Straight to Digital Production

PDP education helps shoppers understand silhouette, rise, stretch and differences between products. Repeatable requests were moving through photo planning, Brand Marketing and creative handoffs even when photography already existed and templates could carry the product information.

I originated the STDP workflow and mapped the production path to identify unnecessary handoffs. The objective was a direct operational route for eligible content, with clear inputs, publishing responsibilities and creative exceptions.

The Q4 MVP supported Denim/General PDP tiles and comparison charts across categories. Existing marketing/PPOF photography, approved templates and structured product attributes let Content Ops prepare content without a new photoshoot. ON Sport/Activewear and Beauty/Collab tiles retained Marketing/Creative routing for custom photography and design.

I defined the intake and content requirements: up to six feature callouts for tiles; a headline, up to five products and three shared custom attributes for comparisons. Comparison attributes were independent of PIM, with P01 imagery or a custom override, line-graph/dot graphics, one fixed CTA and desktop five-up/four-up/custom or mobile 2.5-tile layouts.

For the broader automation work, I recommended fifth placement to preserve the first product views and the fixed fourth video position. Second was too early; ninth offered too little visibility.

I reviewed category shot strategy, identified conflicts with Women’s size-range front/back pairing and sought Creative/division signoff. I favored phased eligible categories and manual support over heavy exception logic. Automation began with a targeted Women’s Denim pilot, defining the initial category scope for wider adoption. Phase-two Product Details blocks or overlay video were proposals to avoid disrupting gallery strategy.

We chose Photoshop automation for the Women’s Denim pilot because existing photography and product attributes already provided the inputs needed to produce the tiles. It met the pilot’s needs at lower cost, so we deferred generative AI. GapGPT for copy support and fal.ai for content generation remained options for future phases where those capabilities could add value.

Online Experience merchandising submits eligible requests directly to Site/App Content Ops through Airtable. Intake captures request type, launch/end dates, a nine-digit imagery CC, one CC from the target Simple Merge Group/SPDP and feature copy. Content Ops adds attributes, creates the templated content and owns deployment.

One nine-digit CC expands targeting to all CCs in the same Simple Merge Group/SPDP, including future additions. AV99 places the tile fifth in the PDP grid, or last available when fewer than five shots exist. If PDPs are unmerged, Content Ops must manually remove the tile.

The Women’s Denim pilot launched automated PDP tile production in Photoshop, using existing product photography and existing product attributes for feature copy, automating manual OE-to-Catalog Ops workflow steps within a targeted category scope. Wider adoption and deeper systems integration form the expansion roadmap.

The proposed file-assisted implementation design starts with an approved Airtable request. An assistant validates CCs against accessible Stibo data, applies Shot Strategy Guide and US/CA rules, and checks existing shots before recommending create, modify, no action or exception. Human review resolves exceptions; a Stibo-ready bulk file is uploaded by a person, with Airtable status and shot-code tracking.

The longer-term roadmap proposes direct Stibo validation/create/modify and Airtable writeback, with upstream DAM/CMS integration dependencies. In the existing downstream process, Catalog Ops creates market-specific Stibo shots and Photo Ops manually attaches the asset to each CC. Content Ops owns content creation and deployment; asset creation alone does not solve downstream shot handoffs.

I led workflow discovery, requirements, build-out sessions and cross-functional decisions with Online Experience leadership, Content Ops, Marketing/Creative, GTS and relevant Catalog Ops/Office of AI partners.

I walked representative requests through the revised process, validated publishing accuracy and exception handling, and documented operational ownership and escalation. I compared the original and revised process maps, then handed ongoing execution to Content Ops. The targeted Women’s Denim automation pilot launched as the initial category scope for wider adoption.

Activewear template support, no-creative VI banners and unified Airtable/OmniBase intake remained roadmap extensions. The delivered STDP workflow reused existing photography and structured attributes.

The Q4 MVP removed approximately 27 manual steps per eligible request across photo planning, creative reviews, design and asset delivery. It established two qualifying formats and Content Ops ownership of creation and deployment, with targeting, placement and exceptions defined. The Women’s Denim PDP tile automation pilot also launched, focused on manual OE-to-Catalog Ops workflow steps.

The broader PDP tile scaling program modeled a move from approximately 1,000 annual tiles at current manual capacity to approximately 4,000 potential annual tiles through automation. Related business estimates put current annual tile contribution at approximately $38M, with up to approximately $114M modeled incremental revenue opportunity. STDP was one operational enabler, not measured STDP revenue.

The lesson was to treat content quality, production inputs and deployment rules as one operating problem. Tile volume, cycle time, rework and adoption provide success criteria for further scaling; repeatable templates alone are not enough without targeting, placement and clear ownership.