product data
6 min
TEXT MANAGEMENT
Easily manage text modules
Most businesses don’t manage their texts efficiently, meaning that text is available only as continuous text in a text file. File management systems, on the other hand, are much more state of the art: a DAM or DMS offers GDPR-compliant digital archiving and enables fast data retrieval – but this can quickly result in a large number of redundant files.
Read on to learn how you can properly manage text modules and clean up your file storage at the same time.
Table of Contents
What are text modules?
Many of any given company’s continuous texts will consistently follow the same structure. Individual sections of this structure make up text modules, so each recurring text type consists of many text modules with the same or similar content.
One example:
A wine distributor creates a description text for each wine and uses it for print materials such as flyers and brochures, an online store, and for online advertising such as Google Shopping. The texts always have the same structure.
- A description of the taste
- Suggestions for suitable dishes
- Identification and description of the wine region
- Description of the winegrower
- Consumption and storage recommendation
As wine lovers know, no two wines taste exactly alike. But the storage recommendation and the description of the winegrower doesn’t change. So why search through text files for the correct text modules for each wine?
Text module management in a DAM system
A Digital Asset Management (DAM) system manages conventional media files such as images, videos and audio files. The 4ALLPORTAL DAM is much more comparable to a Master Data Management system, however, and is equally suited to managing product information, contact data and text modules.
How to manage text modules
Returning to our wine distributor, who maintains all wines in his Product Information Management (PIM) system. He uses predefined selection fields to store the grape variety, winegrower, type, vintage, taste and much more. Then he creates the appropriate marketing materials, and these include a comprehensive description text.
Create text modules
He offers a wine from Italy for the first time and therefore writes a short description about the wine region and its special features. He enters this text section as a separate object in the module for text module management. The procedure differs little from that for entering other objects and files such as images or videos. Keywords like category, text type and language make it easy to find the text module later.
1. Reuse text modules
Back in the PIM module and the matching wine, the wine distributor builds the description according to the predefined structure. He writes individual text sections such as the taste directly into a text field on the product. All recurring text modules are selected from the text module. The text module is physically present in the system only once, and the original is only referenced on the product.
2. Release text modules
If the wine distributor works in a team, he uses the release module to release text modules. To do this, he creates a task for an employee and documents change requests directly on the text module.
If there are conditions for licensing the text modules or if only authorized employees are allowed to access the modules, the wine distributor can store corresponding licensing conditions or authorization concepts.
A useful feature: If a license expires, the software locks the text module against further use.
3. Edit text modules
If the description is no longer current or needs to be edited, the wine distributor goes back to the text module and edits the original. All references to the products update automatically.
By the way: Use of versioning means the old text module is not lost and can be restored at any time.
4. Display text modules
The wine distributor can transfer the text modules to specific sales channels using the REST API or other integration options.
Examples:
- Web-to-print: Smart templates are filled with data from the 4ALLPORTAL. The text modules are placed directly in the correct position – in a product flyer, for instance. The order is then sent directly to the partner print shop with a click.
- Online store: The wine distributor supplies the backend of the store system directly with the appropriate description text – consisting of the text modules – via the interface. The respective language versions for an international store are also assembled in seconds with a few clicks.
Do I need a PIM system?
In which cases does the introduction of a PIM system pay off? In our white paper, you can read about the specific areas in which your company can benefit from a Product Information Management system.
Who needs text management?
The simple answer: any business can benefit. In addition to the example involving product texts, virtually all businesses have many other types of texts that are constantly repeated – regardless of the industry or size of the company.
Examples:
- Job ads
- Company description
- Letters for mailings
- Service descriptions for price quotes
- And much more
Advantages of text module
Save resources
Marketing materials with the same structure: Quickly and easily click together all text modules to create a finished text.
Reduce effort
Regardless of the output channel, including flyers, online stores or Google Shopping, you enter each text module only once.
Faster updates
Change individual text modules only on the original and all links update automatically.
Minimize errors
All employees work with the same – and up-to-date – text modules.
Work efficiently
Maintain all marketing materials in one portal: Images, audio and video files, product information and, in the future, texts.
Monitor usage
Use the usage history to see who, when and where a text module is used, giving you full control over your data.
Link variants
Link all the variants of a text module with each other to maintain a clear overview of all language versions, for example.
