Knowledge base

In the Promidata Dashboard, open Change Suppliers Product Groups from the menu and click Add Supplier. For each supplier you see the A-number, the name, the date of the last data processing, the expected date for new data and the website. Tick the supplier and click Add at the bottom. You remove suppliers on the same page.

Yes. Click the supplier's name, tick the product categories you want and click Add. To remove a category, tick it again and click Remove. A tick in the product categories column means all of the supplier's categories are shown; a cross means you have made a selection. For brands and product filters, click that cross: adding and removing works the same way.

In the Promidata Dashboard, go to the Exclude Include Products page. Download the Excel template, enter the model numbers in the leftmost column, save the file and upload it with the upload function for excluding or for including. Both use the same template.

When you exclude, the products you list are hidden; everything else stays visible, including new products from the supplier. Useful if you want to show 90 out of 100 products. When you include, only the products you list are visible; the rest and any new products are not shown. Useful if you only want to show 10 out of 100.

In your own webshop, in Promotional Sourcing or in the supplier's basic information in the Promidata Dashboard. You need the model number to include or exclude products and to upload your own categories.

The basic information is a file per supplier with all its products: model number, SKU, current category, product name, description, brand, country of origin and filters. You find it in the Promidata Dashboard on the Basic Information page. Each supplier has its data per language; click the language and the CSV file downloads. You use it to recategorise products, add your own texts or include and exclude products.

Promidata's files are comma-separated, so Excel puts all the text in one column. Select that column, choose Data and then Text to Columns. Choose Delimited and click Next, untick Tab and tick Comma, then click Next and Finish. Confirm the message that there is already data with OK. All the data is now in separate columns.

In the Promidata Dashboard, go to Upload Custom Categories and download the Excel template. Enter the model numbers in the leftmost column and the name of the new category in the New Categories column. To put a product into an existing category, enter that category's key instead; you find it in your webshop's backend. This lets you change the structure when the standard categories don't fit.

You decide that in the right-hand column of the template. Enter True to remove the product from its old category, or False to keep it in both categories.

Products come with the supplier's texts by default. These don't always match what you want to say as a distributor, and your own texts make your products easier to find in search engines. You can change the product name, the short and long description, the meta title, the meta description and the meta keywords.

In the Promidata Dashboard, go to Custom Texts and download the Excel template. Enter the SKUs of the products you want to change in the leftmost column (SKU), and the new texts in the columns next to it. Columns you leave empty stay unchanged. Then upload the file on the same page.

In the Promidata Dashboard, go to Change Margins. At the top you see which margins are set and which need attention; 'not set' means there is no margin yet. Click the supplier's name. On the left you enter factors for products and for processing (such as printing); on the right you immediately see the effect on your selling price. Click Update to save.

It depends on the price setting. Based on the recommended retail price, a factor of 0.95 gives a selling price 5% below the supplier's recommended price. Based on the general purchase price, a factor of 1.8 gives a selling price of 1.8 times the purchase price, so 80% above it; a factor below 1 would end up below your purchase price. You see the new price straight away in the orange box.

The default type is factor: the supplier's amount is multiplied by your factor. With addition, your amount is added to the supplier's. With replace, you replace the supplied amount with a fixed amount you set yourself.

Two lines matter most for processing. Imprint Price Basis per Product sets, for example, the selling price of a screen print per item; One-Time Imprint Costs sets the setup costs for preparing the machine. Few suppliers charge extra processing costs. If the price in the orange box doesn't change when you adjust the factor, the supplier doesn't provide those costs: leave the factor at 1, with price on request.

The extended margin settings add two extra lines under products for additional product costs, for example luxury packaging: one line per product and one for costs charged once per order line. Not many suppliers provide these costs yet.

Yes. Click the button for product group or brand, choose the supplier and select the product group or brand; you set the margins there in the same way. With margin for your whole shop you set the margins for all suppliers at once.

On the page with your suppliers, the last column shows the margin check. A green tick: your margin setting is correct. An orange exclamation mark: a non-urgent issue that still needs attention. A red cross: an error to fix as soon as possible.

Type a keyword and click the magnifying glass. Each product in the results shows the supplier's name underneath; click it to see the contact details.

