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The Sitation Blog

Welcome to the Sitation Blog, where we share insights on our work, the e-commerce industry, and our platform partners. Enjoy!

Recent Sitation Blogs

The Role of PIM in Digital Marketing Strategy

The Role of PIM in Digital Marketing Strategy

Discover how Product Information Management (PIM) is crucial to digital marketing strategies, focusing on its impact on improving customer experience, enhancing SEO, simplifying content syndication, and guiding strategic decisions for brands navigating the digital market.

Adapting to Ever-Changing Retailer Product Data Requirements

Adapting to Ever-Changing Retailer Product Data Requirements

Consider strategy for brands to keep pace with the evolving product data requirements in the fast-paced retail sector. Learn the importance of investing in technology, building retailer relationships, refining internal processes, and utilizing data analytics and AI for a competitive edge and sustained growth.

Blog Archives

GS1 is not them, GS1 is us.

In The Future of PIM Beyond 2021, Salsify Co-Founder, Rob Gonzales suggests that the “...goal of a PIM is to help you get your products to market as quickly and optimally as possible and to assist you in keeping your products competitive over time in the face of...

Akeneo Unlock 2022: Highlights

I attended my first Akeneo Unlock Conference in February of 2020 as a brand new employee at Sitation. It was a great experience, as any trip to Paris should be. Akeneo 4.0 was released, a new development track demoed the new upgrade process live, and I met a ton of...

2021 at Sitation – A Year in Review

Unbelievably, another year has come and gone. It was another weird one, but we've continued to grow aggressively, to mature and evolve, and to help our clients grow and succeed in e-commerce. We've brainstormed on a few words that capture aspects of 2021. Enjoy!...

All I Want for Christmas is PIM

As Sitation celebrates another record year of growth, I was struck by a thought this morning: this year, more so than ever, millions of customers, and billions of dollars of their holiday spending, were touched directly or indirectly by the work we do at Sitation. To...

Sitation Unlocks Year 3 of Partnership with Akeneo

Quotes and excerpts taken from Sitation’s Director of Solution Architecture, George Dzuricsko, certified both as a Functional and Technical Consultant with Akeneo, during an interview with Francois Chaix, Akeneo’s Worldwide Partners Evangelist. Additional details from...

Sitation Celebrates 20 Years in Business

Today marks 20 years in business for Sitation. Sitation was founded October 21, 2001 by CEO Steve Engelbrecht. In a winding path over 20 years, Sitation has grown into the e-commerce service provider it is today. Read more about our story here. Please read Steve's...

How to Prepare for an Akeneo Certification

Akeneo offers two certifications. These are the Business Implementation Specialist (BI) and the Technical Integration Specialist (TI) certifications. The BI certification focuses on how to properly model the data and set up business processes in Akeneo. The TI...

Summer 2021 Updates from Sitation

What a summer at Sitation! We've continued to grow and expand this year, with new service offerings for PIM implementation, digital strategy, and of course our platform-specific offerings for Salsify, Akeneo, and Riversand. We celebrated a huge milestone this year as...

A First Look at the Akeneo Events API

With the introduction of Akeneo 5.0 came the new Akeneo Events API aka “Webhooks” from Akeneo. After spending some time playing with the feature I’d like to take you on a deep dive into the pros and cons of using webhooks. The Akeneo Events API Brings Powerful New...

How to Log Akeneo PHP-API Errors the Right Way

Engineer's Log, Stardate 98821.1: Our ship has made contact with an alien species known as the Error. So far, we've only been able to decipher vague sentiments from our communications with these beings. Tensions are high, and the crew is at Red Alert until we can...

How to Import CSV Files to Salsify the Right Way

Most users import data into the Salsify PIM via Excel (XLSX) and Comma Separated Values (CSV) files. While these two file formats are compatible, they are not equal. Too often I help clients resolve poor quality data in Salsify caused by a CSV file opened in Excel....

Sitation Wins the 2021 Akeneo Hackathon

We're delighted to share that Akeneo has awarded Sitation with first place honors in its Unlock 2021 Hackathon! For our official entry, we created a near real-time integratin between Akeneo 5.0 and ElasticSearch, a leading cloud-based search solution. "Why is...

An Insider’s Guide to Akeneo’s Offerings

In today's economy, presenting customers with rich product content and a superior buying experience can set you apart from your competition. Managing that rich content can quickly become a herculean effort for any growing commerce business. Product Information...

Sitation is a 2021 “Triangle Tweener”

Sitation is honored to once again be featured on Scot Wingo's "Triangle Tweeners" list of emerging companies in the Raleigh Durham area. Honorees must be headquarered in the Triangle, be technology-focused, and have 10+ employees (but fewer than 500) or $1M+ in...

How Focusing on Copy Elevates eCommerce Strategy

LIMITATIONS INHERENT TO ECOMMERCE PLATFORMS Despite its many progressions, eCommerce today still falls short of providing an experience that encapsulates the five senses. You cannot smell, touch, or taste an online product listing, and even a product's images can be...

Keeping It Real While Working Remotely

Strong relationships are fundamental to success in businesses of any size or market. The trust we build with our clients and colleagues allows for the open communication and collaboration necessary for fruitful engagements. We now find ourselves in a new business...

A Deep Dive into Akeneo’s Product Version History

When you work on product data in the PIM, you probably have some concerns like…What happens if I make a mistake?What happens if the manufacturer changes its mind?How can I find out who changed this piece of product data? Rest easy, my reader. Akeneo has both a history...

Help! My Products Are Suddenly Missing in Akeneo

Akeneo is designed to manage your product data, so it may cause you some panic if you log into Akeneo and suddenly see some, or all, of your products missing. Chances are your product data has not been lost. The products probably are not displaying correctly. Here are...

Akeneo: Requiring an SSL Connection with MySQL

Akeneo PIM is a PHP/Symfony web application that uses MySQL for persistence, and Elasticsearch for search capability. From an abstract perspective it consists of three major components: · MySQL, a relational database for storing data· Elasticsearch, a search...

Akeneo: The Missing MTA Documentation

Sincerely, Akeneo has some of the best documentation available for installing their software. Here's the main link: https://docs.akeneo.com/4.0/install_pim/index.html. Follow the instructions for Installing Akeneo Manually. And, it is well worth your time...

Keys to a Great Akeneo Discovery

Key Takeaways 1. Great discoveries make great projects. Without them, you are flying blind (in most cases). 2. Validating a project's statement of work (SOW) in a discovery is step #1--must catch misaligned assumptions, undefined requirements, and project risk. 3....

E-Commerce Trends for 2020

With your holiday ecommerce strategy in full swing, it's time to look ahead to 2020 trends. Ecommerce in 2020 is unfolding with a few common themes, centered around the customer's experience of your brand. Find top ways to get customers talking about you this year by...

Akeneo 4.0 Features We Are Most Excited About

Akeneo 4.0 brings several welcome changes to its PIM software. Upgrades to Symfony, Mysql, and PHP offer incremental updates to the technical stack, while performance improvements abound. I was lucky enough to be at the Akeneo PIM Summit 2020 to witness the unveiling,...