Vend Opencart Integration Manual

Advance Search

You can search for a specific item with the following search criteria:

• Source Category
• Item SKU
• Item Description
• Item Keyword
• Parent SKU
• Brand
• Marketplace
• Item Status
• Location
• Style
• In stock?
• Supplier
• Date Added
• Price Range
• Stock Level
• Image Status
• Custom Fields
• Store

If Product items are not shown after doing search, it means that the product item is not yet synced from the POS. Also, make sure that in searching items, you are using the correct Item SKU or Parent SKU. Example below shows that item is not yet found in Octopus Bridge.

Edit Product

Clicking on Product SKU or Item Name will redirect you to ‘Edit product’ page. This is where you can edit products’ information that are linked from the POS to Octopus Bridge. You can perform the following actions in Edit Product page:

1. Edit Product Name: You can create new product name to be displayed in your E-commerce platform. Make sure to click on the box to prevent over-writing Product Name from the POS.
2. Create Parent SKU: Make sure to create a Parent SKU for creating matrix items.
3. Create Product Description: If you want to create a new description to be displayed in your E-commerce platform, make sure to check this box to prevent POS description from over-writing description in your E-commerce platform.
4. Matrix item attributes: If you are creating a matrix item, make sure to input Style Name and Style Value.
5. Upload Product Images: You can upload up to five images per item in Octopus. Make sure to reload page after uploading image/s.

Shopping Cart Module

Once you have selected and added your product items to a specific Shopping cart module or Marketplace module ‘bucket’, they will start appearing under the respective bucket. Images are shown below.

Marketplace Tab

Shopping Carts tab

Downloading Orders

Orders are downloaded automatically from the E-commerce platform to Octopus on a scheduled basis. You can also manually download orders from a specific E-commerce platform. Just click on the orders tab in the Shopping cart module you selected then click on the ‘Download orders from Shopify’ button.

Order Details

In order details page, you can view all the order information downloaded from the e-commerce platform to Octopus.

Order Details: Order details section contains the following information:

• Order No
• Order Date
• Current Order Status
• Billing Address
• Shipping Address
• Customer Contact Details
  

Order Summary: Order summary section contains the following information:

• SKU
• Identification number
• Seller SKU
• Description
• Quantity
• Unit Price
• Shipping Amount
• Tax
• Discount
• Grand Total

About Vend Integration

Vendhq is the web-based point-of-sale (POS) system that makes it simple to sell to your buyers and keep them coming back to your store again and again. This cloud-based POS system is widely used by brick-and-mortar retailers. It can be operated from any platform or device with the help of a web browser or by using Vend Register for iPad. It empowers merchants and other businesses to manage products, accept payments, track customers record, provide loyalty and run business analytics for real-time inputs into business performance. Merchants using Vendhq have access to a collection of more sophisticated tools that are powerful than the ERP systems used by retail giants, at a fraction of the cost.

Buying Opencart API extension

To connect octopus to Opencart, the opencart version should be 3.0 and above. The customer has to purchase the Opencart REST Admin API:

https://opencart-api.com/product/rest-admin-api/

While purchasing the API extension:

1. From Opencart version dropdown, select opencart 3.x
2. From API security dropdown, select Simple(Secret Key)

Installing the extension

1. After you buy the extension, you will receive an email with ZIP folder and order ID. Unzip the folder and upload this extension with the help of FTP. Once the installation is complete, go to Extensions from the left menu and select Modifications.

2. Click on the Refresh button on the top.

Generating Opencart API Key

AnOpencart Key is necessary to connect your Opencart store to Octopus. Please follow the steps below to create an API key.

1. Login to your Opencart Admin portal.

2. Click on Extensions from the left menu and select Extensions from the expanded menu.

3. From the Extension Type dropdown menu, select Modules.

4. In modules, go to Rest Admin API and click on the edit button.

5. Enter the Order ID received on the email in Your Order ID field and click on Activate License Click on the Generate API Secret key button.

6. Your Opencart API Secret Key will be generated.

Connect Octopus to Opencart

1. Go to https://gui.octopusbridge.com/octopus

2. Login using user octopus account credentials.

3. Once you have logged in, go to shopping carts/Opencart.

5. Click on settings and enter the following information

• Opencart Key: Enter your Opencart Secret API Key.
• Opencart Secret Key: Enter your Opencart Secret API key.
• Opencart Base URL: Enter your Opencart store URL.
• Enable Pass-through: When setting up the configuration for the first time, this option should be set to No.
• Setting No, means that any items uploaded from the POS to Octopus will remain at Channel level. These items will not be pushed to your Opencart platform unless it is done manually. This is the recommended setting while configuring the system for the first time.
• You also may set this to No if you have set up your POS to upload All items into Octopus, but you do not want to send All items, automatically, to your eCommerce platform. Setting this to No gives you the opportunity to make items web ready before publishing them to your website.
• Once you set it to Yes, any items uploaded from the POS will automatically be pushed to your Opencart platform. This is recommended only when the settings have been fully configured and tested.
• Sync Status: Select Enable

Opencart Product Module

In Product Management, when an Item is selected to be published to an eCommerce platform, it is first sent to the specific Shopping Cart Module (SCM). SCM for each supported shopping cart, including marketplaces such as Amazon and eBay, gives users the ability to define shopping cart specific rules.

