Start Here: Setting Up Flxpoint and Where Your Data Shows Up
Summary
The front door for a new customer: how Source Inventory, Product Catalog and Channel Listings fit together, source versus channel, which import or button fills each place, the Set Up Guide and its steps, and how often syncs run.
Flxpoint sits between the places you get inventory from and the places you sell. Click Products (tag icon in the left menu) and you see three tabs across the top. Each one holds a different stage of the same product:
- Source Inventory holds the items your sources send you.
- Product Catalog holds your own product records, built from Source Inventory. Some help articles and the Flxpoint Lite app call it the Master Catalog. It is the same place. A product variant's SKU here is called the Master SKU.
- Channel Listings holds one listing for each product on each sales channel.
Orders travel the other way. Get Orders brings an order in from your channel, Send Fulfillment Requests sends it to a source, Get Shipments brings the shipment back, and Sync Orders sends the tracking to your channel.
A source is where your inventory comes from: a supplier, a warehouse, or a vendor's store you buy from. A channel is where you sell. The same kind of store can be either. Your own Shopify store, where you sell, is a channel. A vendor's Shopify store that you buy from is a source. Sources are under Sources (building icon in the left menu). Channels are under Channels (cart icon).
| You run | Where | What it fills |
|---|---|---|
| Get Inventory [Primary] | On each source, under Integrations | Source Inventory |
| Create Products | Button on Source Inventory, after you select items | Product Catalog |
| Import Listings | On a channel. Not every channel has it. | Channel Listings, and the matching products in the Product Catalog |
| Create Listings | Button on Product Catalog, after you select products | Channel Listings in Flxpoint only |
| Publish Listings | On a channel | Your store receives the new listings |
| Get Orders | On a channel | Orders |
- Nothing from a supplier is in the Product Catalog until products are built with Create Products. The exception is a source set to create products automatically when its inventory imports. That setting is on the source's Settings page.
- The Create Products panel can also create listings in the same step if you pick one or more channels in it.
- A listing exists in Flxpoint once it is built, but it only appears on your store after Publish Listings sends it.
- Import Listings is described in the app as importing your channel's listings and creating and updating both listings and products in Flxpoint to match your channel.
- Get Inventory brings a supplier's item into Source Inventory.
- Create Products builds it into a product in the Product Catalog.
- Create Listings builds a listing for each channel you choose.
- Publish Listings creates the item on your store.
- Sync Listings keeps its price and quantity up to date from then on.
Click Get Started (rocket icon at the bottom of the left menu) to open the Set Up Guide. While your account is in onboarding, a banner at the top of the other screens also links to it, as Go to Onboarding Guide. When onboarding is finished, the Get Started item and the banner go away.
The guide starts with your store: step 1.1 connects it and imports its listings, and step 1.2 connects your sources and imports their inventory. If you have no store yet, step 1.1 has a button named I don't have an eCommerce store. The guide has a Need help onboarding? panel with Contact Support and AI Assistant buttons.
Connect Your Store To Sources
- 1.1 Connect Store & Import Listings
- 1.2 Connect Sources & Import Inventory
- 1.3 Connect Store SKUs to Source SKUs: confirm how your store SKUs link to your source SKUs.
- 1.4 Configure Inventory Matching ID: confirm the unique ID that matches inventory items across sources.
- 1.5 Set Up Pricing Rules: set the rules that decide how products are priced on your store.
- 1.6 Start Syncing Listings: start syncing your existing store listings with the sources you set up.
Set Up New Product Listings
- 2.1 Confirm Product Listing Process
- 2.2 Create & Publish Listings
Configure Order Routing & Shipping
- 3.1 Import/Create Orders: confirm how orders route from your sales channel to your sources.
- 3.2 Map Shipping Policies: map your channel's shipping methods to Flxpoint shipping policies.
- 3.3 Create Routing Group: create the default order routing group.
- 3.4 Configure Order Operations: set up the sources that receive fulfillment requests.
- 3.5 Process Orders: review order processing and complete onboarding.
Imports and syncs are jobs that run on a schedule. They do not run the moment something changes. Each job has a schedule where you choose the day and the time. The shortest repeat is Every 5 Minutes. Other choices are Every 10 Minutes, Every 15 Minutes, Every 30 Minutes and Every Hour. Some jobs offer only the longer ones: Get Shipments starts at Every 30 Minutes. The app notes that a job may start 2 to 5 minutes after it is scheduled and can occasionally take up to 15 minutes.