Unlike Other Forms of Digital Content, CAD Lives Beyond The Pre and Post Sales Transaction

As ecommerce transactions accelerate, MRO distributors are considering the needs of different buyer personas within existing and prospective customer relationships. As buyers and sellers increasingly interact through digital channels, content can be a key differentiator for MRO distributors choosing to  stand out from the crowd and create loyalty within their customer communities.

CAD content, while not new, often resides with the OEM’s engineering team or PLM software, never having the opportunity to unlock value further down the supply chain. Always the savvy online merchants, progressive MRO distributors have learned the value of repurposing OEM CAD models by reducing file size, stripping out internals or other OEM intellectual property to create web-ready 3D viewable files, envelope level 3D CAD models and 2D sales drawings.

By integrating CAD assets into the digital buyer’s click path, MRO distributors have the opportunity to create the following business outcomes:

Sizable conversion lift by adding CAD assets to the appropriate product categories online.

Achieve the ‘design-win’ by having their part numbers locked into the bill of materials (BOM).

Support more of the user cycle within the customer’s organization by serving up 2D sales drawings, the ultimate universal asset.

As MRO distributors invest in their technology roadmap, content becomes a strategic consideration. Do they hang their hopes on curating only static content like product images and attribute data? Or do they also invest in dynamic content that serves multiple stakeholders up and down the value chain? For the very top MRO distributors, the answer is clear!