Shopify Integration Information & Understanding Navigation

Shopify Integration Information & Understanding Navigation

This article explains what data is exported from Retailer and what field it will appear as within Shopify.
Info
To configure the Tower Web Connect (TWC) link please see: Setting up a new Webstore

Stock Item Data

Retailer stock items that have 'Webstore' ticked can be sent to Shopify with the following information:

Key Data

Retailer
Shopify
Description 
Product Title
Web Description 
Product Description
Retail or Web Price 
Price
Barcode 
SKU and/or Barcode
Images 
Product Images
Quantity On Hand
OR Static Quantity
Available Stock on Hand
OR Continue selling when out of stock


Extra Product Details

Retailer Shopify
Variants  Variants
Required customer choice. e.g. Size, Colour, Style
Classifications 
Metafields
Optional product info used for website product filters e.g. product specs.
Tags
Tags
Optional product info used for website product filters & another way to create product ranges
Tag starting with "Brand_"
Vendor (a.k.a. Brand)
Assign one brand to a product. Used for SEO product discovery, website product filters and product ranges.
Weight
Weight
Calculated Shipping or Flat rate shipping based on weight
Kits
Product Bundle 
Allow customers to mix and match products
Stock Item Catalogue Price
Compare at Price (a.k.a. Sale Price) 
Show SALE Product badges. RRP (Web or Retail Price) & Sale Price 

Product Ranges

Retailer Shopify
Department  Collection, Product Type or Metafield
Product ranges, website product filters.
Category  Collection, Product Type, Metafield or Tag
Product ranges, website product filters.


Info
Tips - Before you load lots of stock
  1. Ensure Department & Category names make sense by themselves - Think unique & SEO Friendly.
    e.g. Pet store selling Cat and Dog products
    ❌ "Dry Food" - will mix both Cat and Dog dry food products
    ✅ "Dry Dog Food" - ensures there is a separate range is defined for Dogs
    Webstore advice: How to write Product & Collection descriptions that are SEO friendly & informative for customers

  2. Avoid loading stock data with missing or incomplete data.
    Product and Collections handles (the URL of the website page) will use the first title synced. While you can amend this later, loading it right the first time will save you time.
    ❌"Guardian Angel" → /product/guardian-angel
    ✅"Willow Tree - Guardian Angel"  → /product/willow-tree-guardian-angel
    ✅"Willow Tree Guardian Angel Figurine  → /product/willow-tree-guardian-angel-figurine

  3. Check your site as you make changes.
    When starting off - Work on varied items & ensure they're working as expected. Then, continue to load stock. 
    When your site is live - Continue to review menu links or featured product ranges

  4. Keep it consistent & get everyone on the same page.
    Once you're happy with how things are looking, have products that staff members can refer to.     Consider writing up a short guide.
 

Additional for Variants

Variants allow you to give customers up to 3 options within one product.
While the setup may require extra effort, it significantly improves the customer’s online experience.
Tip: Be sure to check important Variant info below before you get started
Important things to consider for Variants
Enter web information in the main variant item only. Shopify does not offer descriptions and tags per variant. Only images.
Tip: If your product has specs, include dimensions in variant names or simply list within the parent web description.

One image per variant allowed. While the main variant can have multiple images (including the ones from the other variants), the other individual variants can only have one image attached.

Variant Groups. Shopify allows for 3 variant groups, with a total limit of 250 images and 2,048 combinations per product.

Variant sort order. Due to the nature of the connection, variant types will be ordered by the length of the variant name.
Idea
If you want to maintain the original order, you can change the variant names to be more descriptive (make some longer).
Colour
Shirt Size
Fashion Style

No blank variant values. In Retailer, any variant ticked as Webstore cannot have a blank variant value.

All variants available in a variant group will be available for webstore.

Unpublishing behaviour for variants. When all items of a variant group have run out of stock - the unpublish option in TWC won't hide or unpublish the variants, as this is not the expected Shopify behaviour & causes issues with the variant sync.

Changing already synced stock items to variants requires changes in Shopify too. To change/convert an existing item already on the website, from a normal stock item to a variant, the item must be deleted off the website and then re-created by the link.

Info
View advice sheet here - Variants (Colour, Size and Style) 


Additional for Classifications

If you're looking to enhance product visibility by highlighting products specs or additional website filters, Classifications are a great way to sync Shopify Metafields. Alternately, you can manage Metafields direct in Shopify.

InfoView advice sheet here - Stock Classification

Understanding Shopify Collections, Filters & Navigation

What are Collections?

Shopify uses ‘Collections’ to group products.  Collections are standalone product ranges used to create main navigation links and showcase products throughout your site. Collections can display product filters based on available stock data.

Collection Setup

Idea
Save time by using Retailer structure!
  1. Retailer & TWC Managed (Recommended):  Sync Departments and Categories as main Collections. Retailer stock changes update synced Collections automatically. Extend ranges in Shopify as needed.
  2. Shopify Managed:  Ignore Retailer structure completely & use stock data to manage collections in Shopify. Collections need to be established & stock data maintained.
Examples of extending or creating online product ranges
Ongoing ranges to create interest: e.g. Sale, Gifts Ideas, Gifts under $50
Limited time offerings: e.g. Mother's Day, Black Friday, Cyber Monday, Christmas, Brand/Range on Sale
Further group collections for large menus: e.g. Outdoors, Home, Pet

Some ways to collect products:
  1. Use keywords in product title or product type to collect products. 
  2. Use sale price or price to collect products
  3. Use tag or metafield to collect products.

Navigation Links & Collections

While web products are sent through at one level, you can easily create up to 3 levels of menu links based on stock data. An example of 2-level menu is one where Department collections are main links and Categories are dropdowns. If you have a larger catalogue or wish to highlight product ranges, you can take

Customer Data

Alert
There are Shopify plan limitations & other factors that restrict Customer data import functions
  1. Customer information isn't uploaded or synced from Retailer to Shopify.
  2. Most customer information recorded on the sale in Shopify, will be added to Retailer when the sale imports into Retailer. This will generally be names, addresses and contact details. This is plan dependent.
  3. The customer will be added as new, if the email address against the sale is not recorded in Retailer.
  4. The loyalty program, discount voucher, gift voucher and discount profiles information, is not synced or tracked with Shopify.

Kits

Kit Items can sync to Shopify as a Product Bundle. 

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