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Universal Components became a Plytix client in 2024. The largest truck and trailer parts distribution company in the UK, the B2B business supplies vehicle parts to garages and mechanics globally.
Universal Components is known for its massive product catalog, so we caught up with Daniel Dixon, their Marketing Manager, to see how Plytix helps them keep it all under control from a marketing perspective.
Before Plytix, it took Daniel a year to put together a product catalog
“We used to manage our product information through a combination of our Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system, spreadsheets, and printed catalogs.”, Dan told us. “But an ERP system is not a place to keep product information. We could only add 3 or 4 attributes per product and no more than 30 characters per attribute, which wasn’t nearly enough. We needed far more detailed information to sell our products,” he explained.
“Plus, our product categories all have really different features and attributes. For example, if you present a list of brake discs to a customer, they need to see a cross-reference number, size, and vehicle application. But for lighting, it’s the vehicle, connector type, plug, and voltage, so the two categories need completely different data,” Dan said.
“Because this data couldn’t all be stored in the ERP, we used files and spreadsheets to store the extra information we needed.” But that led to duplicated or missing information, which was especially problematic when it came to putting together their product catalog.
“Every 5 years, we would make a new product catalog,” Dan told us. “It would have upwards of 16,000 products and 1000 pages. To make it, we pulled a product list from their ERP, then enriched it in spreadsheets with the extra attributes and images. It took 2 of us, working all day every day for 12 months, to pull together the product information,” Dan told us. “And we only had the bandwidth to fix mistakes in the catalog design itself, not in our ERP, spreadsheets, or website as well. That meant our catalog would be our most up-to-date source of information.”
But even so, the catalog still had errors. “Many errors,” Dan admitted. “We’d note them in pen in the margin of our copy of the catalog, but that’s hardly a sustainable way to manage product information.” And as their product list was constantly shifting, the moment the catalog was printed, it was already out of date.
Universal Components has halved its time to market since adopting Plytix
“From placing an order to being able to sell our products, which could take as much as a couple of months in the past, we now do it in a few days,” Dan explained. “We’re able to have all the product information in Plytix and ready to add to our website or catalog before the product has even landed in the warehouse.”
“Getting our products to market has gone from months to days.”
“Building product catalogs has also become something we can do in a matter of days with Brand Portals.” Plytix Brand Portals are branded digital product catalogs that autofill with product information from your Plytix account.
“All I have to do is put together a list of the products I want to include in the catalog in Plytix,” Dan explained. “Then I build out the catalog with our branding and the right attributes for the products we’re sharing and send it over to any stakeholders who need to fact-check it. If there are any updates needed to the data, the teams just make the change in Plytix, and the catalog updates straight away.”
That means that not only are their catalogs always up-to-date, but unlike previously, where their ERP and spreadsheets might still contain outdated product information, making the change in Plytix means their central source of truth is up-to-date, and their sales channels will automatically update, too.
Choosing the right PIM system
“I’m a firm believer that one piece of software should specialize in one area,” Dan told us. “And the core of every business should be data. Your data should drive your ERP, your orders, your sales channels like Amazon, and your website. That’s why we started looking for a PIM.”
What they liked about Plytix was the level of personalization. “The team’s always happy to help out with a bespoke solution. Every time I’ve rung up, everyone’s just been really happy and pleased to talk to you,” he told us. “What I’ve learned is that even if what you need isn’t right there in front of you, there's always a way to get that data you need into the system or compute it so it’s formatted exactly the way you want.”
Dan’s take: The best thing about Plytix
“The best thing about Plytix? We can finally trust our product information,” Dan told us. “That means jobs like updating our catalogs are much easier for me.”
But it’s also had knock-on effects beyond just the marketing team. “If anyone had technical questions before, they had to ask around their colleagues or literally run down to the warehouse to check. Now they can just have a quick look in Plytix. That’s great for the sales team and great for onboarding new employees, too.”
Universal Components results with Plytix
- 2x faster time to market
- Dan can create a product catalog in days that took 12 months to build before
- Data errors have been hugely reduced
- A central source of truth for their product information
