RS Supplier Newsletter – January 2024

Jaycee McGilway is a Senior Category Manager at RS and works with Kevin Brown a Sales Manager at Sick.

They had a joint challenge…how do they expand the current product range more efficiently, utilising digital tools, whilst ensuring exceptional product pages for our customers?

After a few discussions, they decided their next steps were to:

• Understand the requirements for RS to launch the line card.
• Map out the process.
• Update the RS website.

Working with his data team at Sick, Kevin focused on shaping the data into the correct format, gathering all digital assets. This new and improved data allowed us to have all the information in one file, ensuring a seamless launch process.

This example of collaboration enables us to launch products quicker to market with complete content, which in turn enhances the customer experience to make it easier and faster to find the right product.

Kevin Brown from Sick says:

“SICK, as the leading supplier for sensors to RS, are very proud to be considered as one of the best providers of quality data for the RS group. We’re able to provide such quality data by ensuring our Marketing and IT teams at SICK and RS work closely together to agree data specifications in international classifications and formats in line with the RS product launch process. The SICK e-business team regularly provides SICK product data via electronic catalogues that are easy for RS to integrate into their product library. The provision of accurate, complete data that can be imported quickly by RS benefits both companies significantly.”

Jaycee McGilway from RS says: “The customer is at the heart of everything we do at RS Group and having top quality content on our website is crucial for a great customer experience.

The team at Sick understand the importance of this and through collaboration and attention to detail, they have provided us with a complete data linecard for our product launches.

Accessing complete data up front not only delivers great content on our website but also give us the ability to launch products to the market much faster, which is a win for both us and our suppliers!”

Customers want to buy more sustainable products to reduce their impact on the environment and meet their sustainability goals, but they can find it difficult to implement. They want more choice and clearer claims, supported by evidence they can trust. Plus, you, our suppliers, have asked for a clear and standardised framework to focus your efforts and communicate your claims with confidence.

With that in mind, we’re excited to share that we’ve made improvements to our Claims Based Framework, making it easier for you to implement greener products which are better for people, our planet and business.

Each product is now tagged with a badge and description on its sustainability improvement, and we have broadened our framework, splitting products into three categories:

Made more sustainably: Produced using more sustainable materials or manufacturing processes.

Sustainable solution: Delivers in-use benefits which can help you run your business more sustainably.

Supports circularity: Products that increase the product lifespan and reduce end-waste.

Currently there is no clear industry framework, so we are ideally positioned to define and lead the agenda, especially with our commitment to advancing sustainability, alongside our central position in the value chain.

Want to get involved?

Our goal is to collaborate with you to offer our customers a wider range of products and service solutions that help them run their businesses more sustainably. If you would like to include your products within our Better World products framework, or simply learn more about it, then we would love to hear from you:

Submit your product claims and supporting information to our Better World product email, betterworldproducts@rs.rsgroup.com

Please send supporting information that will ideally consist of marketing material which clearly articulates the claim, along with evidence to support the claim.

Our Better World product team will assess the documents and be in touch.

Working with our supplier, Keysight, we recognised an opportunity to create an exclusive campaign together, driving value for RS, Keysight and our customers.

The campaign allows customers to get a great discount on key products from the premium brand, whilst increasing sales for both Keysight and RS.

The campaign ran for six months across EMEA (Europe, the Middle East, and Africa) and was based on a 20% price promotion on 11 products. The exclusive aspect means added focus from our marketing and sales teams, leading to increased volumes and reaching new customers.

The results are in, and we’ve seen a significant 93% increase in volumes, plus a rise of 51% in new customers. RS and Keysight are now reviewing further campaigns for 2024 based on the success of this campaign.

Art McFall at Keysight said: “Looking at the results we’re very impressed that the intended goals of the campaign were met; there was a huge increase in the number of units sold – every month being a record - and even after the additional discount, a significant increase in revenue. The great thing about this campaign is that it will have enabled customers to switch to Keysight from other brands, and these customers will have benefitted from the user experience, and the quality and performance advantages that we offer so remain with Keysight. In addition, RS will benefit from repeat sales from these customers.”

If this is something that interests you, please email your main RS contact.