After a search, for example for USB, the Supplier filter shows which suppliers have products with that word and the Brand filter which brands. With Colour you pick the colour you want and with Categories you narrow the results to one product category. That's how you also find unexpected products, such as a water bottle with a USB charging cable or a pen with a USB stick. Remove a filter by clicking it away.

Select the suppliers you work with in My Account. Promotional Sourcing then only shows those suppliers' products.

Click the button on the product to calculate the selling price including printing; the print configurator opens. Upload your logo with Upload logo if you like, then choose a colour, the print position and the print technique. You then see the variable print costs and the fixed setup costs. Add the print, enter the quantity and put the configuration in the basket.

Once you've collected everything, open the product list: all print configurations are listed there with their costs. At the bottom you choose whether to send the customer a quote, ask the suppliers for a quote or order from the suppliers straight away. You print an order or send it by email. You set your own logo and address details for quotes and orders in My Account.

Click Compare on a product. For a second product, scroll to the recently viewed products and click Compare there too. Then click Start comparison and choose the product you want to configure.

Yes. Click Remember; the product goes onto your wish list. From the wish list you configure, quote and order later, and compare saved products with each other.

Create a new quote and click the Promotional Sourcing button in the item card; it opens on top of Promotional Office. Search for the product and configure it with printing; you can set several print positions and techniques. Use Continue shopping to add more products. Then click Use in Promotional Office, switch back with Alt-Tab and click Add item line. The products are in the quote, including the full print configuration.

Click the Promotional Sourcing button again, find the product, configure the print and put it in the basket. Click Use again, switch back with Alt-Tab and add the item line, including the print configuration.

The customer finds the product and first chooses a colour. The configurator then shows every print position available for that product, such as all-round, front only or front and back. Right after the position, the possible print techniques appear, for example four-colour pad printing. Add print confirms the print.

As soon as the quantity is entered, for example 1,000 pieces, the cost breakdown and the total price including printing appear on the right.

Yes. Click Add print again and choose the position and technique, for example one-colour pad printing on the back. The total price is updated straight away with the extra costs.

No, in the backend you can only view products. The webshop is filled with data from the Promidata Dashboard, and changes made in the backend are overwritten at the next product update. So you change product texts, categories and visibility in the Promidata Dashboard.

Your webshop's data: products, reviews, categories, manufacturers (the suppliers in your webshop), dynamic product groups and attributes. Customer reviews appear there when they are switched on; you can view, approve and delete them.

Under Categories you see your category structure: product categories, footer categories and any menu categories. In the general information you choose the icon for the category menu on the home page (from the free Font Awesome icons). Under Layout you see which layout is assigned and change the content of its elements.

On the category's SEO tab you enter an SEO title, description and keywords. You change the SEO URL at the bottom: choose the right sales channel and edit the URL. Keep the existing URL structure in mind.

A product group that Shopware fills automatically based on criteria. For a group of sustainable products, for example, create a dynamic product group with the criterion that the product has the eco property.

Under Attributes (properties) you see your products' characteristics. For each one you decide whether it shows on category pages and product pages, and the order of its values, for example the sizes in the filter.

Under Orders you find all orders; there you change the order status, create documents and find any logo the customer uploaded. Under Customers you create, edit or delete customers and assign customer groups and permissions.

Go to Content, Shopping Experiences and click create new layout. Choose the type: Shop page (linked to a category), Landing page (a standalone page with its own URL) or Listing page (a product overview). Promidata doesn't use the Product page type, because the print configurator isn't carried over. Then choose full width or with sidebar and name the layout. In the editor's sidebar you set things like a CSS class, background colour and margins per block, and with the navigator you swap, duplicate or delete sections.

Shopware separates layout from content. You link a layout to a category or landing page with Layout assignment, or via Catalogue, Categories, Layout. But content you change in the shopping experience isn't always carried over to the category. In that case, change the content via Categories, Layout.

Save the change and then clear the cache under Settings, System, Cache; only then does it appear in the webshop. This also applies after a theme change. Also check the language at the top right of the backend: it must be set to your shop language. If your shop has several languages, enter the content for each language.

