#Who does what?

#Macro overview

Akeneo PIM provides a single place to collect, manage, and enrich product information, create a product catalog, and distribute it to the syndication solution.

In the context of a "PIM/syndication" architecture, the PIM becomes the Reference of marketing product information.

#Akeneo PIM and ERP solution...

As seen previously, Akeneo PIM is therefore the source for product information... but what data are we talking about?

#Does Akeneo PIM have all product information needed for the syndication solution?

The answer is NO (most of the time) because Akeneo PIM should only manage "cold" product information. It means that Akeneo PIM only owns marketing product information that needs to be checked, organized, enriched. And “cold” product information means that this information does not change every day.

Concerning “hot product information” (i.e. product information that changes frequently: prices or stock), this information should be directly transmitted to the syndication solution without passing through Akeneo PIM. “Hot product information” flow should go directly from the ERP to the syndication solution (It’s the ERP's responsibility to deliver this information. Again: a PIM only manages “cold” Marketing product information).

For price information, Akeneo PIM has the capability of storing product price information, but only for a “reference” price and not an “up-to-date” price. This “reference” price is for information purposes only for the teams managing Akeneo PIM (Julia) and should never be mapped to the syndication solution price displayed in marketplaces.

#Akeneo PIM and DAM

Akeneo PIM manages product-related media.

Since the 4.0 version , Akeneo also facilitates the connection with a DAM software thanks to its new asset management system.

There are different 2 ways to manage media with the PIM:

• Akeneo PIM without a DAM

Akeneo PIM manages product media internally (with some specific media attributes or its asset manager). Media binaries are then stored directly into the PIM.

• Akeneo PIM with a DAM

The DAM solution transfers its data to the PIM (media asset URL and its metadata) and the PIM is then responsible for linking products to media assets.

Instead of binaries stored in the PIM method, the use of media URLs (and therefore the use of a DAM/CDN in addition to a PIM is undoubtedly the best solution to manage product images and allow them to be transferred into the syndication solution in a smooth and optimized way as URL information.

#Conclusions

In conclusion, in relation to what has been said above, it is, therefore, necessary to consider the following possible architectures which may lead to completely different PIM catalog models:

#Architecture ERP / PIM / Syndication solution

#Architecture ERP / DAM / PIM / Syndication solution

Of course these are only basic PIM architectures: some clients may have multiple data sources or destinations making the data workflow managed by your App more complex… However, for asset media management, we suggest that you focus on these 2 typical architectures that we believe are the most used by our clients.