Did you know that you can automate the creation of your catalog in significantly less time, with real-time product updates, and without spending weeks or months on endless processes? Automating your catalog production not only saves time but also minimizes manual errors and boosts your team’s efficiency.
If you’re reading this, chances are you’re once again faced with the tedious task of manually laying out a new product catalog.. We understand what that entails: from entering technical data by hand to verifying images and validating prices. Each of these repetitive tasks consumes valuable time—both yours and your team’s, who spend countless hours ensuring that information is accurate and up to date. With automation, you can streamline these processes, reduce errors, and free up your team for more productive work.
The manual approach creates what we call “hidden costs“: all the hours that product managers and sales teams spend creating each version of the catalog are hours that could be dedicated to more strategic, higher-value tasks for the company. These hidden costs aren’t always apparent, but they have a direct impact on productivity and resources.
Each new catalog version demands a significant investment of time and money. The most concerning part is that these manual processes, repeated in each iteration, aren’t just tedious—they could be far more efficient if automated. By reducing these costs and improving accuracy, your company can focus on what really matters: growth and innovation.
For all these reasons, automation becomes essential in your company if you face one or more of the following challenges:
- When the number of published products is very high: If your catalog contains hundreds or thousands of products, automating the production process becomes essential for managing large volumes of information efficiently and error-free.
- If you need to update prices and information frequently: When prices, descriptions, or images change regularly, automation allows you to implement updates quickly, without the need to manually redesign part or all of the catalog.
- When it is necessary to produce different versions for specific markets and/or languages: If your company operates in various regions or countries and you need to adapt the catalog for different languages or markets, automation simplifies the creation and customization of each version while maintaining design and data consistency.
- When the manual process consumes excessive time and resources: If your team spends countless hours on repetitive tasks such as data entry, design tweaks, or information verification, automation optimizes time and resources, helping to avoid “hidden costs.”
- If recurring errors appear in printed and/or digital versions: Automation greatly reduces the risk of errors such as incorrect data, misplaced images, or outdated information, enhancing the quality and accuracy of every catalog version.
The ideal solution for optimizing catalog production is to automate the layout process. Automation not only drastically reduces the time required for each new version but also minimizes, and even eliminates, the errors common in manual data entry. This saves time while ensuring greater accuracy and consistency with every update.
In this article, you’ll discover the essential steps to successfully implement catalog automation.
Table of Contents
- Strategies for optimizing catalog production
- Inputting catalog information: a critical step in catalog production
- Using a PIM for effective product information management
- Using a database for product information management: CloudDB
- Optimizing data export across multiple channels for efficient catalog production
- Advanced automation: template and module creation with EasyCatalog for InDesign
- Data import and automated pagination
- Final adjustments and artwork creation
1. Strategies for optimizing catalog production
To automate your catalog effectively, you need to meet two fundamental requirements: first, a high-quality data source that contains all the necessary information; and second, an automation tool that seamlessly integrates this data with your InDesign document. At Nousmedis, we use the EasyCatalog plug-in to achieve this integration efficiently and with agility.
EasyCatalog enables real-time synchronization between your data and the final InDesign document, streamlining the catalog creation process. Once the connection is established, custom modules and templates can be programmed to generate multiple catalog versions automatically.
With this approach, you not only save time but also guarantee that every version of your catalog retains consistent and accurate data.
2. Inputting catalog information: a critical step in catalog production
The cornerstone of any catalog is the product information. In fact, the quality of your catalog depends directly on the completeness and accuracy of the data you provide for each product..
Each item in your catalog—whether it’s an appliance, a toy, a piece of clothing, or furniture—should include, at a minimum, the following details:
- Reference number
- Product name
- Description
- One or more product images
- List of features
- Property icons
- Retail price
- Additional information, such as technical specifications, accessories, etc.
If your company uses an ERP or a centralized database, such as SAP, Navision, Oracle, or similar, you may already have much of this information available. However, these systems typically focus on managing only transactional data: the minimum information needed to handle stock, purchasing, sales, and product marketing.
Additional data—such as high-resolution images, technical specifications, property icons, detailed descriptions, or language versions—are often managed manually using spreadsheets (like Excel), Word documents, or even directly within the catalog layout in Adobe InDesign.