Under Media you find all your webshop's media: upload new files, delete unused ones and store downloadable PDFs. Under Themes you change the theme colours and the logo. Clear the cache afterwards.

Under Blogs you create and publish blog posts. Under Forms you create your own forms; Shopware's standard contact form can't be changed. Under Marketing you find the newsletter recipients and create discounts and discount codes.

Settings has three tabs: Shop, System and Extensions. Under Shop, the most important are payment methods, shipping (shipping costs) and text fragments (snippets: the fixed texts in the webshop). Under System you clear the cache. Under Extensions you find the mail archive, where you check whether emails from your webshop have been sent.

In the sales channel you change the sales countries and enable payment and shipping methods for your webshop. Other options on that page are changed in consultation with Promidata Support.

Shopping Worlds are pages you build from blocks with banners, images, product sliders and texts. You use them for your home page, the most important page of your webshop, and for landing pages for product groups you want to highlight. You find them in the backend under Marketing, Shopping Worlds.

Make a copy of the Shopping World before you change anything. If something goes wrong, you put the copy back. Do set the copy to inactive, otherwise two Shopping Worlds appear on your home page.

Open the Shopping World with the brush icon. You see the media blocks, which you resize and move. The brush icon on a block lets you change its content. To add a block, drag it in, size it and fill in the settings. There are blocks for text, images, product sliders and YouTube videos, and for advanced users a block for your own code.

To put an important product group in the spotlight, for example bags or a seasonal product, and send targeted visitors to it, for example with Google Ads.

In the backend, go to Marketing, Shopping Worlds and click the green plus. Type the name, set the page to active, mark it as a landing page and make it visible from the root of your website. Set the grid on the Layout tab, for example 8 columns with a row height of 40 pixels, and save as you go.

Under Elements, drag the banner slider onto the grid and size it by dragging a corner or side. Open the settings with the brush icon, drag all your banners into the Media Selector at once to upload them and choose which banners go into the slider. Tick Display Navigation so visitors can click through, and Rotate Automatically so the banners change every 5 seconds.

Open the slider's settings with the brush icon. Under ListType you choose which products appear: newest, best-selling, cheapest, most expensive or random. Under Filter by Category you choose which category they come from.

Upload the images for your CTA blocks together via the Media Selector and choose the right image for each block; you can add a zoom effect for when visitors hover over it. For the link, go to the category in your webshop, copy the address from your browser's address bar and paste it into the block's settings.

You choose the mode under Layout Settings. Your shop is set to Fluid Responsive by default: an image always fills the whole block, but you almost always lose a little of its edges. With Rows the whole image is visible, but the image's ratio must exactly match the block's, and each element sits on one row at most. With Resize Scaling the blocks keep their ratio and images and texts get smaller on a narrower screen; with Fluid Responsive they stay the same size and only the blocks get narrower. Make a copy before you switch to Rows, or you may lose your blocks.

Open the Shopping World under Marketing. At the top are tabs for desktop, tablet landscape and portrait, and mobile landscape and portrait. Copying is fastest: stay on desktop and click the link icon of tablet landscape, and all blocks are carried over. Keep copying from tablet landscape to tablet portrait, mobile landscape and finally mobile portrait. The number above a screen shows how many desktop blocks are not used there yet; drag those onto the grid yourself. If texts no longer fit, make the blocks bigger or move them.

Preview works, but Google Chrome's developer tools are better. Press F12, click the responsive icon at the top left and switch between landscape and portrait with the rotate icon. Check the final result on a real phone or tablet too.

After every change in the backend you need to refresh the cache; only then do you see the result. Then reload the page with Ctrl-F5. For a Shopping World you can check your work with Preview first and then save. If you're making many changes, put the shop in editing mode: the cache is then refreshed continuously. Always switch the shop back to production mode afterwards.

With the built-in Shop Pages function in the backend. You create a page with text and images and choose where its link appears: in the navigation bar at the top, in the first or second footer column, or in the sidebar. A page can be in several places at once. To show an existing page, such as the terms and conditions, in an extra place, drag that place to its assigned groups.

You set the order per page in its settings: position 1 comes first. For a subpage, first select the page it should sit under and click new page; you're then asked whether you want to create a subpage.

