Attention manufacturing leaders: your product data is not as ready for AI-powered search and agentic commerce as you think, according to Inriver’s Product Data Maturity Benchmark study.
Of the 117 organizations that claimed to be fully prepared for agentic commerce, not a single one met the operational benchmark.
“This report clearly shows that the confidence is real. The calibration is not,” says Jay Roxe, chief marketing officer, Inriver. “Organizations aren’t struggling because they lack AI ambition or awareness of how AI is reshaping buying decisions. However, they do lack accurate understanding of the operational state of their product data. The maturity of their environment isn’t keeping up. Companies that close that gap now will be significantly better positioned for the next generation of AI-driven commerce as the nature of product information management (PIM) transitions from a system of record to a system of work."
Key takeaways:
Nearly half of organizations experience integration failures between product data systems at least monthly.
Only 13.6% have implemented end-to-end product data automation with an audit trail.
Less than one-third have 85% of active SKUs publish-ready at any given time.
Fewer than 12% regularly monitor Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) data, despite increasing investment in AI initiatives.
More than four out of five organizations remain operationally functional but still experience enough friction to limit automation and future AI initiatives.
