Step 3: Set Up Your Inventory Feed

With Locally, retailers can report up-to-date, in-store product availability to shoppers on hundreds of major brand websites for free. You’ll generate a simple, 2-column spreadsheet, schedule it to run automatically, and then transmit it to Locally via your preferred method.

If you are using one of these POS systems, please follow their more specific instructions.


Premier Connections

Our Premier Connection partners allow retailers to quickly activate an inventory feed through a formal integration or by following step-by-step instructions. For more info about making your POS a premier connection, head here.

If your POS isn't listed, don't worry! Simply follow our Universal Instructions below. If you don't use UPC/EANs, please go here first.

Abacus
Adsoft
AmberPOS
AppRoom Cycle
Ascend
AXIS by Gearfire
Bestinfo
BigShift
BikeDesk
BikeSolution
Bookmanager
BigCommerce
Celerant
Citrus-Lime
Cloud Retail Systems/CB Retail
Clover
CORESense
CycleSoftware
Diverse Retail and EncomPos Software
Easyrent
Ecomdash
Edge Technologies
Epicor Eagle
Erply
EVE
Famowa
Feedoptimise
Heartland Retail
Imagine Retail
iZettle Pro
L.A.R.S. Inc
Lightspeed Retail
Lightspeed EVO
LinkEdge
NetSuite
Nutid
Rain POS (real-time connection!)
RB Retail & Service Solutions
RetailEdge
Retail Pro v8
Retail Pro v9
RICS (real-time connection!)
Seanic Retail Software
ServiBikes
Shopify
Sportmas
Teamwork Retail
Talech POS
Tallysoft
Tridata
TransActPOS
Tri-Technical Systems AIM
Tower Systems
VeloData 
Velo.Port 
Vendit 
Wilmar/BlueNotion 
WooCommerce 
Yuzer


Connections with Specific Instructions
ACCEO Smart Vendor, Acomba, BikeDesk, CycleSoftware, Dive Shop 360, Epicor, Futurosoft, IPOS, Microsoft RMS, POSIM, Quickbooks, Retail Express, Runit, Shopkeep, Square, Lightspeed X/Vend

Prospective Connections
We are actively seeking retailers to help us build "Premier Connections" with these systems. 

Aptos POS, Cegid Shopping POS, Cow Hills Retail, Eurostop, Futura4Retail, GINKOIA, Hiltes 4000, Infor Engage POS, Lightspeed EVO, myfactory, NCR Silver POS, NP Retail POS, OmniPOS, PCMS Vision POS, SAP, SKILOU, Springboard, TEKSO, Wasp Barcode Technologies.


Universal Instructions


Part 1: Set Up Your Inventory Report

Locally’s brand partners provide their entire product catalog to Locally, so we only need minimal information from a retailer’s point of sale system: UPC/EAN and quantity on hand. We match your UPC/EANs to the brand catalog to present in-store availability. Products display MSRP by default, but you can opt to display your in-store selling prices. Learn more: Display your In-Store Prices on Locally.

If your POS exports UPC/EAN without the final check digit, please let us know so we can set you up correctly.

Set Up Your Report: Single-Store Retailers

Export an inventory report from your system with the following columns of data:

  • Column A: UPC/EAN

  • Column B: Quantity on hand

  • Column C: Price (optional)


We accept the following file types: .csv, .xls, .xlsx, .txt

If your system can export a similar report that doesn’t perfectly place UPC and quantity in Columns A and B, that’s okay! Contact us about how we can write an adapter to accept the file.

Set Up Your Report: Multi-Store Retailers

Have more than one store? You have two options. 

Option 1: Generate one file for each location. If you have ten stores, you will generate ten files. Each file should contain the two columns described above: UPC/EAN, quantity, price(optional). Simply let us know which file name is for which location.

Option 2: Generate a single “master” inventory file for all locations. To do this, your file will be three (or four) columns: UPC, Quantity, Price (Optional) and Store ID.

In this example, a retailer has three locations, and their IDs are 101, 102, and 103. Column C tells Locally which store to apply each UPC/EAN’s availability to. The location ID can be anything; let us know which ID corresponds to which location.

Note: The above column formats are our ideal templates, but we can also work with additional formats as long as the required fields (UPC, Quantity On Hand, Store ID) are present. Header names are irrelevant. Please send us a sample for evaluation.


Part 2: Schedule Your Inventory Report

Because we are presenting your available selection to shoppers, reports must be updated regularly.  

  •     At a minimum, schedule your report to be transmitted to Locally at least every 24 hours.
  •     At a maximum, you may transmit your report to Locally every 60 minutes. 

Select your preferred file transfer, and schedule your report to be updated and transmitted to Locally automatically at that frequency. The name of your file(s) must stay the same each day.

Have an issue with providing a refreshed report every 24 hours? Contact us and we can review your options.

Can’t automate your report?  You can upload your report manually by following these instructions


Part 3: Transmit Your Report to Locally

Push your file to Locally via any of the following methods. Locally may also pull files from certain existing online locations.  

  • S/FTP
    • To push your file to us via FTP/SFTP, generate credentials from your locally.com account or contact Locally for assistance. Once you have the credentials, drop your file(s) in the folder and then notify retailers@locally.com. Locally will link our system to poll this path several times per day and absorb any changes. 
  • Email: Every store location in our system has a unique email address assigned that inventory files can be sent to. View it in your locally.com account under "Email Method" here. Please contact support@locally.com once you have sent your first file via this method, because we need to create a connection on our end in order for your uploads to automatically sync.
  • Dropbox: Create a Dropbox folder and name it "Locally_StoreName" (replace "StoreName" with the actual name of your store). Share the folder with dropbox@locally.com and then notify retailers@locally.com. Drop your file(s) in the folder. Locally will link our system to scan this folder several times per day and absorb any changes.
  • URL: We can pick up a file at a URL. Note that we can also do this with, for example, a Google Product Feed. If Quantity On Hand isn’t available in this feed, our system would treat a UPC/EAN’s presence as QOH=1 and its absence as QOH=0. Note that we cannot work with .xml files at this time.
  • S3: If your S3 bucket is public, please share the link to your dealer list file with us as support@locally.com. If your S3 bucket is private, please send your S3 access key and the link to the S3 bucket with your dealer list file in it to support@locally.com. Please also tell us the name of the dealer list file.

Additional Details

Inventory Audit

Locally scans all live feeds regularly to ensure they remain fresh. If Locally does not detect a change in the total quantity on hand for 72 hours, our system suspects there may be an issue and an auto-notification is sent to your inventory feed contact. If there is no change and the quantity on hand remains static after 96 hours, our system concludes that an error has occurred in report transmission and temporarily “mutes” your store’s inventory from displaying so shoppers do not act on out-of-date information. You are notified when this occurs. 

When the total quantity on hand of your inventory changes, your inventory feed will “recover” and resume being presented to shoppers. Depending on your integration it may take several hours to receive confirmation that your feed is recovered.

Low Quantity Message

Locally’s default settings display any UPC/EAN with a quantity of one or greater as “In Stock.” However, we provide the option to display a custom message at a certain quantity threshold. To do this, inform your Locally contact of your preferred custom message and the quantity threshold it should apply to.

In this example, a retailer has set a custom message of “Limited Quantity In Stock” when their quantity is at or below a certain threshold.




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