When it comes to Enterprise Resource Planning, things can get complicated. Backbone’s custom fields and Item Views feature makes it easy to manage, track, and export product attributes necessary for third party systems being used post development such as ERPs, Ecommerce Platforms, Purchase Order and Inventory Management Systems.
This article should walk you through Backbone’s best practices for moving your data out of Backbone into your desired third party system using our export/import workflow.
ERP Import 📥
Before jumping into Backbone you will first want to identify the data necessary for your third party system (like Shopify). You can do this by obtaining that system's import template. This will help you identify any required or necessary fields for import.
Everyone's template might look slightly different based on the key attributes you have set up in your ERP or other system.
However the basic setup will be the same in Backbone.
Admin Panel
1. In your Taxonomy Section, we recommend setting up your merchandising hierarchy to match your set up in your ERP or other system for the following reasons:
It ensures all teams across the Product Lifecycle are standardizing the way they create products
It reduces the amount of manual effort required to map data via the export/import workflow
Custom Fields
2. You will want to refer back to your import template pulled from your third party system and add the necessary Custom fields. This will be the data or product attributes you wish to track throughout the development process that you will then export to hydrate your ERP or similar system
To make your export template easy to build later, you may use our custom field dividers to group the fields together.
3. Once fields are created these may be managed and tracked within the product record or within our Item View module. The goal is to make filling in the information a collaborative effort. This ends up saving time and energy among teams trying to gather this information from multiple different places.
ERP Export 📤
The Item View module will be where you will be able to
Get a holistic view of all the information on the product record
Identify and Fill in any missing information
Build your export template for easy data transfer
Item Views are created based on set criteria, for example seasonal attributes or product categories. To begin the export:
1. Create your IV Report: Once the report is set you can then choose the fields that you would like to add to your view which will be creating your export template.
2. You will then want to switch your view into Product Variant view which will drill down to the color level, giving each color their own individual row for export. It should now look like the import template that was pulled from your ERP.
3. Next you will export using the three dot icon and you will more then likely want to export at Product Variant Size level, giving you a row for each product, color, size.
Once exported you will want to review the document and compare to your systems import tool, some manual manipulation or macros might be required depending on your instance.