If your database includes categories for the products in it or has entries which can be used as categories, then you can import products completely automatically.
In this mode the Wizard will import the products and automatically create the departments required, based on categories in your database.
If you later re-import the same products, they will be updated regardless of their location.
A department will be created for each category.
However: Each category must have a unique name for this to work. Otherwise departments will be overwriting each other. The wizard can also create sub-departments. Simply create the sub-departments by separating them from the parent department with a / . This requires ImportWizard Pro.
The uniqueness of products are determined by the "Item Number" field of the ShopFactory.
You need to map the column in the database your importing from. If any item has an empty "Item Number", Import wizard will assign a value to such item such as 'genid_xx' where xx is an integer value, and the assigned values for two of such items are distinguished from each other.
Note of caution:Let us say you are selling computers and you have hardware for PCs and Apple. In your existing database you have categories which define a product as PC or Apple, and sub categories which state if it is software or hardware.
If you now select sub category as category for the import (after all it is the closest category describing the product), then the two departments will be joined in ShopFactory, as Import Wizard can not tell them apart since both are called Hardware) . It would need a category listing such as PC/ hardware and Apple/hardware to tell them apart — or semi manual import where you have to adjust this in ShopFactory after the import.
This method allows you to completely control, which products go into which departments of your shop.
When you now use the import wizard, you will import the product information directly into the departments. So in the Wizard you select the department, then you locate the products in your existing database, and click on the + button, to add the selected Products automatically to the selected department.
Department and Sub-departments can be specified in the database.
For a product to be imported into the sales sub-department in the test department;'test/sales' should be the department field.
If you have imported product information from an existing database, you may want to at times update some of the information in ShopFactory, for example by importing only updated prices.
This works of course best in fully automatic import mode, but can also be done in semi automatic mode.
Simply open the Wizard, select the configuration file created for the first import, and go to the mapping tool.
Map the product name and if required the category, the price and any other fields which need updating. If you do not want information to be re-imported, for example because you have made changes in ShopFactory which you do not want to have overwritten, simply de-select these fields by setting the drop down menu to display the empty field.
Then continue with the import, as with a new import.
Your ImportWizard can import most product and page information.
Below you will find a list all all supported data types.
Here you will find some sample files: Download samples file.
A code which allows grouping products based on a specific type for example to apply discounts
An example file to see how to set up a database with option & choices is "exop.xls". This has 2 options and 3 choices for each option.
Choose the maximum number of different options available for the products and the maximum number of choices to be offered for any of these options.
For example: 1 Option & 2 Choices You will need a column for each of the following:
This field is a number which controls a range of things about the option including;
Below are the values you can use:
Example:
Entering the value 22 in the field will create an option which uses a radio button to select it. The option will be visible in the shop and required.