Importing Product Catalogs
Import your product catalog into Yotpo to benefit from the following features:
In this article, you'll learn how to import a product catalog into Yotpo.
- If you want to update existing products in your catalog rather than add new ones, see Updating The Product Catalog.
- Are you using Shopify? If yes, we recommend you use our automatic update solution to keep your Yotpo product catalog up-to-date. See Keeping your Shopify and Yotpo Product Catalogs Updated.
How it works
The product catalog is the container that holds information about all of your store items, for example, product name, photo, and Global Trade Item Number (GTIN).You can create a product catalog on your Yotpo account by manually uploading a CSV (comma-separated value) file.
Follow this workflow:
- Download the CSV template file and add your product catalog information.
- Import your file into Yotpo Reviews.
- (Where relevant) Review any import errors, fix your file, and then re-import your file to Yotpo
Step-by-step guide
Step 1: Download the CSV template
To save you time and help prevent errors, we’ve created a template file ready for you to use.
Download the file:
- If you’re using a spreadsheet program, do not open the file in a different application before you import, as this might break the formatting.
- If you’re using Excel, see Importing CSV Files Into Excel.
- Edit the data according to your requirements.
We recommend using LibreOffice or Google Sheets when working with the downloaded file. All cells must be in text format. - Save the file as a CSV UTF-8 file.
Step 2: Upload your file
Before you upload the CSV file, go through the following checklist to ensure the import goes smoothly:
- The required fields ID, name, and URL are filled in for each product.
- The file is saved in UTF-8 encoding.
- You do not have any duplicate product IDs or product tags.
- You’ve only added IDs for the products you want to add.
- You’ve added any products that should not receive review requests to your blocklist.
- The cells are formatted as text, not numbers.
- The URLs are formatted correctly, for example with http:// or https:// at the start.
- There are no empty rows in the middle of the file.
- The product tags do not contain commas and you have not included more than one tag per field.
To upload your file, do the following:
- In Yotpo Reviews, click the Profile icon at the top right corner.
- Click Account Settings > Product Catalog.
- Choose the Import Products tab.
- Click Import Catalog at the bottom of the page.
- In the dialog box that opens, navigate to your file, and then click Open.
Once the file is uploaded, you'll see the following message.
Step 3: Import your file
You’re now ready to import your product data to Yotpo.
- Enter your address for the confirmation email. The default address is the one you configured for your Yotpo account
- Click Import.
Once the file is processed, we'll email your Yotpo administrator a report containing a CSV file.
Step 4: Review import errors
If any of your products were not imported correctly to the catalog, they will be flagged with an error message. See error messages
- Open the CSV file report that was sent to your Yotpo administrator.
- Review the file to identify any errors.
- Fix the errors in your file and then repeat steps 2 and 3 to re-import.
File guidelines
- Do not modify the field headers of the CSV file. Doing so will damage the validation process and cause the validation to skip the altered header fields when processing a product update or product create request.
- Yotpo strongly recommends that you add the Product Image URL information so your product images will show in Yotpo's social features, for promoted products, and so on.
- You must include all of the required fields.
- We recommend limiting the file to 10 thousand rows. If your file contains more products than this, you can import in batches.
Listed below are the fields that you can include in the CSV. The fields can be included in any order.
