This guide is for Lengow merchants that have completed the onboarding process first.
Make sure you have the "go" from our Support Team before starting your settings.
IMPORTANT
Everytime the Zalando "MasterData" file is changed by Zalando, it must be emailed again to the Lengow Support for integration in your Lengow/Zalando feed.
EAN Matching
Zalando allows EAN Matching on condition that the products you want to match already exist in their database.
Thus, if your products have already been created by the marketplace by another reseller, you don't need to send the "products" values usually required to create the product ad on this channel.
In Lengow, make sure that the below attributes are correctly filled in:
- EAN
- price
- stock
Match Zalando Categories
Only categories from the "MasterData" file, which are given by Zalando and called "Silhouettes" will be present in the taxonomy.
If you don't find a desired category, it's because Zalando doesn't allow you to sell products in this category.
If something doesn’t seem right, contact your Zalando account manager.
More info on Category matching in our dedicated guide.
Complete Attributes Matching
Zalando Product Overview
Product attributes are organized into three levels:
- product_model: The highest-level details that apply to all options and variants of the product, such as the model name, target genders, or age group.
- product_config: Mid-level details such as color and season.
- product_simple: Attributes that describe one specific product for sell, such as EAN and the size code of each EAN.
There is a relationship of one product_model to one or many product_configs, and each product_config includes one or many product_simples. (see image below)
In the Attributes Matching of Lengow, you will find in the attributes definition references to these levels. These references are here to help you set the correct value.
Example (image below): supplierSKU attribute is to be completed at the Config level or your product. If you have variations, you must complete it.
1. Set up your special offers/sales
To set up special offers/sales, fill in the following fields:
- promotional_price (mandatory): discounted price of your product. If your products are not discounted, your "promotional_price" must be equal to your "regular_price".
- regular_price (mandatory): strikethrough price of your product (original price).
You also have the option to set up scheduled prices to plan future promotions. Scheduled prices take precedence over other prices.
Up to 3 scheduled prices may be added, using the following fields:
- regularPrice_01 (mandatory): original price of your product.
- promotionalPrice_01 (optional): discounted price of your product.
- scheduledPriceStartTime_01 (mandatory): date on which your promotion begins. Format example: 2020-05-20T00:00:00.00Z
- scheduledPriceEndTime_01 (optional): date on which your promotion ends. Format example: 2020-05-30T00:00:00.00Z
Your on-sale prices must be in your optimized feed from the morning of the first day of sales period.
2. Delivery method and costs
Contact your Zalando account manager to set your shipping costs
3. Variation values
3.1 Common fields
- partnerArticleModelId: your parent ID (the ID which is common to all variations from the same product).
Note: This field has to be filled in. If your product doesn't have any variations, fill this field in with the product ID.
- supplierColor: This is the color that was provided by the manufacturer or supplier.
- Block "colors": Enabling you to match your products colors with Zalando's grid.
3.2 Specific fields per products category
Matching has to be completed for colour, size and material attributes. If your product catalogue includes these values, you can use the conversion list through a rule for the concerned attribute.
Note #1: All products must be correctly configured. If a variation is set up incorrectly (e.g. a size which doesn't contain a value expected by Zalando), then all the variations of the product will be unpublished.
Note #2: For products with variations, titles shouldn't contain any notion of variation.
3.3 Sizes specificities
- sizeGrid: Complete with size and size type as provided by your Zalando team partner
3.4 Material specificities
There are two attributes for materials:
- upper_material_clothing (mandatory): fill in the different materials of the product. Expected format: "CO|10000" for 100% cotton, or "CO|7000;EL|3000" for 70% cotton and 30% elastane.
- material (mandatory): the main material only.
4. Stock - Switzerland and Belgium focus
You are selling your products in Switzerland on both German (de-CH) and French (fr-CH) versions and/or in Belgium on both Dutch (nl-BE) and French versions (fr-CH)?
You must update stock for the same article (EAN) with the same value for both languages/subchannels in Switzerland and/or Belgium.
If Zalando receives a stock update (EAN) that doesn’t match for the product, the latest stock update from a particular locale will then be taken and copied to its corresponding locale.
See this example for Switzerland:
5. Other specificities
Other attributes have certain peculiarities:
- ID / SKU:
The "partnerArticleSimpleID", "supplierSKU" and "partnerSKU" fields must be filled in with the same unique product ID.
- Stock
Enter here the stock available in your own warehouses.
If you are using the ZFS fulfillment service, and thus Zalando is shipping your orders, enter the value "0" in this field for the ZFS products.
- "specialDescription":
This field's values aren't displayed on Zalando product page. Use this field to send technical details to Zalando, which are specific to your product. Zalando requests the text to be written in English or German language.
Note: the pipe symbol "|" is blocking for this field, use commas to separate several pieces of information.
- Images:
In the "images" fields, you can enter up to 7 images per variation ("images_01", "images_02", etc.).
- "ignore_warnings":
When this attribute is set to "true", the price update will be applied ignoring the warnings (but not the errors) generated from Zalando's validation engine.
When the value is set to "false", there is no price update on the products with warnings.
The default value is "false".
