How to set up Shopify to work with Shipvine
This article applies to our legacy Shipvine Logistics portal and is not valid for our modern Shipvine Client Portal.
It's easy to set up Shipvine to pull orders from your Shopify e-commerce store. We'll write back the tracking number and close/archive the order if necessary. We can also keep your inventory in sync.
What we need
We'll need three things to set up your Shopify store:
☐ API Key
☐ Password
☐ Example URL
Email it to support@shipvine.com to get your store set up.
You can get to this information via Apps > Private Apps in Shopify:
Below is a redacted screenshot showing the three pieces of information we’ll need:
When creating the app, it'll ask for permissions. We'll need the following:
- "Inventory" set to "Read and write" if you want us to synchronize inventory.
- "Orders, transactions, and fulfillments" set to "Read and write" so that we can pull order data and write back tracking numbers.
- "Products, variants, and collections" set to "Read and write" if you want us to synchronize inventory.
Product Mapping
To ensure that orders flow properly to us, we'll need to ensure that your SKUs in Shopify match up with the ones that you provided to us in your import file, or that you've manually entered into the Shipvine Logistics catalog. For example, in Shopify, if you go to Products, click on a product, and scroll down to the Inventory & Variants section, each should have a SKU that matches what you've provided to us. In the example below, we'd expect to see things like "7647-Gray-L" and so on there.
Additionally, the Inventory Policy for each variant (accessible via the Edit) button should read "Shopify tracks this product's inventory":
Shopify is unique in that the SKU can be left blank and that the same SKU can be reused for multiple products and variants with Shopify. Shipvine (and most other 3PLs) don't allow this. For inventory successfully sync and for orders to successfully flow between the two services,
- each product and variant in Shopify should have a SKU that matches the Merchant Identifier field in the Shipvine Logistics catalog
- each SKU must uniquely identify a single product within Shopify
If a SKU for a given product is wrong or incorrectly duplicated, Shipvine may ship the wrong item to the customer or update inventory counts for the wrong product. The SKU is the most critical piece of information shared between the two systems—each one for products that you intend to Shipvine to ship must be consistent and correct.
Inventory Sync
Our default integration has things set up so that Shipvine Logistics becomes the authoritative inventory source, which means that we'll overwrite the Inventory/Quantity values that you see in Shopify with those in our system. Normally this is what people want, but you'll want to confirm with us that this is the behavior that you're expecting before we turn it on.
Shipping Method Mapping
We'll need to map the shipping methods that you offer in your Shopify store to the ones that we provide. In Shopify, go to Settings > Shipping and send us a list of all of the shipping rates that you have configured there. If this is a new store, you might just have one option named "Standard Shipping", for example.
Orders Setup
Our sync system pulls orders that are in the Open state with a fulfillment that doesn't have a tracking number. If you've been using Shopify in the past in a different manner, we'll want to make sure that any old orders are archived so that our system doesn't inadvertently perceive these as new orders that you intend for us to ship. In Shopify, if you go to Orders > Open, the only orders that you should see listed there are ones that you want us to ship. If your Shopify store isn't live yet, then this step won't apply.
In other words, for an order to be pulled from Shopify for fulfillment at Shipvine Logistics, your Shopify order:
- must be open
- must have a fulfillment without any tracking number
In Shopify, these orders are reflected as having an "open" status and a fulfillment status of "fulfilled" or "partially fulfilled". The reason for the second requirement is because we needed an easy way to distinguish between orders that are "open, but I don't want Shipvine to see them yet" and orders that are "open, and they're ready to go to Shipvine" without requiring custom tags or third-party plugins.
Checkout Setup
To have orders flow from Shopify to us automatically (without you reviewing each individual order and pressing a button each time), we'll need to make sure to check a few options in Shopify under Settings > Checkout:
The important bits here are:
- Select "automatically fulfill the order's line items" to have our sync system automatically pick up "safe" orders for shipping.
- The "Notify customers of their shipment via email" option should, counterintuitively, be unchecked . Our system will trigger Shopify to send its native notification email after we've pushed back the tracking number.
- Optionally, you can check the "Automatically fulfill all orders, even those with a high risk of fraud" option. If unchecked, and Shopify flags it as fraud, then you will have to manually press the Fulfill button in the Shopify interface to transmit the order to us.
- The "Automatically archive the order" option should be unchecked; our integration will automatically do this for you. Orders that haven't been archived, then, represent orders that are still outstanding in some way, keeping the Shopify interface neat and tidy. If you turn this option on, then our system will never see the order.
Related Articles
Reports provided by Shipvine
This article applies to our legacy Shipvine Logistics portal and is not valid for our modern Shipvine Client Portal. Shipvine provides a wide array of reports that will compliment reporting from your e-commerce and/or other order management platform. ...What is the Auto Fulfill Delay?
This article applies to our legacy Shipvine Logistics portal and is not valid for our modern Shipvine Client Portal. The information and how-to are similar in the new portal, however a help file does not exist for the new portal at this time. Contact ...What is a candidate request?
This article applies to our legacy Shipvine Logistics portal and is not valid for our modern Shipvine Client Portal. A candidate request is a draft version of a fulfillment request. They can reserve inventory in Shipvine Logistics and be used as a ...What is a fulfillment request?
This article applies to our legacy Shipvine Logistics portal and is not valid for our modern Shipvine Client Portal. The main object of interest in the Shipvine Logistics system is the fulfillment request. The reason we use this term instead of ...What does the "Saturday Delivery" checkbox on candidate and fulfillment requests do?
This article applies to our legacy Shipvine Logistics portal and is not valid for our modern Shipvine Client Portal. An updated help file does not exist for the new portal, but the information provided below may still be helpful. Contact customer ...