Artisan POS integrates with WooCommerce, which is part of WordPress. WordPress is extremely popular, easy, and flexible. It can be hosted on just about any hosting service such as GoDaddy, and hundreds more. As products are entered into Artisan POS, they are automatically uploaded to your WP site once the interface has been set up.
This article was written with the assumption that you have a basic understanding of Artisan’s Inventory Records (Items, Categories, Vendors, etc.) and have the Artisan Task Manager set up and configured to connect to your WP site. Otherwise, please contact CerTek to schedule your installation and/or training.
Index:
- Video Tutorial
- Mission 1: Put this Navy Mug on Woo
- Mission 2: Add additional colors to the mug.
- Artisan’s Internet Store Fields
A simple step-by-step tutorial on getting a single product on your WooCommerce site.
Coming Soon -> CLICK TO WATCH THE VIDEO TUTORIAL
Tutorial:
Put this Navy Mug on WooCommerce via Artisan POS.
Step 1:
Edit your Item Record for the item you want to be on the site. Enter in all the usual fields:
Description, Category, Vendor, Cost, Price, Quantity On Hand
Step 2:
Add the product image by clicking on the “Pictures” tab and then importing your image. The image becomes part of your database.
Browse to the file you want and import it by clicking “Open.”
You can replace an unwanted image the same way. Click on the red X to remove it.
Step 3:
Click on the “Internet Store” tab and change the three fields as shown.
Copy this text into the “Detailed Description” field.
<ul>
<li>Dishwasher, Microwave, and Oven Safe, up to 375 degrees</li>
<li>Simple, clean aesthetics</li>
<li>Lead-free glazing</li>
</ul>
The text in < > are HTML tags, which can control many aspects of how your text appears, such as bold or italic, or even change the color. In this case, this HTML shows information in a bullet-style list.
<ul> is for Unordered List
<li> is for List Item (which starts the bulleted text).
</li> or </ul> ends the section. In general, this is HTML syntax. Use a slash / to end a section.
To learn more, consider visiting this site for other useful tips: W3 School
Step 4:
Edit the “Category” record for the item and select “Yes” for “Include in Internet Store?”
Step 5:
Save your item record and launch the “Artisan Task Manager” by clicking on “Run” (or “Stop” and then “Run” if it’s already running).
Step 6:
After this finishes, navigate to the “Products” on your WordPress dashboard and look for this new item.
Here is our item listing. 
Hover over the item and choose “View.”
You can see that the mug has been uploaded with its picture and the bulleted description.
Tutorial #2:
Turn the Navy Mug into a base product with variants of additional colors.
Step 1:
In Artisan, edit the Navy Mug and change its description to “Classic Mug.” Reduce the quantity on hand to 0 and save the record.
Step 2:
Edit the record again and click on “Edit List” from the “Product Variant Template” pull-down menu.
Press F3 to create a new Variant Template. Give the template a name and then complete the form as shown (or whatever colors you like) and save.
Now, save the item record to apply the template to the Classic Mug. Select “Yes” to confirm discarding the 12 units.
Edit the Navy item and change its quantity on hand back to 12.
Step 3:
Add the multi-color image to the base product and then edit each variant and import their respective image for each color.
Step 4:
Run the Artisan Task Manger and let it update your products. This will take a little longer because it has to upload all the new images.
Step 5:
Review the Woo Commerce site and look for your changes in the “Products” section, and then on the visible site.
Notice that Shopify displays various color choices, so it is easy for the shopper to see their color options.
More Internet Store Fields
Now that we have gone through a basic item and that you can see how easy it is, let’s dig into a few more details.
There are several Internet Store Fields for WooCommerce. It is important to note that not all the fields in Artisan are used in WooCommerce.
Artisan POS WooCommerce Fields
- Item Code (SKU)
- Product Name or Item Description
- Price and Discounted Price
- Category Description
- Manufacturer (As Shopify Vendor)
- Inventory Tracking
- Available Qty (un-reserved QOH)
- Taxable
- Product Variants
- Featured Product
- Product Tags
- Shipping Weight
- Additional Categories
- Brief Description
- Detailed Description
- Full-Size Image and all the Additional Images, not Thumbnail Image
Item Code (SKU)
Product Name or Item Description
This is the main Artisan description. If you want that name to be different, you can use the “Product Name” field, which you can make much longer than the 40 characters allowed by the “Item Description.” To use a longer description, enter that in the “Product Name” field, which will override the Description field.
