Retrieving Data from External Platform

Much of the setup and processing we discuss is based on data starting in Business Central and pushing out to the external platform.  However, there are things that can originate on the platform and be brought into Business Central. 

Loading CSM Listings from WooCommerce

It is possible to import product information from your connected WooCommerce platform into Business Central, then create CSM listings from this data. You can then link these CSM listings to Business Central items. This is useful if you have already created products on your WooCommerce platform, and would prefer to use this external platform, rather than Business Central, as the basis for your CSM listings.

Note: the process of importing listing information from WooCommerce and into Business Central is meant to assist in the initial setup of your CSM listing management module. For the ongoing maintenance of products between platforms, we recommend using Business Central as the primary source and then exporting data to WooCommerce.

To load listings from WooCommerce:

• Open the CSM sales channel that represents your WooCommerce platform
• From the Related ribbon, select Setup Actions and then choose Load Products From Channel
• On the Get Listings from Channel page, confirm the correct sales channel has been selected, then choose OK

CSM will import product data from WooCommerce and create a separate CSM listing record for each product. The external ID for each listing will be populated with the unique identification number assigned by WooCommerce. In addition, any product listing availability default settings that are defined for the sales channel will be assigned to these new CSM listings.

• Open each CSM listing, and on the General FastTab, enter the corresponding Business Central item number in the No. field to link the CSM listing to an item.

Note: you can automate this linkage prior to loading items from WooCommerce by assigning the product’s channel item SKU as one of the Business Central item’s item identifiers. When CSM creates a new listing with data from WooCommerce, it will determine if any Business Central items have an item identifier that shares that listing’s channel item SKU; if it can find a match, it will assign the item to the new listing.

Retrieving External Inventory

You can retrieve a product’s inventory as it is entered in WooCommerce. In this way, you can determine whether any discrepancies exist between an item’s Business Central and WooCommerce quantities. A CSM listing record must have an assigned external ID in order to properly communicate with the WooCommerce platform to retrieve this information.

• Open the relevant CSM listing
• From the Actions ribbon, choose External Inventory then choose Get External Inventory Supply

Note: You can also perform this action against multiple listing records at once from the CSM Listings page by selecting all items you want to perform the action against and following the menu path above. 

CSM will retrieve the on-hand product quantity from WooCommerce and present it in the External Inventory On-Hand field on the Inventory Information FastTab.

Any selected CSM listings that do not have an assigned external ID will not be included as part of this retrieval process.

Alternatively, you can instruct CSM to automatically retrieve external inventory information for a CSM listing record by enabling the Auto Retrieve Channel Inventory field on the CSM Listing page’s Inventory Information FastTab. When the CSM automation routines are executed, external information for any listings that have this setting enabled will be retrieved from WooCommerce.

Retrieving Configurable Items from WooCommerce

Executing the Load Products from Channel action for a sales channel retrieves all products from the connected eCommerce platform and creates corresponding CSM listings in Business Central. This includes any configurable items that you have set up in WooCommerce. CSM creates a number of different records in Business Central for each retrieved configurable item:

• CSM listings are created for the top-level parent configurable item as well as each child variation.
• CSM listing attributes are created for the configurable item’s variable These attributes are assigned to the newly created CSM listing records.

As with any CSM listing that is retrieved from WooCommerce, it is necessary for you to associate configurable item listings to Business Central items or variants by using the Type and No. fields on the General FastTab to select the relevant record.

It is also possible for you to retrieve configurable attributes and children from WooCommerce for an existing CSM listing. The listing must have the following values:

• Channel Product Type: this is set to Configurable.
• External ID: this is populated with a value that connects the listing to a WooCommerce product. 

Choose the Actions ribbon, then choose the Retrieve Information from Channel menu and execute the following functions in order:

• Get Configurable Attributes: this retrieves the product’s configurable attributes and their values.  New CSM listing attributes are created for these records. In addition, these attributes are assigned to the configurable CSM listing.
• Get Variants for Listing: this retrieves the configurable variations that exist for the product in WooCommerce. These variations are entered as separate CSM listings in Business Central. These listings are structured as children of the top-level parent configurable listing. The relevant attributes and their values will also be assigned to each new CSM listing.

Next: CSM Listing Synchronization History