Linked Shops - B2C Microsites or B2B2C

If you want to set up one or more other websites which are websites that are linked to your main website, you can do this through AB Commerce - and the product data on the main website (the master website) will automatically be available on the microsite (the linked website) - e.g. if you change a price or the stock levels change on the master website, they will automatically update on the linked website, or if you change the product description or upload a new product image, this will automatically update on the linked website.

A linked website contains a subset of products from your main website (and possibly additional products that are not on your main website).  For example, you may want to set up a separate website for a specific brand with it's own URL and then have your product information automatically sync with this new website.

Or if you are a B2B website, you may want to offer your customers the option of having their own website with your products automatically appearing and updating on their website.  And they can also add their other products to their website too.

How it Works

To do this, you just need to use the same product code as on the master website for the products / versions that you want to sync. You can add additional products to the linked website that are not on the master website as long as they don't have the same product code as a product on the master website.

If you want to override a field, just enter a value for it's field on the linked website and this will be used instead of the corresponding value on the master website. For example if you want to display a different short description, once you enter characters on the linked website for this product, these will be used instead.  Or if you want to override the price, you can enter your own price.

Field that you can link with

On your local database, you can link to the master database using one of the following fields:

• Product Code
• BarCode
• GTIN
• Supplier Code
• Commodity Code

And they are all available under the EDIT PRODUCT screen under the first tab (click ADVANCED SETTINGS):

What Fields are Synced with the Main Website?

The following is the product data that can be synced with the linked website automatically.  When setting this up, tell the Help Desk which groups of fields you want synced.

Keeping Stock Levels Accurate

Note that if you are syncing stock levels, these are pulled from the master website (if the linked website stock levels are zero) but are not pushed back to the master website when items are ordered on the linked website.  Therefore, it's important to include your linked website sales when downloading web orders from the master website by also downloading the web orders from the linked website and then sending back accurate stock levels to the master website (which the linked website then automatically picks up).

Adding Products from the Master Website to the Linked Website

You can add products quickly from the master website by going into a category on the linked website in the web admin screens and clicking Add Linked Products.  You then just enter the list of product codes separated by commas and then click Add and they will add to the linked website for this category.

Products with Versions

If the product has versions, it will also copy across the versions list from the master website.

Also, if you add a parent product code that already exists but there are new versions added to the master website, this will create the new versions on your website.

OPTIONAL Approval Process

For the linked website, It's important to view this article: The Approval Process / Products Missing Images - and then consider the option of only showing approved products so that when you add a product from the master website, you can edit it first before it goes live.

What does "Blank" mean?

For each field that is linked, the platform checks to see if your local value for the field is "blank" and if it is, it uses the value from the Master website.  The following are what is deemed as "blank":

• For text fields, an empty field is considered blank - note that some of the DESCRIPTION fields may look blank but if you save a description using LIVE EDIT, it can be saved as "<p></p>" which stands for an "empty paragraph" which is not blank
• For numeric fields, zero is blank
• For checkbox fields, UNCHECKED is blank

Overriding Short and Long Descriptions and the product detail sidebar fields

Note that once you click SAVE on the product detail page as in the following screen, it will copy all values from the left sidebar and the short and long descriptions on the main page over to the linked website so they wont be synced anymore with the master website.

Therefore, it can be safer to edit products through the Catalogue - Products screens instead.

Further Point on Admin Product List Page

When viewing the product list page as follows, you may see some products with the GREEN ACTIVE tick.  This normally indicates that the product has been overridden with local values using the above screen.  If this happened incorrectly, you can simply delete the product and re-add it again using the ADD LINKED PRODUCTS button above.

Next Steps

For more information about pricing for an additional website and the steps to take to have this linked website set up and configured to link with your main master website, contact the Help Desk.