Price and Discounted Price
In the “Artisan Task Manager,” you can specify a Price Level or Customer Type. Most of the time this would just be Retail, but if your shopping cart was targeted at wholesalers, you would want to change it. If you are using normal retail, then the price comes from the Retail Price field in Artisan.
If you have a discount, then the computed discount price is also sent to Shopify and shows as the “Compare at price.”
Category Description
When you set a category to be included in the Internet Store, the category description (not the category code) and other Internet Store fields will be uploaded to Woo Commerce.
You can use categories to create a menu that will point to all the items in that category. Use the image and long description from the category record to entice and set the mood.
Uploading a Category will NOT automatically create a menu option.
Here are the exact steps to do that:
- From within WordPress, click on “Appearance” and “Menus.”
- Select the “Screen Options” panel (top right).
- Check off “Product Categories” and “Products tags” Screen Options panel.
- In the “Menu Name,” type in “Main”. We are going to replace the entire default menu with our own.
- Our goal is to make our menu look something like this. Of course, this is where you can customize which options you want your customers to have.
You can create as many menu entries and sub-entries as you need. Look for examples from other sites that are similar to what you are looking for. - To add the options to your now blank menu, click on the option and then click the button Add To Menu. You can add more than one option at a time.
- In order to add all the Category menus you want, make sure you have those categories in Artisan and send them over to WooCommerce. If you don’t see them, make sure you checked off Product Categories in step 3.
- Drag it into the position where you want it to appear on your menu by moving them up, down, or indenting them.
- Click “Save Menu.”
- Click on the “Manage Locations” tab and make sure that you have selected where you want your menu to go.
Click on “Save Changes.” - Your new menu should display.
Manufacturer (As Shopify Vendor)
When you specify a Manufacturer in Artisan and indicate that the vendor is to be included in the Internet Store, Artisan will upload that to Shopify.
Remember that Vendors and Manufacturers are pulling from the same VENDOR list in Artisan. In the vendor record, you can specify what type of Vendor they are, but it really doesn’t matter except that when the Vendor you select in Artisan is also a Manufacture or Artist, Artisan will automatically select them as a Manufacturer, too.
In Shopify, the Vendor field will show up in your products. You can use this field to make a Vendor collection and put that on the menu if you want.
Inventory Tracking
In Shopify, you can specify whether or not you track quantity for products. If you don’t, that product will remain on the site as available. Perhaps this is a product that you have readily available or is a service.
Most products will have a checkmark to show that you are tracking inventory. The Track Quantity setting in Shopify is directly set from the Inventory Tracking field in Artisan.
Available Quantity On Hand (un-reserved QOH)
This is the number of units you have in stock – minus the number of units reserved.
If you sell something on WooCommerce that you just have one of and you don’t have anymore, and don’t have “Continue selling when out of stock selection” checked, then that item will show as sold out.
In Artisan, that item will show as one on hand, minus the one reserved and it will upload a quantity of zero to WooCommerce.
Taxable
Most products are taxable, but for the few that aren’t, you can specify which ones those are.
In Artisan, this field is in the Category record.
Product Variants
As described in Tutorial #2, you can have product variations such as size, color, shape, and others. There are a number of options in the Artisan Product Variant template that controls how this looks.
Featured Product
Depending on your Template and settings, you may choose to display a featured product. On the WooCommerce front page, you usually have the option to specify which products you want to feature. Maybe these are new products or products that haven’t been noticed much by your customers.
With this option set to “Yes,” Artisan will create an “Inventory Tag” called “Featured.”
With a tag, you can create a “Collection.”
With a “Collection,” you can specify which products are featured and other details.
