Before submitting an inventory file via FTP, FTP processing for your account must be enabled, and default settings need to be configured. To get a full overview of this process, see Importing Inventory Using FTP.

Uploading images via FTP is slightly different than inventory; visit the Uploading Images page to learn more.

Prerequisites

You should be familiar with the following topics before continuing:

•  Using an FTP Client

• Compiling your product data and saving it in the ChannelAdvisor Inventory format or a Custom Format

How to Configure FTP Push Settings

ChannelAdvisor supports multiple methods of FTP and HTTP connection in order to submit inventory items in bulk. The preferred method of file transfer is FTP Push, meaning that you place your inventory file(s) on the ChannelAdvisor FTP location (ftp.ChannelAdvisor.com) for processing, but other supported methods include FTP/HTTP(S) Pull file transfer. Accepted file formats include:

• Text Tab Delimited (.txt) 
• Text Pipe Delimited (.txt) 
• Comma Separated (.csv)
• XML

1.  Go to Inventory > Settings > FTP/HTTP Settings.

2.  Click the Edit button next to Inventory (Push).

• Enter a Login Prefix - Create a 6 character "Login Prefix" that will be used with your login id. Use this login prefix and your username when uploading images and inventory for this account. For example, if the login prefix is 'abc' you would enter 'abc:user@yourcompany.com' when prompted for your username by the FTP site. Changing this prefix will also change your Image FTP Settings.
   
• Enable FTP Processing - Check this box to begin tell ChannelAdvisor to begin scanning your FTP account for inventory files.
   
• Account Flat File Format - If you are sending a Flat File format, you must also specify the delimiter that is used to separate each field of data. Supported delimiters are Tab and Pipe.
   
• Account File Processing Defaults - Choose the method to be used when processing your inventory upload file using FTP.  By default, the ChannelAdvisor system will use the first option: Process the entire file.
   
• All: This selection will process ALL rows included in your upload file and create any new item and edit any existing items in your account.
   
• New Only: This selection will process only rows that DO NOT already exist in your ChannelAdvisor Inventory. Any existing item rows will not be processed.
   
• Updates Only: This selection will process only rows in your inventory upload file that ALREADY exist in your account. Any new item rows will not be processed.
   
• Detect Dropped Items: This selection will process your inventory upload file and "detect" any items that are in your inventory but are NOT included in the file you have submitted. These items will be set to quantity of zero (0) using the 'Unshipped" quantity update type, and thus removed from all channels. If you have selected this setting and want your items to remain in any channels they are currently published to, the item MUST be included in your upload file.

• Apply Templates to an FTP Upload - In addition to the default processing selection (above), you can also specify a default Templateto be applied to all inventory uploads processed via FTP in your account. By selecting a default option, the template that you have chosen on this settings page will be applied when any new file is processed from your accounts FTP location.
  
  
  • Inventory uploads that should use a Template must go in the 'Inventory/Transform' subfolder.
     
  • If a default template has been selected in settings, it will be used unless overridden in the file name.
     
  • A template can be applied to an upload file, or the default template selected in settings can be overridden, using a file naming convention.  To specify a template, add the template code to the end of the upload filename after a "."
    
    • EX: "CA Upload.TEMPLATECODE.txt"
   
• Account File Processing Overrides - When processing inventory files submitted to the FTP location for your account, ChannelAdvisor can "recognize" how to process the file based on the filename. By using a specific filename prefix, which can be defined on this settings page, the system will know whether to process the entire file content, or only those SKUs that already exist, or those that do not already exist.  If you do not use a filename prefix override, the default settings selected for the account will be used.

  Default filename overrides are:

  • AddAndUpdate_ is used to process the entire file.
     
  • UpdateOnly_ is used to process only SKUs in the file that already exist in the account.
     
  • AddOnly_ is used to process only those SKUs in the file that do not already exist in the account.
     
  • TrackingNumbers_ is used to process files containing order/shipment tracking number information.

Tasks to Complete

Complete the following tasks related to this topic:

1. Compile your product data and save it in the ChannelAdvisor Inventory format or a Custom Format.
    
2. Configure FTP/HTTP Settings
    
• FTP Push
  
  
• FTP/HTTP/HTTPS Pull
  
  
3. Transfer Files Using FTP