Our recommendation: to automate a complex catalog with multiple categories, product images, tables, and property icons, use a specialized tool for managing and maintaining product data, known as a Product Information Management (PIM) system.
3. Using a PIM for effective product information management
A PIM is software designed specifically for managing product information—such as names, references, descriptions, and prices—along with the additional files that complement each product: images, logos, diagrams, and tables. It enables you to automatically import all product data at regular intervals (hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly) and, most importantly, ensures that everything is efficiently organized from the start.
Utilizing a PIM has become essential for marketing departments, as it facilitates the organization, classification, and management of product information, ensuring the quality and consistency required for catalog automation. From a technical standpoint, a PIM helps extract, harmonize, and propagate data. Functionally, it supports the classification, enrichment, and translation of product information.
A PIM manages:
- Marketing information (descriptions, tags, images, multimedia content…).
- User information (comments, product ratings).
- Technical information (measurements, composition, identifiers, technical drawings).
- Sales prices, discounts, prices by country.
- Logistical information.
- Product classification.
Nousmedis offers consulting, implementation and support for Sales Layer, a SaaS PIM that resides in the cloud and allows immediate implementation.
Sales Layer, the PIM in the cloud that revolutionizes product management
Sales Layer is a powerful and user-friendly PIM (Product Information Management) solution designed to deliver a seamless experience. Hosted in the cloud on the reliable Amazon Web Services (AWS) infrastructure, it is offered as a monthly subscription service. With just a web browser, you can easily access comprehensive management of your product information.
This PIM enables you to create multiple customized forms for each product family and provides a diverse range of field types, including text, numbers, value lists, long descriptions, images, files, and Boolean fields (Yes/No), among others. All features are designed to help you manage your product data efficiently and accurately.
Unlimited integration and flexibility
With Sales Layer, importing and exporting data is incredibly straightforward, thanks to the numerous pre-integrated channels. A channel essentially serves as an export format.
These channels are fully customizable, allowing the platform to adapt to any type of company and workflow. Additionally, Sales Layer features a comprehensive formula language akin to that found in spreadsheet applications like MS Excel, making customization even more intuitive.
Total security and control with Time Layer
With Time Layer, Sales Layer’s automatic backup system, your data is always secure. This system enables you to restore information to any previous point in time, allowing you to recover the original state of your data in case of major errors or incorrect modifications to product references.
Sales Layer: Continuous innovation
With Sales Layer, you gain access to a platform that is constantly evolving. Thanks to its subscription model, you will receive regular updates driven by the feedback and suggestions from a large user community. This ensures that the tool continually improves, adapting to the ever-changing needs of the market and its users.
4. Using a database for product information management: CloudDB
In some companies, a key consideration in managing product information is whether to implement a custom solution based on a database like CloudDB or to utilize a specialized tool such as the PIM Sales Layer. Both options offer distinct advantages, and the choice largely depends on the specific data requirements and needs of your business.
A custom solution based on CloudDB may be more suitable in certain scenarios, particularly when dealing with a high volume of products and more technical data. Although CloudDB does not come with the advanced functionalities of a PIM like Sales Layer, its flexibility enables our specialists to configure a tailored solution that meets your business’s unique needs. This option may be ideal if precise control over data structure and processes is required, albeit without the self-management features provided by Sales Layer.
Using a tool like CloudDB is akin to working with traditional databases such as Microsoft Access or FileMaker. Similar to these platforms, CloudDB allows you to structure and manage data in a customized manner, enabling users to define tables, relationships, and queries according to specific project requirements. Additionally, CloudDB’s cloud hosting provides significant advantages in terms of accessibility and collaboration. Data can be accessed from any location and device with an internet connection, facilitating remote access and real-time collaborative work. Moreover, it alleviates concerns about physical infrastructure, as the storage and management of the database occur on external servers, ensuring enhanced security and automatic backups.
Working with CloudDB feels familiar, allowing you to leverage the flexibility of the cloud for scalability, increased storage capacity, and a more modern, accessible working environment.
On the other hand, Sales Layer is a user-friendly platform specifically designed for product information management (PIM). It provides a wide range of tools that not only simplify the organization of information but also enhance data quality. Additionally, its robust capability to manage graphic files supports a greater variety of formats and larger storage capacities. Sales Layer also excels in its ability to automatically convert files into different formats, facilitating their use across various platforms and sales channels without requiring external intervention.
