126 billion by 2025, reflects the growing adoption of AI in various sectors, where it automates and simplifies complex processes and ensures consistent product information quality. Integrating AI with Product Information Management (PIM) systems offers innovative solutions for data onboarding, validation, and normalization, addressing the challenges of managing vast and complex product data.
- Channel-agnostic — PXM equips businesses with a way to centralize product data, ensuring consistency and quality across all platforms, from online to in-store. This drives a seamless shopping experience as managing channel requirements becomes easier with automated workflows for an accelerated process.
While PXM stands out for delivering impactful product experiences, it doesn't operate in isolation; it requires the right software platforms to manage the varied processes and workflows critical to its success. Although PXM is often used interchangeably with Product Information Management (PIM), they are distinct entities with different focuses and functionalities.
What is the difference between PIM and PXM?
Product Experience Management begins with PIM
The journey to PXM begins with consolidating fragmented data sources, formats, and structures for cohesive and efficient data handling and ultimately creating a single source of product truth. A PIM system is the solution to carry out this massive task of managing product information and making it available in the right format across all channels. However, PIM alone does not guarantee the delivery of an impactful and positive product experience. Providing emotionally charged interactions is only feasible when there is a mechanism for customers to communicate their desires and preferences to the company. And this is where PXM comes in.
