How to create a digital product catalog for wholesale retailers
KEY TAKEAWAYS
- Connect your catalog to your ERP for accurate product, pricing, and inventory data.
- Personalize assortments by retailer, season, region, or customer tier.
- Make catalogs visual and shoppable so buyers can discover, evaluate, and order products in one place.
- Use buyer data to improve assortments, engagement, and wholesale sales.
BUILDING A CATALOG
What should a digital product catalog include?
An effective digital product catalog combines product storytelling with the information wholesale buyers need to make a purchase. To build a catalog that works as part of a scalable wholesale operation, it must include:
Product imagery & media
Use high-quality product photography, alternate images, video, and other visual content to help buyers understand the product before they order.
Complete product information
Include style numbers, SKUs, colors, sizes, materials, specs, pack information, and other details buyers need to evaluate an assortment.
Account-specific pricing
Show the right wholesale pricing for each retailer or account. Buyers should not have to ask a sales rep which price applies to them.
Product availability
Show current inventory and future availability when applicable. Buyers need to know what they can order now and what they can plan for later.
Delivery information
Make shipment dates and delivery windows easy to find, especially for seasonal and pre-book orders.
Ordering functionality
Let buyers move from browsing to building an order without switching between a catalog, spreadsheet, email, and ordering system.
Static PDF catalogs hold wholesale brands back
Static PDFs become outdated as soon as product data changes, and they force buyers to work around a document’s limitations. Inventory moves. Prices change. Products get added or discontinued. Delivery dates shift. A PDF cannot reflect those changes unless someone updates it, exports a new version, and sends it to every affected buyer.
That creates work for sales and creates risk for buyers. A retailer can make a purchasing decision based on information that is no longer accurate. Your team then has to correct the order, resend information, or explain why the product is no longer available.
PDFs also separate product discovery from ordering. A buyer may find a product in the catalog, check a spreadsheet for pricing, email a rep about availability, and then place the order somewhere else.
A digital catalog can connect those steps.
With the right B2B platform, product data can sync with your ERP, so buyers see current product information, pricing, and availability. Elastic supports integrations with NetSuite, SAP, Microsoft Dynamics, and more than 250 ERP and back-office systems.
The result is a catalog that works as part of your wholesale operation instead of sitting outside it.
“I really like to make custom collections so they don’t have to flip through pages of things they won’t buy and shouldn’t buy. It makes it more digestible for the customer, and it improves the chance they place an order that makes sense for their location.”
How do you create a digital product catalog for retailers?
Creating a retailer-ready digital catalog starts with accurate data, then adds organization, personalization, and visual merchandising.
STEP 1
Connect your product data to your ERP
Start with the data behind the catalog. Connect your B2B platform to your ERP and other relevant systems so product, customer, pricing, and inventory information stays aligned. This reduces manual updates and gives buyers more accurate information.
Elastic connects with 250+ ERP and back-office systems and supports real-time visibility into inventory, sales orders, and customer data.
STEP 2
Organize products by season and availability
Make it easy for buyers to find what they need.
Separate seasonal assortments and clearly distinguish future-season products from at-once inventory. Show delivery windows alongside products when timing affects the buying decision.
This structure reflects how wholesale buyers actually plan. Retailers often buy months ahead of a selling season, while also managing immediate replenishment and reorder needs.
Your catalog should support both.
STEP 3
Create buyer-specific catalogs and assortments
Do not make every retailer sort through your entire product line.
A specialty retailer may need a different assortment than a national account. Different regions, channels, seasons, and customer tiers may also require different products and pricing.
Use custom catalogs or collections to present the products that matter to each buyer. Elastic supports custom collections and pricing as part of its B2B platform.
The goal is simple: show buyers what they are most likely to buy, not everything you sell.
STEP 4
Add visual merchandising to the buying experience
Product images help buyers understand individual products. Visual merchandising helps them understand the assortment.
Use curated collections, assortment planning, and merchandising presentations to show how products work together. Elastic’s Whiteboard feature lets teams arrange products visually for merchandising and presentation, while Assortment Builder helps teams organize and present products through drag-and-drop workflows.
This gives sales reps a better way to present a collection and gives buyers more context when building an assortment.
STEP 5
Make the catalog shoppable
A catalog should not end with “contact your sales rep.”
Let buyers select products, build an order, review availability, and submit the order from the same experience. Elastic supports digital catalogs alongside ordering, custom collections, merchandising, and other wholesale workflows.
The fewer steps between seeing a product and ordering it, the easier you make wholesale buying.
STEP 6
Measure engagement and orders
Your catalog should give your team insight into what buyers are doing.
Look at product engagement, assortment activity, order volume, and conversion. Use those insights to identify products that attract attention, assortments that perform well, and buyers who may need follow-up.
That turns your catalog from a static sales asset into a source of useful buying data.
How can personalized digital catalogs improve wholesale selling?
Personalized catalogs reduce the amount of work buyers need to do to find the right products.
Instead of presenting the entire product line, sales reps can create assortments based on factors such as retailer type, season, region, product category, customer tier, previous purchases, promotional programs, and delivery requirements.
Consider two buyers: a specialty outdoor retailer and a large national account. They may sell the same brand, but they do not need the same assortment. A curated catalog can surface the right products for each buyer while keeping pricing, availability, and ordering relevant to that account.
Personalization also gives sales reps a better starting point for sell-in conversations. Rather than asking a buyer to build an assortment from thousands of SKUs, the rep can present a proposed assortment and refine it together.