Manage your Exclusions
Zalando recommends excluding:
- Products you don't want to sell on this marketplace.
- Products not authorized by Zalando.
- "Parent products" if your catalogue includes some.
During the first set up
Send only a few products to start. This will allow you to make sure that Zalando's integration returns are good and will make it easier for you to identify the corrections to identifiy the corrections to be made to the configuration.
Preview your data
Check the data you are about to send to the channel at the "Preview" step.
Configure your Options
Configure options before sending your product catalogue to the channel.
1. "Your Zalando parameters"
In the meantime, you can enter a hyphen "-" in each of these fields.
2. "Your Zalando parameters for order documents"
Accepted formats for your logo: PNG, JPEG, GIF and SVG.
For Zalando to provide Lengow with your credentials, you must first authorize Lengow as integrator. Please follow the instructions detailed in Zalando's documentation.
Launch the channel catalogue
- First launch: When your feed is ready for integration, contact your Zalando account manager AND the Lengow Support to launch the display of your products.
- Folowing updates: Zalando gets your catalog hourly.
Read Integration Reports
Read Integration Reports to check that your products are properly configured at both the product creation level (product feed) and for updates (offer feed).
These reports list only items which were rejected by Zalando. For each product in error, Zalando specifies the reason for the rejection.
The errors are detailed in this Zalando documentation.
Product and offer integration reports can be downloaded from:
- Lengow: "Channel" tab > select "Zalando" > click on "Activity"
If a variation of the same product is incorrectly configured, all products linked together won't be published.
Edit a product file
Please contact your Zalando account manager for more information about editing a product file.
Unpublish/Delete an offer
To unpublish a product on Zalando, indicate 0 units as a quantity.
Manage your Zalando orders
You can manage your orders in the Lengow platform.
1. Order retrieval
Lengow retrieves orders placed on Zalando hourly.
To make sure Lengow can retrieve your orders and update your data, set the App Permissions in Zdirect to "Read All" and "Write All" for the Orders API and the Products API (see screenshot below).
2. Order processing
Orders go through various statuses in Lengow while being processed.
Specific documents
Zalando requires specific documents to be added to the package of the order. These documents are available in Lengow on the order details page:
- invoice
- delivery note
- return form
You can also access these documents directly from the Lengow Orders API when your order has the "Approved" status ("Accepted" in Lengow).
3. Zalando order statuses
Orders go through various statuses in Lengow while being processed.
For Zalando, here are the Lengow statuses you can find on your orders:
✅ "new" corresponding to the Zalando statuses:
- "initial"
- "New"
- "NEW"
Zalando is in charge of approving the order at this stage, not the merchant.
✅ "waiting_acceptance" corresponding to the Zalando statuses:
- "approved"
- "Approved"
The order is awaiting acceptance, you need to accept it.
✅ "waiting_shipment" corresponding to the Zalando status:
- "exported"
Possible actions on "waiting_shipment" order:
- ship. Ship action requires "carrier" and "tracking number" to be specified.
- cancel.
✅ "shipped" corresponding to the Zalando statuses:
- "fulfilled"
- "SHIPPED"
Possible actions on "shipped" order:
- refund. Refund action requires "refund_reason" to be specified. Do not enter a "refund_quantity" (number of products to refund) if the whole order is being reimbursed.
Wait until you receive the product to perform the refund action. Lengow then informs Zalando that the product has been returned and the customer will be refunded.
- cancel.
✅ "refunded" corresponding to the Zalando statuses:
- "refunded"
- "returned"
- "RETURNED"
Channel's news
Find here the latest changes/communications from the channel and what you have to do in Lengow:
- To sum up
Starting October 2022, Zalando is increasing its sustainability commitment and has made changes in sustainability attributes.
Changes to existing products will need to be done before the end of February 2023. After this date, non-updated products will lose their sustainability tag on Zalando.
- What you have to do in Lengow
- To update your existing products:
Zalando will provide you with a pre-filled template to update your missing data by February 2023. Contact Zalando for more information.
-
- To create new products:
You need to contact Zalando to get your new masterdata with these new attributes.
Once you receive this masterdata, please send it to our Support team in order to update your Lengow/Zalando feed with these attributes (each Zalando feed is specific to one masterdata).
- Original message
Refer to the documentation provided by Zalando which is available here.
Annex
Understand your MasterData file
The MasterData file is provided by Zalando and integrated in your Lengow feed. This file includes all Zalando valid values for your products. Every "MasterData" file is unique and personalized by your Zalando Account Manager.
The values contained in your "MasterData" may change over time. These changes will not be automatically updated in Lengow. If your "MasterData" evolves, contact the Lengow support team to add the new data to your Lengow feed.
The "MasterData" file contains the information expected by Zalando for your products:
- Your silhouettes, i.e. categories in which you can sell your products on Zalando ("silhouettes").
- Your brands ("brands")
- Your seasons ("seasons")
- Your genders ("genders")
- Your age groups ("ageGroups")
- Your colours ("colors")
- Your materials ("materials")
- Your sizes ("sizeGrids)
- Your lengths (lengthGrids")
If you don't use Lengow's matching features, you can retrieve the values to insert into your source catalogue from this file.
