Commercial facts often start in ERP, while engineering and compliance truth frequently starts upstream in PLM/QMS/EHS or DAM. But once a truth changes, it still has to traverse PIM, CPQ, middleware, flat-file exports, EDI feeds, APIs, and distributor portals before it becomes customer-facing reality.
The often-hidden problem is whether truth propagates predictably, measurably, and verifiably across every surface where your products are quoted, sold, or specified.
A Product Truth SLA applies service-level discipline to volatile product facts. It defines how fast a truth-changing event must be detected, approved, and reflected across every governed publish surface, plus what happens when it is not.
Where Product Truth Breaks
Common examples:
- Lead time updated in ERP at 9:10 AM, distributor portals still show the old lead time at 2:00 PM.
- New price effective date is approved internally, but a legacy flat-file export continues sending the prior price to a partner feed.
- Approved substitute exists in engineering/PLM or item cross-reference data, but CPQ rules and quoting tools never get updated.
- Compliance certificate expires, but it is still downloadable on distributor sites.
- An EDI/API/flat-file partner feed partially fails, ingestion “succeeds” with missing fields, nobody notices until an escalation.
If you cannot prove the change propagated, the market is still operating on the old truth.
What a Product Truth SLA Looks Like
Most Product Truth SLAs are measured across three clocks:
- Detect: Time from a truth-changing event to organizational awareness (log, alert, queue, ticket).
- Decide: Time from awareness to approval (owner validation, exception handling).
- Publish: Time from approval to confirmed reflection across governed surfaces.
Product Truth SLA example for a compliance attribute:
- Detect: The SDS for Tier A SKU ABC-123 is replaced in the PIM/DAM (v6 → v7). An alert is generated within 15 minutes when the new document is published, and the old one is retired.
- Decide: Regulatory validates the SDS and approves the publication within 4 business hours for Tier A SKUs.
- Publish: Within 2 hours of approval, the manufacturer portal reflects the new SDS link, the distributor feed export contains the new SDS URL, and the prior SDS URL is removed from both.
- Fallback: If publish proof is missing or the old SDS is still accessible downstream, display “Documentation pending” and require review or block checkout for regulated SKUs like ABC-123 until validation passes.
- Proof: Store timestamps for approval and export completion, plus a validation check confirming the manufacturer portal displays the v7 SDS link (and not v6) and the distributor feed contains the v7 SDS URL (and not v6).
The point is operational specificity: a defined event, measurable clocks, a fallback behavior, and proof.
The Workflow: How It Actually Works
This is the minimum playbook most manufacturers can run without turning it into a multi-year program.
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Define truth-changing events
Build the list by system and attribute, for example:
- ERP: cost, lead time, allocation, status (active, discontinued), supersessions
- PIM: sell copy, attributes, docs, category assignment
- CPQ: price logic, eligibility, configuration constraints
- Compliance systems: certification status, market restrictions
- Integration layer: EDI mappings, API schemas, file exports
Output: A table that says Event → Owner → Source fields → Downstream surfaces → SLA window.
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Assign owners and approval rules
This is where real org boundaries get documented, not hand-waved:
- Pricing approval: Finance
- Lead time and allocation: Operations
- Compliance and restrictions: Engineering or Regulatory
- Publish operations: IT or Digital Ops
Output: “Who decides” is explicit, including exceptions.
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Instrument detect, decide, publish
This is the “proof” layer that prevents guesswork:
- Log aggregation across ERP, PIM, middleware, EDI, and feed processors
- Attribute-level diff checks between source-of-truth and published surfaces
- Schema validation to catch truncation, unit formatting, and mapping breaks
- Monitoring of API response codes, EDI acknowledgments, ingestion receipts
- Alerting when publish time exceeds SLA windows
Output: A dashboard of SLA compliance by event type and channel.
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Validate the downstream surfaces that matter
Your ERP being correct is not the finish line. The finish line is the channel surface.
Governed surfaces often include:
- Distributor portals and partner extranets
- Marketplace listings (when applicable)
- Manufacturer-run portals and commerce
- Customer support tools that reference product truth (docs, status, restrictions)
Validation methods can include portal checks, feed reconciliation, ingestion confirmations, and differential audits.
Start Small: Top 100 SKU Pilot
The fastest path to traction is a focused pilot:
- Pick Top 100 revenue or highest-risk SKUs
- Choose 3 truth-changing event types (pricing, lead time, compliance, substitutions, allocation)
- Define SLA windows and fallback behaviors for governed channels
- Implement publish proof (validation checks) per surface
- Run a disruption drill: change a value at 2:00 PM and measure real propagation end-to-end
Reality check: If a major pricing, lead time, or compliance change happens at 2:00 PM today, how long until each governed channel reflects it, who approved it, and what is your proof it propagated correctly?
Product Truth SLA Program (what we do): Layer One helps manufacturers identify truth-changing events, document owners and approval rules, define governed publish surfaces, set measurable SLA windows, and implement proof (instrumentation + validation) so approved changes can be verified across ERP, PIM/CPQ, and distributor channels.
Let’s start with a focused snapshot of your highest-risk SKUs.