Elastic’s sell-in workflows support custom catalogs, curated assortments, visual merchandising, and order creation as connected parts of the buying process.
“Whiteboards are an absolutely necessary tool to take this sales experience to the next professional level… it really helps instill their trust in me as a rep, because I know how much space they have in the store and the type of assortments they like to build. I don’t want to just sell it to them — I want it to sell through.”
How can visual merchandising make a digital catalog more effective?
The best way to showcase products to wholesale buyers is to give them both product detail and assortment context.
A buyer needs to understand more than what an individual product looks like. They also need to see how products work together, which products belong in a collection, and how the assortment could work in their stores. Visual merchandising can help answer those questions.
For example, a sales rep can use a Whiteboard to arrange products into a proposed store assortment or merchandising presentation. The buyer can see the products together rather than reviewing a list of individual SKUs.
This makes the catalog more useful during sell-in, line reviews, virtual meetings, and follow-up.
What is the difference between a digital product catalog and a digital line sheet?
A digital product catalog showcases products and collections with rich visuals and merchandising content. A digital line sheet gives buyers the product, pricing, availability, and ordering details they need to make a purchase.
The two work best together. A catalog helps buyers discover products and build interest, while a line sheet helps them evaluate and order. A connected B2B platform lets buyers move between both without switching systems.
How do you know if a digital product catalog is working?
A successful digital product catalog should improve both the buyer experience and your wholesale operation. Track metrics like:
- Catalog engagement
- Product views
- Assortment engagement
- Orders generated
- Order frequency
- Retailer adoption
- Order errors
- Sales rep time spent building orders
- Print and sample costs
The business case can extend beyond revenue. Stanley, for example, reported 123% year-over-year order growth in 2024 after implementing Elastic, along with an 87% increase in dealer engagement. The brand also saved more than $100,000 in printed material costs.
These results show why digital catalogs should not be measured only as a replacement for printed materials. When connected to the broader B2B buying experience, they can influence how buyers discover products, build assortments, and place orders.
What is the best way to create digital product catalogs for wholesale buyers?
The best approach is to build the catalog around the buying process, not around the format of the old sales materials.
Start with accurate product data. Connect it to your ERP. Organize products around how retailers buy. Personalize assortments by account. Add visual merchandising to help buyers understand the collection. Then make the catalog shoppable.
That turns a digital catalog into more than a PDF replacement.
It becomes a connected wholesale buying experience.
Elastic Suite gives brands a purpose-built platform for digital catalogs, custom collections, assortment planning, visual merchandising, ordering, and ERP integrations. With 250+ ERP and back-office integrations, 30+ currencies, 18 languages, and 95% customer retention, Elastic is built to support complex wholesale operations at scale.
Ready to move beyond static catalogs?
See how Elastic can help your team create better digital buying experiences, streamline wholesale operations, and give retailers an easier way to buy.
Still have questions?
FAQs
What is a digital product catalog for wholesale buyers?
A digital product catalog is an online buying experience that presents a brand’s products with the information buyers need to evaluate and purchase them. It can include product imagery, SKUs, pricing, inventory, delivery information, and ordering functionality.
Unlike a static PDF, a digital catalog can connect to business systems and update product information as data changes.
How do you create a digital product catalog for retailers?
Start by connecting your product data to your ERP or other source systems. Then organize products by season and availability, configure account-specific pricing and product visibility, create curated assortments, add visual merchandising, and connect the catalog to ordering.
The goal is to give each retailer a clear path from product discovery to purchase.
What should a wholesale digital catalog include?
A wholesale digital catalog should include high-quality product imagery, product specifications, SKUs, pricing, inventory availability, delivery information, and ordering functionality. Personalized product visibility and assortments can make the experience even more relevant for each retailer.
What is the difference between a digital catalog and a digital line sheet?
A digital catalog is primarily designed to showcase products and collections. A digital line sheet gives buyers the product, pricing, and availability details they need to make purchasing decisions quickly.
Both can support the wholesale buying process, and they work best when they connect to the same product, pricing, and inventory data.
How can wholesale brands personalize digital catalogs?
Brands can personalize catalogs by retailer account, customer tier, region, season, product category, or other business rules. This lets sales teams present the products and pricing most relevant to each buyer instead of asking them to navigate the entire product line.
How can digital catalogs reduce wholesale costs?
Digital catalogs can reduce the cost of printing and distributing sales materials while also reducing manual work associated with updating product information. When a catalog connects to ERP and other business systems, it can also reduce errors caused by outdated pricing, inventory, or product data.
Stanley reported saving more than $100,000 in printed material costs after implementing Elastic.
Can a digital product catalog support wholesale ordering?
Yes. A digital catalog can connect product discovery directly to order building and submission. This allows buyers to select products, review relevant information, and place orders without moving between separate catalogs, spreadsheets, and ordering systems.
What is Elastic Suite?
Elastic Suite is a purpose-built B2B ecommerce platform for wholesale brands. It combines digital catalogs, online ordering, sales tools, merchandising, analytics, and integrations with ERP and other business systems in one platform. Elastic supports more than 250 ERP and back-office integrations.
Is Elastic Suite built for brands with large product catalogs?
Yes. Elastic is built for complex wholesale operations with large assortments, multiple retailers, seasonal selling, account-specific pricing, and multiple ordering workflows. Its platform combines catalog management, assortment planning, visual merchandising, ordering, and ERP integration in one system.