These rules may vary based on the eCommerce platform that you are using. For example, Items being sent to Opencart may have a different Product Name, Prices, and Quantity as compared to items being sent to eBay.

Whereas ‘Product Management’ module shows all the products uploaded from the POS, Opencart Product module shows only those items that are actively synchronizing with Opencart.

1. Hover your mouse to the Shopping Carts tab
2. Select Opencart under the dropdown menu
3. Click on Opencart products

All Opencart Products

1. This screen shows items that have been enabled to sync with Opencart and should already be in sync. To manually publish items to Opencart, Select All Pages and Publish.
2. You can also use CheckBoxes to select a specific item to publish.
3. Product SKU: The dot is an indicator if a product is successfully synchronizing with the website. Green means successfully added while red means it is not successfully synced. If Red, you can use the Log files to troubleshoot.
4. Opencart ID:When an item has been successfully set up to sync with Opencart, it shows its Opencart ID. If an ID is missing, it means the item is not yet synced with Opencart.
5. Add Product to Opencart: This button allows you to add products to an Opencart website.
6. Search tab: This tab allows you to search for a specific item by entering the product SKU or keyword.
7. Item per Page: Clicking this will create a drop-down box where you can select how many product items to be displayed per page.

Download Brands

If you intend to use Brands on your website, you need to create them in Opencart and download them into Octopus. Click on the Download Brands button to start downloading. Once Brands are downloaded in Octopus, they will show in Map Brands section.

Map Brands

This option allows to ‘map’ POS Brand structure to Opencart Brands so that POS brand labels are placed in the right item when loaded into Opencart platform.

1. The left-hand side shows the POS Brand structure.
2. Downloaded website brands from Opencart platform are shown on the right-hand side with a drop-down box.
3. The drop-down menu shows mapped and unmapped brands. To map additional brands, click unmapped Brands from the drop-down menu, then select which brand to map.

Download Categories

In order to make sure products are displayed in the correct product category in Opencart, make sure to create your Department & Category structure in Opencart first. Once created, you can Download Category structure into the Channel.

To download Opencart Category:

1. First you need to click on the Download Category tab
2. Then click on the ‘Download’ button

Once you download categories it will show how many categories that are downloaded successfully.

Note: Always download categories to update Octopus every time you create/update a new category in Opencart.

Map Categories

When items are uploaded from a POS into Octopus, they are uploaded with POS Department & Category structure. At the Octopus level, it’s called Source Categories.

POS Category structure may or may not be the same as Opencart Category structure. This option allows to ‘map’ POS category structure with Opencartcategories so that POS items are placed in the right category.

1. The left-hand side shows the POS category structure.
2. Department & Categories downloaded from Opencart are shown on the right-hand side with a drop-down box.
3. The drop-down menu shows mapped and unmapped categories. To map additional categories, click unmapped categories from the drop-down menu, then select which category to map.

Map Product Attributes

Merchants using various POS systems may use any of the fields within a POS while creating items.

1. Map Fields option allows a merchant to map Opencart product fields with their own POS product fields.
2. For example, Opencart website Product Name (Title) can be mapped with any of the POS data fields provided in the pull-down menu.
3. This also provides an option DO NOT UPDATE to not send certain POS data to Opencart website.
4. Some fields, such as, SKU and Quantity are mandatory and are automatically updated in the website.
5. The left-hand side shows the Opencart fields. The right-hand side shows the POS fields

Custom Rules

In the Custom Rules tab, product-specific rules should be defined before the items are set up to sync with Opencart. Once done, all items synchronizing with Opencart will inherit these rules.rule(s) set here will be applied to all the products being uploaded from Channel to Opencart.

Custom Title: This feature allows you to create a search engine friendly Product Name by combining multiple fields. For example, you may want to use Product Name and Brand fields from POS to create a unique eCommerce product name, resulting in ‘Product Name by Brand’.

1. Click on Add Fields.
2. Select a field, such as Product Name
3. Enter Separator, such as, By
4. Click on Add
5. Once again, click on Add Fields
6. Select another field, for example, Brand
7. Remember to remove the ‘Enter Separator’ from before
8. Click on Add

Going forward, before an item is sent to Opencart, this rule will combine the fields to create a unique name. If left blank, Custom Tile does not apply.

Set Deduction Rule:The quantity inserted in this box is reduced from the Product Management stock. For example, if a Product Management item quantity is 50 and you insert 10 in the ‘Enter Value’ field; in Opencart, the quantity of the item will be shown as 40.

Set Quantity Rule: Regardless of the stock level in product management, as long as the quantity in opencart is greater than the quantity entered in the enter value field, the product will remain in stock in opencart. As soon as the quantity becomes equal to the quantity entered in the box, the product will become “Out of Stock” on Opencart.