In summary, while Sales Layer is a comprehensive and powerful solution for product information management, CloudDB offers enhanced customization capabilities for more specialized needs. The right choice ultimately depends on the type of data being handled and the technical resources available.
5. Optimizing data export across multiple channels for efficient catalog production
After your product information is fully complete, validated, and paired with the relevant graphic resources (product images, environment photos, detail illustrations, logos, icons, etc.), the next step in catalog production is exporting this data in the correct format for use across multiple platforms or applications. Each format is referred to as a “channel.” For instance, if you want to display the product data from your information management system on both your website and a physical catalog, you’ll need to create two separate channels: one for the website and one for the catalog.
If your catalog production involves generating print catalogs in multiple languages, you’ll need to create a unique channel for each language, or configure a channel that exports data in multiple languages simultaneously.
Thus, the next critical step in automating catalog production is developing a channel that can export all necessary product fields for publication, as well as the required structure to accurately replicate the catalog.
5.1. Exporting product fields for catalog production
In this step, you’ll configure the channel to select the specific fields needed for catalog production. There are three main types of fields involved:
- Product-specific fields: These include fields like “image,” “logo,” “name,” “description,” and “reference.” The content of these fields is unique to each product and will be directly printed in the catalog.
- Structural fields: Fields such as “category,” “family,” “section,” and “collection” fall under this category. For instance, a cooking pot may belong to the “kitchenware” category within the “kitchen” family. These fields classify the product, impacting both the order of appearance in the catalog and possibly the design itself. Typically, structural field content is displayed as headers or section-opening pages in the catalog.
- Layout and appearance fields: These fields dictate catalog-specific meta-information, such as “offer,” “page number,” “order,” and “new.” These don’t get printed directly but instead control how the product appears in the catalog. Adjusting these fields affects the final layout, providing critical instructions for the catalog automation process.
PIM (Product Information Management) tools, such as Sales Layer, come equipped with dozens of pre-built channels that simplify catalog production by seamlessly exporting data to various platforms. These channels can connect your PIM system to major online marketplaces like Amazon or Mercado Libre, as well as content management systems like WordPress, e-commerce applications, such as Prestashop or Magento, or in our case, directly with InDesign through the EasyCatalog plug-in. By utilizing these PIM capabilities, you can streamline catalog production across digital and print formats.
With CloudDB, you can streamline catalog production by utilizing both the API and external data integration and transformation tools—such as SyncWall—to import and export data in a structured, controlled, and unattended manner. This ensures smooth data management throughout the catalog production process.
5.2. Exporting the catalog structure: categories
Since the designer is not usually directly involved in the creation and layout process of an automated catalog -at least not in the information dumping phase-, it is necessary to indicate in an infallible way the exact order in which the products must appear in the catalog, as well as their classification. For this purpose, a specific channel is usually used to export exclusively the classification of the products and the relationship between each of the sections.
In automated catalog production, designers are often not directly involved in the initial data layout and information transfer phase. To ensure the correct order and classification of products within the catalog, it’s essential to provide the exact and infallible order in which the products must appear in the catalog, as well as their classification. This is typically done through a dedicated channel that exports the product classifications and defines the relationship between sections.
For instance, in a toy catalog, a remote-controlled car might fall under the hierarchy: “Battery-powered toys > Cars > Remote-controlled cars.” Alternatively, classification by age could be used: “Over 10 years old > Cars > Remote-controlled cars.” The highest-level categories are referred to as “parent categories,” while the more specific ones are “child categories.” This categorization ensures proper product placement and a logical flow in the catalog production process.
In many catalogs, a product may appear in multiple sections. For example, a lamp accessory might be compatible with various lamp models within the same catalog. In these cases, it’s crucial that the catalog structure allows a single product, such as a fixture, to appear in more than one section simultaneously. A PIM system like Sales Layer or a database like CloudDB simplifies managing product classifications by generating unique identifiers for each product based on its classification, which is far more efficient than using spreadsheets like MS Excel.
For now, we’ll leave it here. There’s still much more to cover in the automation of catalog production processes, including advanced template automation, data dumps, and the correction process.
Visit and read part two of this post, where we’ll dive deeper into these topics.
If you’re interested in learning more about automating catalog production processes or have any questions, feel free to contact us or share your thoughts in the comments below!