Synchronize products

When you sell through a webshop, each item must exist in both your webshop and Business Central. The product records must be linked so that both systems recognize them as the same item.

Before you start processing webshop orders, decide which system is your source of truth for product data. That is the system for creating, updating, and deleting your products. Tinx Connector then lets you replicate the item to the other side and establish a match between the two records. Without this match, Tinx Connector cannot convert incoming webshop orders into Business Central sales orders.

This article covers both directions of the synchronization. However, most companies choose Business Central as the source of truth for products, so they publish products from Business Central to the webshop. Downloading products from the webshop to Business Central is typically used during the initial setup by companies that already have products in their webshop.

Webshop Item Card page and Item by Sales Channel page

Tinx Connector offers three options to manage your product information in Business Central. If you have one sales channel, you can use either the standard Item Card page or the Webshop Item Card page. If you have multiple sales channels, use the Item by Sales Channel page.

Access the Webshop Item Card page from the Webshop Item List page, and the Item by Sales Channel page from the Items by Sales Channel list.

The Tinx Connector Webshop Item Card page is based on the Item table 27, just like the standard Item Card. The Webshop Item Card page is the e-commerce-optimized version. On the action bar, in the Webshop group, you can find different PIM features in Tinx Connector. For more information, see Product information management. In the Links group, you can find the actions to enable cross-selling or up-selling. You can also switch to the standard Item Card page by choosing the Default Item Page action in the Home group.

The Item by Sales Channel page allows you to manage the product information separately for each sales channel. The following screenshots show the item AT-DC-CND-AMB, which can have different attributes, images, or web text on two separate sales channels: Shopify and WooCommerce. For example, you might need to describe the same item differently on different sales channels.

Enable product synchronization

The procedures in this article require that the appropriate synchronization dashboard and message definitions are running. Activate them depending on what you are going to achieve.

The following tables show the synchronization dashboard and message definition for some of the webshops. The codes for other supported webshops follow the same pattern.

Publishing products from Business Central to your webshop

You can publish items from Business Central to your webshop from the Items page or from the Item by Sales Channel page. Use the Items page if you have a single webshop (not Shopify). Use Item by Sales Channel if you manage multiple sales channels or use Shopify.

To publish an item from the Items page

1. Select Search (Alt+Q) in the upper-right corner, enter Items, and then choose the related link.
2. For the item you want to publish, select the Publish to Webshop check box.

To publish an item from the Item by Sales Channel list

1. Select Search (Alt+Q) in the upper-right corner, enter Items by Sales Channel, and then choose the related link.
2. On the Items by Sales Channel page, find the item you want to publish and select the related line. If the list is empty or you can’t find the item, choose the Insert Item action, select the sales channel in the Sales Channel Filter field, then choose OK.
3. Select the Publish to Webshop checkbox.

After you publish from the Items list or the Items by Sales Channel list, the appropriate message definition detects the change and places a message on the Record Queue page. For more information, see Record queue. Depending on your TINX NAS Outbound Mgt job setup, the message is processed during the next scheduled run, typically within one minute. After creating the product in the webshop, Tinx Connector updates the Webshop Product ID field with the value assigned by the webshop. This confirms that the item has been successfully published and matched between Business Central and your webshop. In most cases, the Webshop Product ID is populated with the product ID assigned by the webshop. However, depending on the webshop, the value can be a GUID in Shopware or a boolean (true/false) in some other webshops.

When using Shopify, WooCommerce and Magento, see the following information.

For Shopify: Option to save product as a draft

On the Items by Sales Channel page, Tinx Connector does not select the Is Active checkbox by default. You have two options:

• Select the Is Active checkbox manually to create a product in Shopify immediately after publishing.
• Leave the Is Active checkbox unselected to save it as a draft in Shopify and update the collection.

For WooCommerce: Different message definitions

There are different message definitions on the WOO-OUT-PRODUCTS synchronization dashboard, depending on the way you publish your items.

• Use WOO-020 and WOO-024 for the items published from the Items list.
• Use WOO-021 and WOO-022 for the items published from the Item by Sales Channel list.

For Magento: Before publishing

You must complete the following in Business Central before you can publish a product.

• Assign an item to an Attribute Set. For more information, see Attribute sets.
• Select the correct Product Type on the Web Item Extension page.

Importing products from your webshop to Business Central

If you already have products set up in your webshop, you can download this data into Business Central using Tinx Connector during the initial setup. Also, use this option when the product information is managed in your webshop rather than in Business Central. Some companies choose the webshop as the source of truth for product information. For more information, see How the integration works. Downloaded product data is stored on the Webshop Products page (table 11205274), which contains the links between Business Central and your webshop.

The following procedure applies the recommended approach, where the Item No. in Business Central is equal to the Webshop SKU. If you can’t apply this approach, you can use an alternative identifier. In this case, the message definition mapping must be configured to use a different identifier, such as an item reference based on a barcode. The mapping then downloads the identifier from the webshop, compares it with Business Central, and writes back the matched item number.

To download products from your webshop and match them with Business Central items

1. Select Search (Alt+Q) in the upper-right corner, enter Synchronisation Dashboard List, and then choose the related link.

2. Open the Synchronisation Dashboard List page and select the dashboard with the message definition related to publishing products. For more information, see Enable product synchronization.

3. On the Synchronisation Dashboard page, on the General FastTab, in the Processing Policy field, select Manual, and then clear the Active checkboxes of the message definitions that are responsible for publishing products. This blocks the automatic publishing of the newly created items.

