Help Centre

Introduction

The Create Import/Export tool is a way to update data on all of your products at one time. It's perfect if you would like to make simple alterations to existing options, such as the price, weight, or any of various product identity fields.

Disclaimer - Please Read

Before you start anything, we recommend downloading a complete file of your Shop as it is, to keep as a backup should you make any mistakes with editing a file. A regular desktop/computer should be used for this entire process. Please note: We cannot offer support should you experience any issues caused by incorrect use of this feature. In addition, we may not be able to retrieve any information lost and revert any changes made.

1. Click the Shop area on the Top Menu
2. Click Import/Export in the left-hand menu
3. Under Export Products click the drop-down menu
4. Select Shop (Top). This will download a file of your complete shop, as it is at the time of download. The file will be called CREATE_productFeed.txt (we recommend changing the file name to something you will recognise as a backup)
5. This initial file should be stored safely, as a backup file of your shop.

Downloading the Shop File

Now you have your backup file, you can export a second file which you will make the edits to.

1, Click the Shop area on the Top Menu
2. Click Import/Export in the left-hand menu
3. Under Export Products, click the drop-down menu
4. Choose if you wish to export a file of your whole Shop (Top, as before) or a specific Shop Category.
5. Tick to include all sub-categories within that category, if you want them
6. Click Export Products
7. The file will be downloaded to your computer, the file name will be the same as before, CREATE_productFeed.txt

Editing the Shop File

Once you have saved this file to your computer you will then need to open this to start editing your Shop. Your file will be downloaded as a .txt file. To make editing your data easier, you will want to change the file type extension from .txt to .csv. This will allow you to open the file as a spreadsheet, using a spreadsheet application of your choice, such as Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets.

You can change the file extension by locating the file on your computer and then left-clicking it once. Your computer should then allow you to rename it, simply change the .txt to .csv and confirm the change.

It is extremely important that the format of the spreadsheet does not change while you are editing as this will have a negative effect on your import.

Please note, there are certain aspects of your products that could have a negative effect on your import, should they be changed or added. These are as follows:

SKU - If your products did not already have a SKU number before exporting, our system will have applied one automatically to your product. Do not adjust any SKU numbers on the spreadsheet. We also strongly recommend checking them to make sure there are no duplicate SKUs. The easiest way to do this would be to sort the SKU column in the spreadsheet.

If you notice there are duplicate SKUs, you need to amend the SKU of the product, directly in the Create application, not on the spreadsheet. After amending the products in the app, you will then need to perform another export and use this newly exported file to make your amendments to.

Product Options - It is not currently possible to edit these using Import & Export

HTML Fragments – If these are present within your products this could cause some error

For specific details of the data included on your spreadsheet, we recommend reviewing this guide which is a key to the different data included in the file you export.

Importing the Shop File

Before you import your shop file, there are a series of checks we strongly recommend you review on your spreadsheet.

• The SKU column should not have any duplicate SKUs, we recommend sorting the column in numerical order to double-check this. If you do find that some of your products have duplicate SKUs, you will need to change the duplicates within the 'Edit Product' area. Once corrected, you will then need to re-export your shop file in order to make the relevant changes you need before importing. 
  
  
• Do you have any HTML Fragments in your products or categories?
  
  
• Do you have any special non-alphanumeric characters within your descriptions?
  
  
• Have you saved an unedited version of your shop file to your computer?
  
  
• How many products are on your spreadsheet, if over 3000 we recommend splitting the import into 2 separate imports.
  
  
• Is your file in the correct format? The file name must have no spaces in it and it should end with .txt or .tsv will be suitable

If you are happy that your file passes the above checks, to import your file into your Shop please follow these instructions:

1. Click the Shop area on the Top Menu
2. Select Import/Export from the left-hand menu
3. Within the Import box, ensure that type Create: Product is selected
4. Click Choose File and locate the file you wish to import. Ensure the correct file is selected
5. Click Update Images if you are importing a file from an external website*
6. Click Import

The system will then run the import with a status log showing it’s progress and status of the import. Upon successful completion of the import, the system should state Import Successful.

*Update Images - By choosing this option, when you upload your file it will retrieve any images that are hosted externally and upload them into your Create account. This means that they will now be hosted with Create and not on your external host.