Importing Product Images From Google Drive
After uploading your product images to a file storage service like Google Drive, you can then generate and use their respective links to import those images to Acenda and your connected sales channels. To do so, follow these steps:
Upload all your product images to a folder in Google Drive. To do so, simply drag and drop your image folder.
Right click the folder and click Share. Under General Access, choose ‘Anyone with the link’ and ‘Viewer’ to its right. Then click Done.
Open a new spreadsheet in Excel.
In one tab paste the following headers into the first row: sku, images.default.main.url, and images.default.swatch.url. The main image (images.default.main.url) and sometimes swatch image (images.default.swatch.url) are required. Acenda allows up to 15 alternate images. To add them, insert more headers such as images.default.1.alternate.url, images.default.2.alternate.url, images.default.3.alternate.url, etc.
You must copy the image links and paste them in a separate cell. The copied links will be comma separated and it is therefore necessary to use the TEXTSPLIT function to separate them.
To do so, highlight up to 390 links at a time (the maximum text limit in a single cell), right click, select ‘Share’, and then ‘Copy links’. The links will be ordered in the direction you highlight them. Then paste the links in an empty column cell and use TEXTSPLIT to separate them vertically or horizontally.
You can also copy the image names by highlighting them in the same direction and using Ctrl + C. This is useful if your image names contain the SKU and/or image types.
If your SKU images are grouped by date modified, you can sort the Google Drive folder by ‘Last Modified’ to group them by SKU. If your SKU images are grouped by folder you can use Ctrl + C to copy the folder name if it contains the SKU.
Once you have filled in the spreadsheet with the SKUs and image links in their corresponding columns, you must use find and replace to edit the links. Replace file/d/ with uc?id= and /view?usp=drive_link with nothing.
Clear any irrelevant cells or columns such as those with image names or the comma separated links.
Ensure the links do not prompt you to log in to Google Drive by pasting them in an incognito window.
Once finished inputting data, save the file as a CSV UTF-8 which is the only file type supported by the import.
Now go to Import/Exports, click the Import tab, and click + New Import. Select ‘Catalog’ from the Import Type dropdown and then select the file you just saved as a CSV UTF-8 by dropping it or browsing.
You will now see a list of all your file’s attributes (source headers) next to data mapping fields. In the ‘Select Field’ box choose the Acenda mapping to use for that attribute. You can only use a mapping once per upload. The system will automatically find the closest match if your header is already an Acenda mapping. Check the box to the attribute’s left to enable it.
To save the upload file format for future use, check the box next to ‘Save custom import profile for future use’ and give the profile a name in the box which appears once checked. You can then select that saved profile from the ‘Import Profile’ dropdown where it says ‘- - Custom Import Profile - -’ to automatically map future image uploads with the same column headers your initial upload used.
If the upload contains only new SKUs leave the next two boxes unchecked. If adding new SKUs as well as updating existing SKUs check the ‘Overwrite any records that have the same ID’ box, and if only updating existing products check the ‘Only update existing records’ box.
Click Start Import.