Yes. Enter a link to the external website on the page. Choose Blank if it should open in a new window.

Use Shop Pages to create a new page with a title, place it in the navigation bar (Navigation) and enter the landing page's link as the link address. For a news blog, that's the name of the blog category followed by a slash, for example news/. Then refresh the cache and reload the page with Ctrl-F5.

With the Snippets function. In the snippet manager, first click the tab for your language and search for the text. Type the new text and click Update. Then refresh the cache and reload the page with Ctrl-F5. You change all other fixed texts in the webshop the same way. In Shopware 6 the snippets are under Settings, Shop.

A news blog is a collection of articles with text, images and videos that customers can comment on and subscribe to via RSS. Articles are grouped by month and several colleagues can write. It keeps customers informed, and Google values regular new content, which can help your webshop get found.

In Shopware 5 a blog is a category. In the backend, go to Categories, select the main category Shop and click Add New. Name the blog, for example News, set it to active, make it a blog category and save.

Go to Content, Blog and click the green plus icon. Enter the title, choose the author, set the article to active and fill in a short description and the main text. Choose the date and time, your blog as the category and finally an image. When uploading blog images, drag them into the green Blog folder, or they won't be visible in the webshop.

In the overview you edit an article with the brush icon, delete it with the red stop icon and duplicate it with the blue copy icon; you also see how often it has been read. Comments with the status Pending are waiting for your review; the second tab lists them all. An approved comment appears in the webshop straight away.

In your regular webshop, all kinds of business customers order from your standard range, in your house style. A Full Service Shop is made for one customer, in that customer's house style, with the products and rules that fit them. It ties the customer to you, because they order all their promotional products and gifts from you.

Mainly larger business customers. They use it, for example, as a gift shop for their staff, to distribute promotional gifts to their own customers, or to let branches order promotional material themselves. Keep in mind that you hold the customer-specific branded products in stock.

Yes. You give each employee a budget in euros or order points. You can lock the shop so products are only visible after logging in, or open it and only allow ordering after login. Range and prices can differ per customer, employee or login, and you decide who may log in.

You put the range together from hundreds of thousands of standard products in the Promidata network, plus your own products.

Yes. Full Service Shops work with ERP systems such as SAP, Exact, Navision and Ariba. Through an OCI connection, large customers purchase from within their own ERP system.

Full Service Shops are only hosted with providers that hold the required ISO certifications. Not sure where to start? Get in touch with Promidata and we'll think it through with you.

KMS stands for Clothing Management System. It automates the sale of workwear, so your customers' employees order their own workwear. It's meant for dealers who sell workwear to companies where workwear is worn every day. You offer each occupational group a tailored solution, and the convenience ties your customers to you.

Each employee (wearer) gets their own personal webshop with only the workwear that belongs to their job, in their own sizes. A driver might see three products and a nurse eight entirely different ones. If a customer has hundreds of wearers, KMS creates hundreds of wearer webshops.

Each wearer orders only their own workwear in their own sizes, by phone or computer. Managers can give wearers points to order with during the year. Instead of personal webshops, you can also create one webshop for a manager, who then orders for all wearers in their department or branch.

KMS is connected to the Promidata network database, with hundreds of thousands of products from almost every workwear and promotional brand, such as Tricorp, Mascot and Santino.

After logging in you see your revenue per customer and the budget in points your customers have reserved for the coming year. The two main sections are Customer and Sales.

On the Promidata Dashboard home page, go to Post New Message. Enter the title and description; the buttons above the input field format the text. You can upload one image per message. Then choose the publication week and the language.

You choose the publication date as a week number. The message appears on the first working day of that week; if you schedule it for the current week, it appears the next day. If you tick draft, the message is saved but not published.

The language your message is written in. The message is only shown to those active in the countries where that language is spoken.

The message centre page has a table of your messages: publication date, message ID, title, language and whether it's a draft. In the last column you edit or delete a message; the edit icon also shows a preview. You can't change the publication date when editing.

Once the publication date has passed, the message appears on the Promidata Dashboard home page under Message centre, visible to suppliers and distributors. Show all lists all messages.