CE Pro July 2022 - 60

Channel
TIPS | EDUCATION & EVENTS | DISTRIBUTION
New CEPro-iQ Offers
Searchable Product
Database
Website portal features hundreds of
thousands of SKUs and detailed product
information centralized for dealers to
access. By Jason Knott
WOULDN'T IT BE GREAT if
there was a single web portal
where a custom integrator
can do direct product
comparisons when creating
a project product list instead
of having to open multiple
browsers to view 10 manufacturers'
websites? Well
now there is. CEPro-iQ is a
new portal that draws from
the successful AV-iQ centralized
database with hundreds
of thousands of SKUs
to display detailed product
information for the residential
integration industry.
CEPro-iQ also can create
custom catalogs for integrators
to embed on their
own websites that drive
them to top of the Google
search rankings.
CEPro-iQ (cepro-iq.com)
is born from AV-iQ, which
has been around for 20
years in the commercial AV
space and boasts 400,000
products from hundreds
of brands. The site is used
by not only integrators
but by decision-maker end
60 | CE Pro July 2022
users seeking out solutions
for their facilities, as well
as by architects looking to
build technology into their
designs. Emerald, owners of
CE Pro and the CEDIA Expo,
purchased AV-iQ in 2021.
" We've been around for
so long and I've always
believed this is a platform
that could be applicable
to many different industries, "
says AV-iQ business
development lead Mark
Loftus. " With the acquisition
by Emerald, the easiest and
smartest place to start was
to sidestep into the residential
AV and custom install
market. We already work
with a lot of commercial
manufacturers that make a
lot of product lines for the
residential space. Combine
that with the fact that CE
Pro has been around for 30
years as the leading publication
in the space, and CEDIA
Expo is the No. 1 tradeshow,
it made the most sense to
create a digital platform for
the database of product
CEPro-iQ's searchable database is free. For $150 per month,
integrators can embed custom catalogs into their own websites,
resulting in higher Google search rankings.
information for residential
integration space. "
Loftus says CEPro-iQ is the
first new launch, but others
will be coming based on other
brands in Emerald's portfolio.
One unique opportunity
is for integrators to use
CEPro-iQ to elevate their
own website's Google search
rankings. Dealers can embed
a catalog of the equipment
they use onto their own
sites as a searchable list
for customers to see. The
embedding is seamless so
it appears the user is still
on the dealer's website but
is on cepro-iq.com. It does
not affect the speed of the
integrators website or open a
new browser. By embedding
the catalog, it lifts the SEO of
the dealer's website, which is
vital given that most clients
begin their journey to custom
installation with online
searches for products.
Loftus says a typical integrator's
website might have a
handful of pages that Google
scans. When a CEPro-iQ
catalog is embedded, Google
registers thousands of additional
pages to the integrator's
website, which boosts
the ranking position. The
catalog embedding costs
around $150 per month.
The onboarding process
for CEPro-iQ is simple.
Once the dealer has signed
up, he or she gets access to
an admin tool where they
tick off the brands and the
lines that they carry and
want in the catalog. The
CEPro-iQ team works with
the dealers to design the
catalog to mimic the look
and feel of the dealer's
website, then simply give
the URL to the dealer to
put in the navigation on
their website. Loftus says
most dealers will call it a
" Product Catalog " or " Product
Directory. " The only
pricing exposed is MSRPs.
For the consumers who
come to the site, they can
select the products they are
interested in and outreach
for installation.
cepro.com
http://www.cepro-iq.com http://www.cepro-iq.com http://www.cepro.com
CE Pro July 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of CE Pro July 2022
