A comprehensive, web-based solution for product portfolio management is essential for meeting consumer demand in today’s fast-paced retail environment. After identification of emerging trends, the key challenge for manufacturers is to deliver the right products in time to satisfy consumer demand without compromising product quality or profitability. An automated, real-time platform for tracking and sharing product merchandising and line planning data provides a foundation for the informed yet agile decision-making required for success in today’s retail space.
What are the most significant benefits of implementing an online solution for product portfolio management?
Online product portfolio management tools provide flexible views of pertinent design, development, and production data across the full spectrum of your company’s new and existing products. These ad hoc data views facilitate fact-based decisions regarding which products should move forward and which products should be eliminated.- An online product portfolio management platform brings all your product data together in one place, providing a Single Source of Truth (SSOT) and guaranteeing that all stakeholders have access to the same, up-to-date information at all times.
- Product innovation and development become more visible when product portfolio management is brought online. Greater visibility raises awareness of product development costs and resource allocations; equally important, it encourages collaboration among product development teams and suppliers during all phases of product design and materials sourcing. Ultimately, increased visibility fosters communication efficiencies that lead to improvements in product development performance and net reductions in cycle times.
Merchandising and line planning efforts become more collaborative, streamlined, and efficient through implementation of an online product portfolio management solution.
When fully integrated, online product portfolio management offers support across all aspects of product planning and development. A few examples of key activities include:
- Optimizing the product mix for upcoming selling seasons based on current and forecasted market trends as well as past product performance
- Setting targets for selling prices, production costs, and margin
- Tracking design specifications for multiple products that will eventually be included in or dropped from each line
- Tracking product measurements, materials, colors, construction, etc.
- Making late additions, drops, and revisions to the line in response to changing market needs
- Tracking costs across all products and all distribution channels
An online product portfolio management solution enables your merchandising and line planning teams to work together more effectively to deliver in-demand products on time and within budget. How? By promoting multi-level sharing of product design specifications, a collaborative review and revision process, and the use of objective decision criteria for product approvals.
Do you need an online product portfolio management solution? The answer is an unequivocal YES!
Here’s why:
- To encourage and facilitate collaboration among all stakeholders
- To maximize your return on investments in new product development
- To respond to market trends on a timely basis
- To allocate product development resources most effectively
- To increase the visibility of product development costs and progress
- To record and share product design specifications
- To track and communicate product design changes in real time
- To inform decisions on product inclusion or elimination
- To maintain your competitive edge
Online product portfolio management is an integral part of an effective Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) system. To learn how your company’s product development requirements align with PLM, download our whitepaper that explains the twelve most important considerations for selecting a PLM system.
