The agricultural engineering technology specialist Poettinger simplifies their product communication

According to the catchphrase "make it easier", Alois Poettinger Maschinenfabrik primarily stands for simplifying agricultural producers’ work conditions by means of modern, innovative agricultural engineering products and services. With the introduction of Viamedici‘s product information management system EPIM this adage is now also realized in the areas of management and publication of their own product data.

As an internationally active agricultural company, Alois Poettinger Maschinenfabrik’s portfolio is always state-of-the art. The focus is on innovations which allow farmers to work more comfortably, economically and easily. The family business has grown with this philosophy over the course of its 140 year history, now employing about 1200 people at the headquarters in Grieskirchen and in various sales and production locations in Europe and overseas.

At the same time, continuous technological developments ease and optimize their own work. “We publish in many different areas and media. Our product range is constantly growing and the machines themselves are becoming ever more complex. The time came when it was no longer possible to efficiently deal with this using the existing means. The idea to implement a PIM system to keep data consistent and up-to-date seemed obvious. “In addition, we wanted to shorten and simplify publication cycles”, explains Anita Jungreithmayr, who works in marketing at Poettinger. Past experience had shown that the success of such an undertaking is not dependent alone on the functional technology, but much more on how optimally the specifications suit the individual requirements. That is why upon selecting the appropriate solution focus was placed not only on technical aspects, but above all on the linking of branch, process and technological knowhow. In order to find the provider with the maximum chance of success, right from the beginning, much time was set aside for the evaluation phase.

At the beginning of the year, the decision was made for Viamedici. In addition to excellent references in comparable projects, the standard PIM software convinced with the professionalism of their service employees. “We now have a good basis to be able to publish in any media we want”, says Anit Jungreithmayr.
„Presently, data are being supplemented so that the first price lists can subsequently be published.“
EPIM offers an interface to the existing SAP system which is very important to Poetticher and which is often used in the company. Anita Jungreithmayr explains: „We were able to configure EPIM so that it really suited us and our machines. That way we found a good solution also good for us in the long term.” 

The data structure at Poettinger is just as complex as the agricultural machines. On top of that, the diverse product groups differ greatly from one another. The interface to SAP ERP was set up so that the necessary data could be easily imported into EPIM. Viamedici EPIM therefore became the linking element between marketing and merchandise management. The most important base data were taken directly from the ERP system, are then supplemented by marketing texts, pictures and other additional information and are then available for publication.

After the price lists, the 2nd step is the EPIM supported creation of Internet content.
Anita Jungreithmayr: „Some of this content we use online can be taken from the price list. We have already created a good interface to our homepage. Soon, the first data will be online. A few technical information have already been taken over.“ In the future it is planned to generate operating instructions directly from EPIM. For this, the technical documentation department is already working on creating operation instructions from the system. „Admittedly, the colleagues are just beginning with the data entry”, adds Anita Jungreithmayr.

Step by step, the bulk of Alois Poettinger Maschinenfabrik’s publications is being created by the employees themselves using EPIM. Price lists and online content on the one hand and technical documentation on the other are just the beginning. “We really want to take it a step further in the direction of advertisements. For that, we could imagine putting an interface to a database at the disposal of sales partners selling our agricultural machines to end users, so that they can create their own advertisements”, says Anita Jungreithmayr. Another vision for the future is the use for brochures, using text content from the system and then processing it creatively.

About Poettinger:

For more than 135 years, the Alois Pöttinger Maschinenfabrik has stood for fair partnerships. The company has improved working conditions with innovative agricultural engineering and thereby contributed significantly to the increased efficiency of agricultural products. Poettinger offers high-quality connected, mounted and pulled equipment for soil cultivation, sowing and harvesting with the best price-performance ratio. Dabei nimmt das Familienunternehmen die Verantwortung gegenüber nachfolgenden Generationen und der Umwelt sehr ernst.

About Viamedici:
With locations world-wide and a multitude of renowned and enthusiastic customers, Viamedici is the leading software company for product information management (PIM) and cross media publishing (CMP). The product suite Viamedici EPIM allows product information to be administered centrally and published in diverse target media such as catalogues, brochures, operating manuals, Web-CMS (content management) or online shops.