Data lineage tracks the origin, transformations, and destinations of data, providing a complete audit trail for compliance, quality, and understanding data flows.
Data lineage refers to the lifecycle of data, tracking its origin, where it moves, how it's transformed, and its ultimate destination. It provides a comprehensive audit trail that explains what happened to data over time, including all changes, aggregations, and derivations. This traceability is essential for understanding data quality, validating data accuracy, and ensuring compliance with regulatory requirements. By visualizing data flows, from initial source systems (e.g., ERP, supplier feeds) through intermediate stages (e.g., PIM, data warehouses) to final consumer applications (e.g., e-commerce storefronts, analytics tools), data lineage offers transparency into the entire data journey.
In e-commerce, maintaining high-quality and trustworthy product data is paramount. Data lineage helps businesses understand the reliability of their product information, especially when data is sourced from multiple external systems and undergoes various enrichment processes within a PIM. It enables e-commerce teams to quickly identify the root cause of data errors on product pages, verify compliance with industry standards (e.g., for sustainability claims), and track the impact of data transformations. This transparency ensures that product data presented to customers is accurate, consistent, and compliant, building trust and reducing returns or customer service inquiries related to misinformation.