How PIM can increase Customer Lifetime Value in 2025
January 21, 2025Maximizing your Customer Lifetime Value can be lucrative - but you need the right tools in place to achieve your CLV goals.
Since Product Information Management software’s inception, PIM solutions have been valued for their ability to become an organization’s single source of truth for market-ready product information. PIM software frees businesses from the limiting chaos of spreadsheets to drive efficiency, accuracy, and agility on a global scale. But as PIM evolves, more businesses realize it’s also a powerful tool with revenue-driving use cases that are far more sophisticated than data administration.
PIM systems play an integral role in delivering standout product experiences across all digital and in-person channels. These experiences create loyal, satisfied customers who come back to your brand time and time for repeat purchases. This represents a significant boost to Customer Lifetime Value (CLV). If increasing CLV is your goal in 2025, turning product data into product experiences should be your top priority.
Why does Customer Lifetime Value matter?
We’ve previously touched on why CLV is so important, but here’s a quick recap. Essentially, CLV is the total revenue a single customer is likely to generate for a single brand. It considers their initial purchase, repeat buys, and add-ons they’re likely to be interested in and how many months or years they may remain loyal.
It’s more cost-effective to retain than acquire customers, so that’s part of why CLV is important. This metric shows you which customers are likely to return and how valuable their repeat custom is, allowing you to tailor your product experience to those with a high CLV.
Your product data has a bigger impact than you think
Something as foundational as product data can significantly impact CLV. In the recent Why Prioritize PIM in 2025? webinar, Chuck Gahun, Principal Analyst at Forrester, explained that a key source of consumer frustration is a lack of trust in product data. Too often, listings are incomplete, incorrect, or inconsistent—particularly when comparing the information shown on direct-to-consumer (DTC) sites and marketplaces. Consumers demand a level of trust that many brands struggle to deliver.
With so many shoppers choosing digital commerce experiences, quality product information also creates dynamic product experiences that show consumers what it’s like to use or own items. Chuck believes it’s essential to extend these data-driven experiences across third-party channels to facilitate strong engagement across a distributed commerce space.
How PIM increases CLV
PIM is often seen as a time-saving tool that protects product data accuracy and helps you work faster. However, many organizations have yet to appreciate how PIM’s wider capabilities can lead to deeper, more rewarding customer relationships. Here are three key ways a PIM solution can help:
- Protect data accuracy
At a base level, accurate, channel-optimized data can enhance CLV by reducing return rates, customer churn, and the number of interactions with customer services. PIM’s syndication capabilities mean getting information out to channels is much easier, even if you’re a global brand with hundreds of retail partners. You’ll find it easier to distribute the right information, with the power to add new attributes or alter data on a daily basis.
- Unlock deeper customer insights
Solutions like the inriver PIM have built-in Digital Shelf Analytics (DSA) capabilities. You can go beyond distributing accurate data with a strong understanding of how consumers are engaging with your digital storefront. DSA can help you tailor product bundles and incentives to maximize each transaction’s value and make data-backed choices about the products you bring to market.
- Support product lifecycle management
It’s never been more important to take a truly holistic view of product lifecycle management, even before manufacturing begins. Evolving regulations such as the EU’s Digital Product Passport (DPP) and growing demands for product traceability and repairability globally have changed the game. As a result, aftersales, maintenance, and parts management are likely to become a much bigger area for many brands. PIM can help you maximize ongoing customer value with timely communications and intelligent product suggestions for relevant replacements and add-ons.
Real-life examples of PIM unlocking Customer Lifetime Value gains
For two inriver customers, PIM has played a key role in boosting CLV in different ways.
For Stacey Gardella, Head of Global MarTech at ProDriven Global Brands, the inriver PIM has helped ProDriven remain a trusted partner to its B2B customer base. In the Why Prioritize PIM in 2025? webinar, Stacey explained that delivering on customer commitments is made easier with PIM, thanks to accurate, high-quality data and faster go-to-market speeds. Acing these basics has helped ProDriven increase its CLV across the globe.
Meanwhile, PIM’s value has evolved in the global manufacturing business KOHLER. It was initially implemented to simplify the organization’s tech stack while supporting global product truth and syndication. However, as Technical Platform Owner Steven Christensen and the team explored ‘product data as a service’ through the inriver PIM, they realized that leveraging this information could significantly improve CLV and average order values.
inriver: Making 2025 the year you maximize CLV
A PIM-powered approach to increasing CLV can work for every business – whether you’re in a rapid scaling phase or managing conflicting demands of established global markets. The fully flexible inriver PIM provides businesses with a single, scalable source of truth for product information, AI-powered content enrichment, API-based single-click syndication, and advanced digital shelf intelligence. We are also a certified member of the MACH Alliance and have one of the biggest partner ecosystems of all PIM vendors, with over 160 implementation and 60 technology partners.
Watch our on-demand webinar, Why Prioritize PIM in 2025?, featuring Chuck Gahun, Principal Analyst at Forrester, for more insights into the power of PIM. Or get in touch to set up a meeting with one of our experts to discover how PIM could supercharge your growth.
want to see the inriver PIM in action?
Schedule a personalized, guided demo with an inriver expert today to see how the inriver PIM can get more value from your product information.
