Shopify Integration - Some thoughts

Hi,

The Ecommerce Integration log shows problems if any, and helps one to get a successful integration, so that was very helpful for me to get my Shopify Integration with ERPNext going. A few observations though:

  1. There seems to be remnants of the old code when Shopify integration was part of the ERPNext code. So I kept looking at the Shopify Synch log and kept finding nothing there. Once Ankush pointed me to the Ecommerce integration log, I managed to figure out what I’d missed / done wrong and it was easy to fix it.
  2. In the B2C world where the payment is already made, I do not think it’s a good idea to make a Sales Order and a Sales Invoice as the buyer checks out. Reason is that Shopify can be setup to book orders for short quantities. So, it may take a day or two for the products to ship. I think a better protocol would be to make the Sales Order and make a Payment Entry linked to the Sales Order on ERPNext as the user checks out on Shopify. As the Order is marked as fulfilled on Shopify, a Delivery Note and Sales Invoice can be made. Or a Sales Invoice with Update Stock checked can be made.
  3. Fulfillment from ERPNext needs to be enabled. This would become important for Products for which Batch Numbers and Serial Numbers need to be managed. I did set up an item as a Batched Item and it did go through as ERPNext auto-populated the batch number in the delivery note (there was only one Batch on my ERPNext instance), so maybe that’s why it went through. I will try with two batches with a. Same expiry date and b. Different expiry date and report back. I think the integration needs to be enhanced so that a user can pick up a Sales Order on ERPNext that flowed through from Shopify and make a delivery note (or Sales Invoice with update stock checked) and the integration marks the Order on Shopify as complete and the Tracking Number and Carrier updated on Shopify. This will ensure that Batch Numbers and Serial Numbers can be selected by the user so that ERPNext (atleast. If Shopify supports Batch Numbers and Serial Numbers and the integration can update this information on the Shopify order, that would be awesome. Even if Shopify does not directly support Batch Numbers, Expiry Dates and/or Serial Numbers, if custom fields can be added on the Shopify Order and these fields are updated by the ERPNext integration, that would serve the purpose.
  4. Most companies that are thriving in the D2C space work with logistics partners such as WareIQ (in India) and other applications such as FarEye and these integrations would be needed too. But that’s for the future.
  5. Many D2C companies do contract manufacturing or even manufacture the products they sell on Shopify themselves, so we absolutely need to control on ERPNext what Items need be synced with Shopify. The way to hack it right now is to leave items that one doesn’t want to publish on Shopify as Draft on ERPNext, but most companies wouldn’t like that.

I mean great work with the Shopify integration and I don’t mean to be critical, but these are the enhancements that I see becoming necessary.

Happy to help in this process!

Hope this helps!

Thanks

Jay

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