This explainer is for Australian ecommerce, merchandising and IT leads who keep hearing "you need a PIM" and want to know what that means before anyone books a demo. It covers what a PIM does, how it connects to your ERP and ecommerce platform, how it differs from MDM and DAM, the main platforms, what drives the cost, and the signs you need one.
What does a PIM actually do?
A PIM does five jobs that spreadsheets and ERPs do badly.
- It holds one record per product. Every SKU, its variants (size, colour, pack size), and its relationships (accessories, spare parts, bundles) live in one place, with one owner.
- It gives each product family its own data model. A cordless drill needs voltage, battery type and chuck size. A jacket needs size, colour, fabric and care instructions. A PIM lets you define the attributes each family must have, so nobody fills in "voltage" for a jacket or forgets it for a drill.
- It runs the enrichment workflow. Raw data arrives from suppliers or the ERP. Copywriters add descriptions, translators localise them, merchandisers attach images, and someone approves the result. The PIM tracks who does what and shows a completeness score per channel, so you know a product is ready for the website but not yet for the marketplace.
- It publishes to each channel in that channel's format. Every channel wants something different. Google's Merchant Center product data specification, for example, requires an ID, a title of up to 150 characters, a description of up to 5,000 characters, a landing page link, an image link, availability, price and brand, and it disapproves products whose GTIN fails GS1's checksum rules. A PIM stores the data once and produces each feed from it.
- It governs the data. Validation rules stop a product going live without a weight or an allergen statement, and an audit trail shows who changed a claim and when.
How does a PIM fit with your ERP, ecommerce platform and DAM?
A PIM sits in the middle of the product data flow, between the systems that create products and the channels that sell them:
- The ERP creates the SKU and stays the owner of operational data: cost, price, stock, supplier and logistics details.
- The PIM receives the new SKU and becomes the owner of everything a customer reads: names, descriptions, specifications, marketing copy, translations and relationships.
- The DAM holds the files (photos, videos, spec sheets, brand assets), and the PIM links each product to its approved assets rather than storing copies.
- The channels receive the result: your ecommerce platform, marketplaces, retailer portals, print catalogues and the product pages your sales team sends.
Getting those boundaries right matters more than the software. If price lives in two places, it will be wrong in one of them. Our guide to enterprise systems integration covers how to decide which system owns which record, and our piece on agentic AI in PIM integration looks at how AI agents now help keep these flows in sync.
PIM vs MDM vs DAM: what's the difference?
The three get confused because they all manage "master" information. They own different things.
| PIM | MDM | DAM | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Owns | Product content needed to sell: attributes, copy, specifications, relationships | The single "golden record" for core business entities: customers, suppliers, locations and products | Files: images, video, documents, brand assets |
| Main users | Ecommerce, merchandising, marketing | Data, finance and operations teams | Marketing, creative and brand teams |
| Main question it answers | "Is this product ready to sell on this channel?" | "Which record is the true one across the business?" | "Where is the approved version of this asset?" |
The lines are blurring. A summary of Gartner's 2025 Market Guide for PIM solutions notes that PIM products are adding product experience management (PXM) features, such as digital shelf analytics and AI-generated content, and that the distinctions between PIM, MDM and PXM are fading. In practice, most mid-market businesses start with a PIM and a DAM, and add MDM only when customer and supplier data also need a single owner. Our DAM services cover the asset side; for a global retailer we migrated 300,000 assets (2 TB) into an enterprise DAM (case study).
What is a PIM used for? Five examples
- Supplying the big Australian grocers. Coles uses supplier data from GS1 Australia's National Product Catalogue and checks it for issues with net content, net weights, temperature, dangerous goods, Health Star Rating and diet type, according to GS1 Australia. Products published to Coles also need on-pack information for ecommerce, including ingredients, allergens, the nutrition panel, warning statements and country of origin. A PIM holds those attributes once, validates them, and feeds the catalogue.
- Launching on marketplaces. Amazon, eBay and Google Shopping each have their own attribute names, limits and category rules. A PIM maps one record to each format instead of someone rebuilding listings by hand.
