Introduction of Sepia Alterra PIM at Rudolf Müller Media Group

About Rudolf Müller media group

The Rudolf Müller media group, seated in Cologne, Germany, is a specialist publisher focusing on the areas of architecture and the construction business. For their daily business, the publishers make use of various forms of conveying information, from classical print media such as magazines and books, to electronic online and offline media, to seminars and training programs.

Background

The Rudolf Müller media group was looking for a data storage solution for their broad product portfolio. After a selection process, the publishers' solution of choice was Sepia Alterra PIM.

Project objectives

On the background of the broad portfolio, the sought-after software solution should be able to cope with the resulting requirements for a modern product database. 
What was actually needed was a solution that was able to provide the data of all products in a media-neutral way and – because of the constantly updated and expanding information – was easy to maintain and flexible enough to be expanded. 
In addition to these requirements, a decisive criterion was in particular the solution's ability to provide the product data for different purposes. It should, for instance, be possible to use the product data for the automatic creation of print catalogs and sales records and, at the same time, for the delivery of content for websites and e-shops.
Sepia Alterra PIM met these requirements. Thanks to a graphical user interface (GUI) that is in line with popular operating systems and can be used via a web browser, it offers intuitive operation and is accessible to users without the need for time-consuming familiarization with the system. Additionally, the system can be maintained and data retrieved from any place via online access. 

Implementation

Once the necessary authorization groups, on the one hand, and the desired product categories and hierarchies as well as the product attributes, on the other, have been established in cooperation with the team of Sepia, Sepia Alterra PIM can not only be easily maintained by the competent departments, but is also able to provide data in the required format:

• XML or HTML for online applications;
• office formats such as Word, Excel, PowerPoint, OpenOffice;
• PDF for advertising media;
• for further use with layout programs such as InDesign;
• for websites and shop systems.

 

Connection to Magento and Typo3

The special focus of the publishing house was on the integration of the data maintained in Alterra PIM with the webshop www.baufachmedien.de that was launched in parallel with the PIM project; the order processing of the shop was implemented via the open-source shop system Magento.  Technically, the data transfer between Alterra PIM and the Magento shop has been implemented via the PIM-to-MAGENTO plug-in. 

 

The website www.baufachmedien.de with product data provided by Sepia Alterra

In addition, product data is also provided to the website www.immobilienmanager.de that has been built with TYPO3.

Flexibility in adapting the software

Besides these features for the management of product data and the output of this data for information, presentation or advertising purposes, the flexible structure of Sepia Alterra PIM also allows to map workflows. The structure of the data management system enables the adaptation of workflows without the hassle of customizing.
Rudolf Müller media group successfully use this possibility to optimize internal processes. Sepia Alterra PIM contributes to the consolidation of data storage and enables the centralized management of all data of both already published products and products that are still in the pipeline; data can be continuously kept up to date and provided in the required form. 

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