4. Create new items in Business Central for each product in your webshop that you want to synchronize. For more information, see Register new items.

   Each item must have the item number equal to the webshop SKU. This allows Tinx Connector to match the webshop product with the correct item in Business Central right after the download.

5. Ensure the synchronization dashboards and message definition related to webshop product import are active. For more information, see Enable product synchronization.

6. Wait for the message to download the products. To check the imported products, select Search (Alt+Q) in the upper-right corner, enter Webshop Products List, and then choose the related link.

7. On the Webshop Products page, verify the list of products downloaded from your webshop.

   Each line represents a link between an item in Business Central and a product in your webshop. The Webshop SKU and Item No. fields are used to match products between the webshop and Business Central. Check whether the new items are correctly matched to the imported webshop products. The following image shows an example of the import.

   

   There are two products identified by different Webshop SKU and Webshop Product ID values. These two products represent two different scenarios of matching webshop products with items in Business Central.

   • LT-FLR-ARC has the same Item No. in Business Central, so Tinx Connector automatically matched the webshop product to the item. If the webshop is your source of truth for products, use the same product identifier in both the webshop and Business Central.
   • LT-PND-CRM has no value in the Name field. This means the webshop product has not yet been matched to any item in Business Central. Tinx Connector filled in the Item No. with the default value, which matches the Webshop SKU. You must either create a new item with the same item number as the Webshop SKU or manually match the webshop product with an existing item. For more information, see To resolve unmatched products in webshop orders.

8. If you have only one sales channel, on the Webshop Products page, on the action bar, in the Functions group, choose the Update Items (T27) and Variants (5401) action.

   This updates each new item card with the webshop product ID. TINX Publish to Webshop and TINX Webshop Product ID fields are populated on the Items list. Your webshop products and items in Business Central are matched. The following example shows the LT-FLR-ARC item matched in the previous step. Use this action only if you are running one sales channel. You need to modify the message definition if you have more sales channels. For more information, see To configure the GQL-180 message definition for multiple sales channels.

   

To configure the GQL-180 message definition for multiple sales channels

The Update Items (T27) and Variants (5401) action allows you to update the item card with the webshop product ID only if you have a single sales channel. If you manage multiple sales channels, you need to modify the message definition mapping to ensure that the correct webshop product ID is written to the correct item card for each sales channel.

1. Select Search (Alt+Q) in the upper-right corner, enter Synchronisation Dashboard List, and then choose the related link.

2. On the Synchronisation Dashboard List page, select the GQL_IN_OTHER dashboard, and then choose the Edit action.

3. On the Synchronisation Dashboard page, on the Lines FastTab, select the GQL-180 and then choose the Message Definition action.

4. On the Message Definition page, on the Lines FastTab, add a new line, and then in the Table No. field, select the 11205331, which is the TINX Item by Sales Channel table.

5. On the action bar, choose the Links action.

6. On the Document Line Link set up the links between the fields on the Item by Sales Channel page (TINX Item by Sales Channel table 11205331), and the Webshop Products page (TINX Product table 11205274).

   The following screenshot shows the links required for multiple sales channels.

7. Close the Document Line Link page to return to the Message Definition page, and then choose the assist edit button in the Element Name field.

8. On the Object Children page, select Up.

   

9. On the next page select nodes and then choose OK.

10. On the Message Definition page, on the Lines FastTab, on the action bar, in the Line group, choose the Indent action.

    The following screenshot shows the new setup of the GQL-180 message definition.

    

Orders with products not matched with items in Business Central

If a webshop order contains a product with no matching item in Business Central, Tinx Connector imports the order into the Webshop Orders page and sets the Blocked Order field to Yes. The order is blocked and is not converted to a sales order until the item is matched. The following image shows the orders imported into the Webshop Orders page. For more information, see Customer and item matching.

To resolve the issue of unmatched products in webshop orders

1. Select Search (Alt+Q) in the upper-right corner, enter Webshop Orders, and then choose the related link.

2. On the Webshop Orders page, find the order with the unmatched product, and select Yes in the Blocked Order field.

3. On the Webshop Sales Order Lines page, find the lines with the blocked items, and copy the values in the Webshop SKU field.

   This is the product identifier from the webshop. The item number in Business Central should match the value of this Webshop SKU. There are two options:

   • To create a new item in Business Central, follow the steps in this procedure.
   • To match an item with the item number that doesn’t match the Webshop SKU, see To manually match a webshop product with an item in Business Central.

4. Create a new item in Business Central with the same item number copied from the Webshop SKU field in the previous step. Fill in the required fields on the item card. For more information, see Register new items.

5. To create the Webshop Products entry for the new item, run steps 5–8 of To download products from your webshop and match them with Business Central items.

6. Open the Webshop Sales Order Lines page again, and clear the Item Blocked checkbox for the lines with the unmatched products. Wait for the next job queue run to process the webshop order again.

To manually match a webshop product with an item in Business Central

If you have a webshop product with a corresponding item in Business Central, but the item number and webshop SKU don’t match, you can link them manually on the Webshop Products page.

1. Select Search (Alt+Q) in the upper-right corner, enter Webshop Products, and then choose the related link.
2. On the Webshop Products page, select the New action.
3. In the new line, fill in the Item No. and Webshop Product ID. If necessary, fill in the Variant Code and Unit of Measure Code.

Related information

Customer and item matching
Synchronize attributes
Synchronize images
Synchronize web text and SEO
Key concepts in Tinx Connector
Troubleshooting checklist