ROBUS LED Group Case Study - Channel Studios

ROBUS, LED Group

Global lighting company ROBUS is known worldwide for its energy-efficient commercial and residential lighting solutions.

Supported by world-class customer service in more than 40 countries, a 100,000 sq. ft. head office and distribution centre in Dublin, plus distribution and offices across the UK, Australia, China, France, Benelux, South Africa, New Zealand and the Middle East – ROBUS services more than 3,000 stockists and tens of thousands of installers.

The Challenge

Not having an effective Product Information Management system was inhibiting ROBUS from maximising the performance of its most valuable resources – people, time and money.

An ever-growing number of lighting products and accessories was leading to an increasing amount of information (technical, marketing, regulatory) associated with each product variation. As a result, continuing to rely largely on manual processes to manage and distribute this product information – across multiple channels, countries and languages – was becoming arduous. It had become clear that a more automated and scalable approach was needed.

Additionally, ROBUS required a process to simplify the production of catalogues and various other forms of marketing material in multiple versions and languages, with different product ranges for different countries.

The Solution

It was essential that the right PIM system for ROBUS would:

Reduce the time taken to produce and distribute product information to customers, sales, regulators and industry partners.
Easily manage and report on product information in the industry standard format (ETIM).
Remove unnecessary replication and provide a single source of truth for product information.
Enable customers and employees to access product information easily and quickly, in a self-service manner.
Enable suppliers to onboard product information.
Automate the production of product sheets and catalogues in different languages.
Collect and manage product information without burdening the SAP Business One ERP application.
Ensure that implementation across the business would take place in an efficient and controlled manner.

Robus lighting catalogue pages on a computer screen

The Implementation

Following a thorough needs analysis, our product information management partner, Proplanet, delivered a fully working PIM solution to the goals and requirements set out by ROBUS.

Specific to the electro-technical sector for manufacturers and distributors, Proplanet has had many years of experience working with the ETIM classification, which is considerable, being co-founders of ETIM themselves.

This included all necessary integrations between the PIM solution, SAP B1, eCommerce site, CMS, ETIM, EDA, EPREL, ReluxNet, LUCKINSlive, FAB-DIS and DIALux.

Subsequently, Channel Studios was able to implement an efficient catalogue publishing solution, allowing ROBUS to enhance its product marketing activity.

This has been achieved via the ‘AutoPub’ module of the Proplanet PIM, which enables the central creation and management of product categories in web shops, online publications and printed catalogues.

Changes made in Proplanet PIM are immediately reflected in ‘AutoPub’, therefore product information on marketing collateral is always up-to-date and consistent.

Channel Studios worked closely with the internal team at ROBUS to create page templates that suited the relevant product range requirements, enabling them to automatically populate these pages with product images, descriptions, specifications and pricing. Varying page templates for different countries allowed for changes to product range and content by locality.

The pagination solution has provided ROBUS with the functionality to efficiently produce catalogue product pages directly from their central data source, whilst maintaining the flexibility to make changes to those pages via InDesign.

The Results

ROBUS is now equipped with a full end-to-end publishing operation, with Proplanet PIM being its central source of truth for data and media.

Proplanet PIM is feeding data to multiple ROBUS websites, in addition to the artwork for the full range of printed and digital catalogues.

ROBUS is now able to publish its marketing material quickly and easily for various product ranges in multiple languages with the confidence that all content is consistent and accurate.

In year one, ROBUS outsourced its catalogue page production to Channel Studios to alleviate internal workloads during a time-sensitive period. This solution was so successful that ROBUS continues to use Channel Studios for production of its catalogue product pages, while its internal design team focuses on non-product pages.