Product Tags
Product Tags are very similar to Keywords in Artisan. They help you group products by details beyond category or product type. In the Artisan field, separate the various words with a comma. With tags, you can create collections or help your customers narrow down products to what they are interested in. Here are some examples of Product Tags: Blue, Outdoor, Indoor, Watercolor, Gold, Silver
Shipping Weight
This is the individual weight of the product (including packaging). This weight will be used to calculate shipping charges depending on your shipping options in Shopify. This field is not used if you choose flat rate shipping.
Additional Categories
Additional categories are another way to cross-reference products to place the products into multiple collections automatically. In the Artisan field, you MUST specify valid Artisan categories that have the Include In Internet Store set to Yes. Separate these codes with a comma.
Brief Description
Right now, the Brief Description is used for “Meta Description” for Search Engine Optimization or SEO.
What is a meta description?
Here’s an excerpt from a blog on the topic.
Meta-descriptions play a big role in search results. In case you’re unfamiliar with the term, a meta description is the snippet of information below the link of a search result. Its purpose is to describe the contents of the page to the searcher. The end goal is to convince and persuade the searcher to click through to your website. Any words that match the search term are bolded in the description.
The image below shows you the basic anatomy of a search result, including where the meta description fits in.
This is the link to the source in its entirety:
https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/how-to-write-meta-description-ht
Detailed Description
This field is one of the most import fields for communicating what your product is about. This section can include just straight text or it can include HTML tags. HTML tags dramatically expand the look of your text. There are two basic ways you can enter this text. You can type in the tags yourself:
<ul>
<li>Dishwasher, Microwave, and Oven Safe, up to 375 degrees</li>
<li>Simple, clean aesthetics</li>
<li>Lead-free glazing</li>
</ul>
The text in < > are the HTML tags, which can control many aspects of how your text appears, such as BOLD or Italic, or even change the color. In this case, the HTML is used to give a bulleted list.
<ul> is for Unordered List
<li> is for List Item (which starts the bulleted text).
</li> or </ul> ends the section. In general, this is HTML syntax, use a slash / to end a section.
Here is a great site for learning on <ul> and much more.
Secondly, you can use Shopify’s Description field and use their Rich Text editor and when you have it the way you want, then switch to the HTML version and copy this text into the Artisan Description field. You can even embed videos and other media.
Full-Size Image and all the Additional Images, not Thumbnail Image
One of the most important ways to communicate details about your products is through product images. Just try to see it from the shopper’s perspective. What things do you need to know in order to make a buying decision about this product? With Artisan and Shopify you can have up to 6 images per product.
For variations, you can one image each. If you need to have multiple images, you can put those in your Base Product, and then each variation can have it’s one image.
The Thumbnail Image is not used with Shopify.
There are several critical attributes when it comes to images:
Size: It is important to get the right size and it is good to have consistent sizes throughout your site.
Shopify says: “It’s vital to strike a balance between images that are large enough so users can zoom in and those that are an optimum size so they don’t take up too much space and slow down your page load times. On Shopify, you can upload images of up to 4472 x 4472 pixels with a file size of up to 20 MB. But the platform typically recommends using 2048 x 2048 pixels for square product photos. These are high-resolution images that give your store a professional and well-rounded look with great zoom capabilities. Keep in mind that for zoom functionality to work your images have to be more than 800 x 800 pixels.”
We at CerTek think that for most products, your images should be around 1000 x 1500 or 2500 to 3000 when you add length and width together.
Background: Of course it is best if you can take all your own images with consistent backgrounds maybe a black and a white option… this helps your site look more consistent and amazing. However, if you can’t get all your own photos, try to do the best you can. Reduce the amount of background where possible, show as much product as you can.
Bright, Clear, In-Focus images are best.
Editing your Images:
It is important to have a good image editor to resize, crop, adjust the colors, etc. There are lots of good ones out there. PhotoShop is very popular, but if you aren’t already familiar with it, there may be a learning curve, but it certainly is very powerful. I personally like ScreenPresso and ThumbsPlus. ScreenPresso is easy, fast, and awesome for editing a single image or for screen capture. ThumbsPlus is more powerful and most importantly it has a batch option that can resize a whole group of images.
Remember:
You should NOT enter in your products directly into Shopify, please use Artisan instead for most things.