ARLINGTON, Va. — The Industry Data Exchange Association, Inc. (IDEA) has announced an expansion to the Industry Data Warehouse (IDW) standard.
IDEA’s management and board of directors have mandated the population of a set of 43 critical data fields that distributors have identified as necessary to conduct business today. Manufacturer compliance to this updated standard will be measured as part of IDEA’s new Data Certification Program, the first comprehensive IDW metric for data quantity and quality.
“These critical data fields and the related Data Certification Program support IDEA’s continuous goal of increasing the depth, breadth, and quality of the IDW,” said Chris Curtis, chief executive officer, IDEA. “Manufacturers and distributors alike will see an increase in the value they receive from complete, certified product data, improving the overall quality of any trading partner transaction moving forward.”
The Data Certification Program, which evaluates a manufacturer’s population of all 43 critical data fields, is built upon the foundation set in place by the IDW Bands of Excellence quantity metric that had focused on populating four IDW data fields. The 43 critical fields are sets of transactional and descriptive product information comprising the minimum data that distributors need to conduct business (e.g. brand; packaging; price effective date; etc.).
Within IDEA’s new program, all active items in the IDW will be measured against both a compliance metric and an excellence metric. First, an item will be identified as “compliant” if each of its 43 critical fields is fully-populated. Once complete, the content within those fields will then be subject to a quarterly programmatic quality check, as well as a visual quality check, to evaluate for consistency and accuracy for each item.
“Complete, high-quality data helps all facets of eCommerce and drives more sales for our manufacturers,” said Mike Wentz, vice president of operations at IDEA. “Through standards and certification, both distributors and manufacturers will have the ability to assess the completeness and excellence of the data being used to sell products within the electrical channel, facilitating everything from catalogs or web stores to EDI and counter sales.”
Effective February 1, 2015, all new items added to the IDW must have all 43 critical fields fully-populated, and all existing active IDW items must have all 43 critical fields fully-populated by October 1, 2015. Evaluation results from both metrics will be reported. A list outlining all mandatory fields can be accessed here.
