Digital shelf analytics: DSA benefits include real-time insights, better CX

In modern B2B and B2C commerce, the importance of your digital shelf can’t be overstated as it directly impacts the customer experience.

From your website to marketplaces, third-party resellers, and social channels, your digital shelf is more than just an online storefront. It’s a portal that showcases the soul of your brand and invites would-be customers into a world curated to captivate their imagination and ignite desire for your product.

At least, that’s how it’s supposed to be.

Unfortunately, many digital shelves end up in a chaotic mess with incomplete product listings, missing critical product details, or distorted visuals. All this adds up to potential customers feeling confused, frustrated, and unlikely to hit that buy button.

Enter digital shelf analytics.

What is digital shelf analytics?

Digital shelf analytics (DSA) uses smart automation to constantly monitor products across the multiple online touchpoints that make up the digital shelf, providing real-time insight for brands and manufacturers.

DSA delivers essential data about buyer behavior, product performance, and channel competition. The technology relieves companies of the burden of monitoring multiple touchpoints and gives them a heads up on problems so they can take action to ensure a consistent customer experience.

For example, DSA can alert a brand about issues with product listings such as a missing image or incorrect text. This closed-loop feedback ensures product detail pages are always optimized for customers, the brand, and the channel.

Going beyond syndication tech for real optimization

Digital shelf analytics works with product information management (PIM) product data syndication (PDS) technology to provide a complete solution for delivering an optimal digital storefront.

A PIM solution establishes a single, verified data source for product information —a reliable, structured framework from which PDS can draw.

Product data syndication extracts this enriched data from the PIM system and distributes it to various endpoints like marketplaces, retail sites, ecommerce sites, virtual showrooms, dealers, and social media. This ensures the right information reaches the right destination.

Together, PDS works with PIM to streamline the process of data management and distribution.

However, even with syndication capabilities, distributing product data to various endpoints can be sub-optimized since these various endpoints govern how the product data that’s been syndicated to them is ultimately displayed. This causes an enterprise to assign resources and continually monitor these endpoints to protect their brand, which is costly and inefficient.

DSA helps brands evaluate and validate how product data is displayed. This ensures customers have a positive experience, increasing the likelihood they’ll buy.

What is PIM: Product information management definition, types, benefits

PIM ensures that product information is accurate, useful, and engaging. Here's everything you need to know about this core CX technology.

5 benefits of DSA technology

If you’re syndicating product data to various endpoints and selling online without digital shelf analytics, you’re flying blind.

Benefits of DSA include:

1. Visibility: Syndicating product information to various online channels is crucial for reaching a wider audience. However, without DSA, it’s hard to track and measure the performance of product listings. Analytics provides valuable insights into how products are performing across different channels, allowing retailers to make data-driven decisions to improve visibility and reach.
2. Complete, accurate information: Syndicating product information ensures that accurate and comprehensive data is provided to online channels. DSA goes a step further by spotting any missing or incorrect data in product listings, making sure customers receive consistent and reliable information.
3. Content optimization: Analytics provide valuable insights into how customers engage with product content, helping retailers optimize descriptions, images, and other attributes to enhance the overall customer experience.
4. Monitor competitors: Digital shelf analytics gives retailers the ability to monitor and compare their product listings, pricing, or promotions with competitors. Analytics provides competitive insights and helps retailers make informed decisions to stay ahead in the market.
5. Timely updates: Analytics enables real-time monitoring, providing alerts and notifications to retailers, so they can update and maintain accurate product information in a timely manner.

Without these analytics, syndication may fall short of its full potential and not yield what every brands wants: better product visibility, improved customer engagement, and more sales.