Field | Value | Description | Example |
---|---|---|---|
Product ID (Required) To learn how to find the correct product ID, see Finding Product IDs in Your E-Commerce Platform. | String/Unique ID | This string is used to identify the product in the catalog. It is used both for review syndication and for Google Shopping review feeds. Learn more about unique identifiers Product specification values support alphanumeric (a...z, A...Z, 0...9), "_" and "-" characters only. | 2134234 |
Product Name (Required) | Text | The name of the product | T-shirt |
Product Description | Text | Description of the product | Stylish Yotpo-branded T-shirt |
Product URL (Required) | Full URL | The URL of the product on your store | http://magento.yotpo.com/index.php/ yotpo-products/yotpo-t-shirt.html |
Product Image URL | Full URL | The URL of the product image | http://magento.yotpo.com/media/catalog/ product/cache/1/image/ 9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/2/0/ .jpeg |
Product Price | Integer | The price of the product | 15 |
Currency | Currency type/abbreviation | The currency according to the ISO 4217 format | USD |
Spec UPC | Universal Product Code | ||
Spec SKU | Stock-Keeping Unit | ||
Spec Brand | Brand | ||
Spec MPN | Manufacturer Part Number (MPN) | ||
Spec ISBN | International Standard Book Number (ISBN) | ||
Product Tag | The tag for the product used in custom forms. This field can accept one tag per product and cannot contain commas. Learn more in Custom Questions | ||
Blacklisted | Boolean | Send (false) or do not send (true) review requests for this product. The text must be in lowercase. | true/false |
Product Group | Text | The group you want to assign the product to. You can assign a maximum of 1,000 products per group. Learn more in Grouping Products Product Groups cannot contain spaces and must not exceed 100 characters. Only lowercase alphanumeric characters (a...z, 0...9) and the "_" and "-" symbols. | v-neck_tshirt |
Product Collections | Text | Assign products to collections according to store categories. There is no limit to the number of products you can add to a collection. | T-Shirts, Summer Collection, Sale, Clearance, Black Friday |
Product collections
Product collections are currently only displayed in Yotpo Insights.
You can group products into custom collections by including the collection name in the Product Collections column of your Yotpo product catalog. Product collections are updated every 24 hours.
Product collections usually reflect specific categories in your store. For example:
- Products of a certain type e.g. Menswear, swimwear, accessories, etc.
- Products on sale e.g. sale, clearance, Black Friday
- Seasonal products e.g. fall collection, summer collection, new collection
- Products in a certain size e.g. plus-size, big and tall
Please note that product collections are used for insights and are therefore distinct from product groups. Yotpo automatically retrieves product collections from Shopify stores. If you're missing the Product Collections column in your product catalog, please contact your Yotpo representative for assistance.
Product tagging
If you're including product tags in your CSV import file, it is highly recommended to review the guidelines and best practices in the Product Tagging User Guide.
Errors
Import errors
There are one or more invalid inputs. Check product details and try again.
The data in the CSV file is invalid, for example, a mandatory value is missing. Check the rows with the error code and re-upload the data. You can see examples of errors by clicking here.
Cannot update products on creation mode.
Some of the products you are trying to import already exist in your Product Catalog. See the Updating your Product Catalog article for more information.
The data is uploaded but is incorrect.
The same product ID may appear more than once in the CSV file. The data from the last entry is used. Remove duplicate data and re-upload the catalog.
We failed to group your product. Please make sure that all the data provided is according to the requirements.
A group name can contain up to 100 characters. This error indicates that the group name you chose has over 100 characters. Shorten/change the group name.
Failed to validate import file.
The file wasn't saved as a Comma Separated Sheet. Make sure to select the correct file formatting when saving the file. For more information, click here.
File errors
Cannot Create Products in Update mode.
Make sure you’re importing into the Import Products tab.
Trailing spaces in product specification values are automatically stripped.
If your specification values such as Product IDs or SKUs contain spaces after the ID, these spaces will be removed when we import to Yotpo.
Any combination of leading zeros (“0”), leading spaces, and leading dashes (“-“) are automatically stripped from the product specification values.
If your specification values such as Product IDs or SKUs contain spaces before the ID, these spaces will be removed when we import to Yotpo. If this is an issue, please contact Yotpo support.
Product specification values support alphanumeric (a...z, A...Z, 0...9), "_" and "-" characters only.
Make sure your specification values contain only letters, numbers, “_”, or “-”. Any other special characters are not supported.
Product specifications values are case-sensitive.
If your Product IDs contain letters, make sure the case in the file you upload matches the case in your store catalog. For example, a product with the ID “123B” and a product with the ID “123b” are considered two separate products in Yotpo.
Product tags cannot contain commas.
Remove any commas from your product tags.
An “N/A” value for product specifications is invalid in any case and is ignored.
If your product does not have specifications values, make sure you leave this cell empty. Do not enter “N/A”. You must always include a Product ID.