16 February 2012

Open Range Launches the UK's First Independent Product Data Service for Office Products

Open Range announces the availability of the UK's first, ecommerce Product Data Service with fully searchable product attributes, for the Office Products Industry, Get-the-Spec/Office^TM. For the first time, high quality product data and images for the products distributed by Spicers and VOW is available to UK office dealers in a single database format. 

"Lack of good quality product data and images has become an increasingly critical problem for the office supplies industry as ecommerce solutions have evolved" Iain Howarth, Managing Director of Open Range said.   "There have been several previous industry initiatives to solve this problem over the years but they have all ended in failure. Our "Get-the-Spec/Office^TM" service delivers all the data features modern e-commerce systems need, such as multiple hi-resolution images, improved product descriptions, much richer marketing text, expanded product specifications, consumables and accessories linked to the parent products, manufacturer brochures and fully searchable attributes.  Support for video is planned for later in the year. 

Whilst it is true that many office supplies customers place repeat orders, new requirements continually generate new sales opportunities.   This is when customers need to search for the products that meet their specific criteria.

"Until now, most office supplies web stores have not been able to support this sort of function.  Our structured data makes it easy for resellers to design web stores with guided navigation that helps customers quickly find relevant products with just a few mouse clicks.  This delivers major improvements to customer experience and promotes increased sales conversions.  It's all about serving the customer better." said Howarth "Because our service independent, it works with any web store platform.  Our IT and consumer electronics service is already used by numerous IT resellers." 

Leading B2B ecommerce provider Netalogue also recommends the service. The Netalogue^TM Ecommerce Platform is used extensively by many major corporations and SMEs. Commenting on the new service, Netalogue Director, Andrew Robathan said:  "Until we discovered Get-the-Spec/Office^TM from Open Range, obtaining high quality office product data was a major headache and administrative chore for our clients.  Get-the-Spec/Office^TM data however enables our clients to fully exploit all the very latest guided navigation and product filtering features which are available in the Netalogue^TM Ecommerce Platform which in turn is delivering our clients huge competitor advantages in their markets. The high quality and comprehensiveness of product images Open Range are providing are also constantly improving."

Iain Howarth explains the previous lack of solutions by commenting: "Building and transforming rich product data across multiple manufacturers needs a seamless blend of highly specialised technology, skills and a well-trained team of editors. It requires complete focus. For the distributors, it is really a bit of a burden, because it is not their core business. For more than 10 years, Open Range has focused solely on creating high-quality product databases.  It is all we do and so it is inevitable that we have developed unique technologies and processes which deliver a greatly improved solution to the reseller."

Subscription rates are said to be relatively modest and are based on size of reseller's turnover. "We want as many companies as possible to be able to benefit from the service, whilst also ensuring the  revenue adequately covers the costs of maintaining the service to the highest standards. Subscription rates also depend on the quantity of data required." Howarth explained.