- Running a B2B catalogue. A manufacturer or distributor with thousands of parts, technical specifications and compatibility rules can publish the same data to a dealer portal, a print catalogue and an ecommerce site.
- Selling in more than one market. Brands selling into New Zealand or Asia manage translations, local units and market-specific claims per locale, without forking the product record.
- Feeding AI tools. AI that writes product descriptions or answers shoppers' questions is only as accurate as the attributes behind it. A PIM gives those tools a structured, approved source instead of whatever is on the website.
Which PIM platforms are there?
The market splits into dedicated PIM platforms and PIM features inside larger suites. Commonly shortlisted dedicated platforms include Akeneo, Salsify, Informatica (now part of Salesforce), inRiver, Stibo Systems, Syndigo, Bluestone PIM and Pimcore. Ecommerce platforms also have basic product management built in, which is enough for a small catalogue on one channel.
Licensing models differ more than feature lists. Two examples:
- Pimcore's Community Edition moved from the GPL to the Pimcore Open Core License from version 2025.1, and is free until your revenue reaches EUR 5 million, according to Pimcore.
- Akeneo's free Community Edition remains supported, while support for its version 7 on-premise and PaaS editions ended on 30 September 2026, according to Akeneo's help centre. Its main commercial editions are cloud subscriptions sold on quotes.
Great Minds is an Akeneo partner. We'd still start any selection with your data model and channels, not a vendor.
What does a PIM cost in Australia?
Most commercial PIM vendors don't publish prices; they quote based on the number of products, channels, locales and users. The total cost has three parts:
- Licence. Usually an annual subscription. Ask whether price steps up with SKU count, channels or locales, since those grow fastest.
- Implementation. Designing the data model, cleansing and migrating existing data, and building integrations to your ERP, ecommerce platform, DAM and channels. This is often the largest part of the first-year cost, and the integrations are where projects slip.
- Data stewardship. Someone has to own product data after go-live. A PIM makes that work faster; it doesn't remove it.
Three checks specific to Australia:
- Where the data is hosted. Ask SaaS vendors which region your instance runs in and where backups and support access sit, especially if product data includes regulated claims.
- GS1 identifiers. If you sell through retailers or Google Shopping, your GTINs must be valid GS1 numbers. Make the GTIN a required, validated attribute in the PIM from day one.
- Retailer feeds. If you supply grocery or liquor retailers, confirm the PIM can export to GS1 Australia's National Product Catalogue, directly or through a connector.
When do you need a PIM?
You probably need one if three or more of these are true:
- You sell through three or more channels, or plan to.
- Product data is maintained in spreadsheets that are emailed between teams.
- Launching a new product takes longer to get online than to get into the warehouse.
- Retailers or marketplaces reject listings for missing or wrong data.
- The same product has different specifications on different sites.
- You translate or localise product content for other markets.
You probably don't need one yet if you sell a small catalogue on one website and your ecommerce platform's product editor keeps up. Start by naming an owner for each attribute and cleaning the data you have; that work carries straight into a PIM later.
If you're weighing a PIM, our PIM services cover selection, data modelling and the integrations to your ERP and channels. For the ERP side of the picture, see What is an ERP platform?
Frequently asked questions
Is a PIM the same as a product catalogue? No. A catalogue is one output, printed or online. A PIM is the system that produces catalogues, feeds and product pages from one set of data.
Can my ERP be my PIM? An ERP is built for operational data such as cost, stock and orders. It rarely handles rich copy, per-channel attributes, translations and approval workflows well, which is why most businesses keep the ERP as the owner of operational data and add a PIM for content.
What is PXM? Product experience management. It's the name for PIM plus features that measure and improve how products appear on each channel, such as digital shelf analytics and AI-generated content.
Do I need a DAM as well as a PIM? If you manage a large library of images and video, usually yes. Some PIMs store basic images, but a DAM handles versions, rights and formats far better. The PIM then links each product to its approved assets.
Planning a PIM, or untangling product data spread across your ERP and ecommerce platform? Talk to us.
