Product Workflows Overview

Product Workflows in Pimberly

Workflows let you orchestrate, automate, and control key product processes - like enrichment, approval, categorisation, and release - across your PIM instance.

When you assign workflow templates to schemas, changes to products trigger human or automated logic (depending on the workflow type) to enforce rules, notify teams, or drive state transitions.

Pimberly’s visual workflow builder enables you to build drag-and-drop flowcharts that manage everything from enrichment checks to final release.

Why use workflows?

• Ensure consistency and validation before data is published

• Offload manual steps (notifications, attribute updates)

• Govern control via approvals where needed

• Chain processes across multiple workflows or decision logic

• Maintain clarity: know exactly which conditions or rules govern product movement

Here are some real examples:

• A price change is made to a product: before it publishes, it goes into an approval workflow. If approved, the change is applied and released; if rejected, it’s rolled back and a notification is sent.

• Once all mandatory attributes (title, description, image) are filled, the product is automatically categorised and released to an eCommerce channel.

• When a product enters “Needs Photography”, a workflow notifies the photography team automatically.

Table of Contents

1. Creating a Workflow

2. Workflow Types

3. Creating an Approval Workflow

4. Creating an Automation Workflow

5. Actions You Can Use in Workflows

6. Best Practices & Tips

7. Common Workflow Scenarios

1. Creating a Workflow

Administrators can define new workflows and manage existing ones.

Steps:

1. Go to Admin → Products → Workflows.
   

2. You’ll see a list of existing workflows, with columns such as:

   • Name

   • Type (Approval / Automation)

   • Date Created / Updated

   • Comments or descriptions

   • Clone / Edit / Delete options
     

3. You can search by name, sort, or filter existing workflows.

4. Click New Workflow to begin a fresh workflow definition.

2. Workflow Types

Workflows in Pimberly are divided into two principal types.

Approval Workflows

• Triggered before a change is applied to a product.

• The product remains in its current state until approval is reached.

• Supports branching for Accepted, Rejected, or Timed-Out outcomes.

• Useful where human validation or review is required (e.g. pricing, descriptions, compliance).

Automation Workflows

• Triggered after a product update is submitted.

• Execute automated actions: modify attributes, notify users, release, categorise, etc.

• Ideal for enforcing business logic and consistency.

3. Creating an Approval Workflow

Permissions: Only users with Administrator rights can create approval workflows.

Steps:

1. Navigate to Admin → Products → Workflows.

2. Click New Workflow.

3. Choose Approval as the workflow type.

4. Enter a Name (and optional description).

5. The canvas begins with two tiles: Start and Accept.
   

Constructing the workflow:

• From Start, drag a leg to a new tile.

• Choose a Transition mode.
  

  • Always — unconditional move forward

  • On Condition — only transition if defined conditions are met

• If conditional, define:

  • Property: attribute, lifecycle stage, categorisation, etc.

  • Comparator: equals, greater than, not empty, etc.

  • Value: constant, function, or attribute reference
    

• Add as many conditions as needed on a single transition.

Adding approval logic:

• Insert an Approve step.
  

• Configure:

  • Timeout period (how long to wait for decision)

  • Approval group / users (who gets the request)

• The Approve tile supports three possible outputs:

  • Approved (green)

  • Rejected (red)

  • Timed out (yellow)

• You can branch from each outcome tile, e.g.:

  • On Approved → apply change, notify, release

  • On Rejected → rollback, notify requester

  • On Timeout → escalate or take default path

• Continue building further steps as needed (notifications, modify, release, etc.).
  

4. Creating an Automation Workflow

Permissions: Only Administrators can create automation workflows.

Steps:

1. Go to Admin → Products → Workflows.

2. Click New Workflow.

3. Select Automation as the type.

4. Give it a Name and optional description.

5. You’ll start with a single Start tile on the canvas.

Building steps:

• Click Start, drag a leg to place the next tile.

• Choose the Transition mode.
  

  • Always — always proceed

  • On Condition — requires condition(s) to follow this path

• If conditional:

  • Define Property, Comparator, Value

  • Combine multiple conditions in that leg
    

• Continue dragging out more steps - you can chain multiple nodes in a linear fashion or branch into parallel paths.
  

5. Actions You Can Use in Workflows

Workflows support an extensive set of actions. You can mix and match them to achieve complex logic.

Some points to note:

• A Modify action within a workflow does not itself trigger further workflows.

• Release only acts if the product is not already released to that channel.

• You can chain workflows or decision tables to achieve more control - e.g. one workflow triggers a decision table, which then triggers another workflow.

• Workflows only act on the product that triggered them (though they may access parent/child information).

• Multi-value attributes (e.g. multi-select, media sets) are not accessible via workflow logic under current constraints.

6. Best Practices & Tips

Use these tips to design workflows that are reliable, maintainable, and clear:

• Set a trigger in the Schema
  A workflow must be bound to a schema via a trigger (on create, delete, update, or specific attribute updates) for it to execute.

• Evaluation order matters
  Workflow legs (transitions) are evaluated in the order they were created - not based on canvas layout (left-to-right or top-to-bottom).

• Chain workflows and decision tables
  Use Workflow or Decision Table actions to control execution order or modularise logic.

• Linear vs branched workflows

  • Linear: one chain of steps

  • Branching: multiple legs diverging for different conditions or paths

• Modular design helps maintainability
  Break large workflows into smaller, focused ones and chain them.

• Use clear naming and descriptions
  Make it easy for future users to understand what a workflow does.

• Limit excessive triggers
  Only trigger when needed (e.g. attribute-level triggers) to reduce performance load.

• Test before enabling broadly
  Try workflows on a small set of products or sandbox to catch logic errors.

• Monitor and review
  Watch for workflows with high failure or timeout rates and refine conditions or paths.

7. Common Workflow Scenarios

Here are some workflow patterns you may find useful or adapt in your instance:

a) Price Change Approval Before Release

1. User updates Retail Price attribute.

2. Approval workflow fires: checks that new price > 0.

3. Product change is held until approval.

   • If Approved → modify attribute, then automate release

   • If Rejected → notify user and revert

   • If Timeout → escalate or default to rejection

b) Enrichment + Channel Release

1. User adds missing title, description, image.

2. Automation workflow triggers when all required attributes are non-empty.

3. Workflow sequence:

   • Modify or derive additional fields (e.g. generate SEO summary)

   • Categorise product

   • Move to next lifecycle stage

   • Release to eCommerce channel

c) Notification on Status Change

1. A product moves to stage “Needs Photography”.

2. Automation workflow triggers a Notify action to the photography team.

3. When images are complete and attribute updated, another workflow can release or move stage.

d) Chain Workflows / Decision Tables

You might have:

• Workflow A: data validation and enrichment

• Decision Table: determines routing logic based on product type or region

• Workflow B: release and categorisation

You can link them via Workflow or Decision Table actions so execution follows your intended order.