What does Mortar do?
Each in-store POS product is linked to a Shopify product that has the same SKU
Mortar links Shopify products and variants to your POS, making your POS the source of truth for products and inventory.
You can add new products to Shopify from your POS or link to existing products in Shopify. Once products are added or linked, product details and inventory are synced from your POS to Shopify based on your Mortar settings.
Products are linked to your POS
Mortar searches existing Shopify SKUs and Barcodes and matches them to your POS products to create a unique link between platforms. When a unique match is found, Mortar links the Shopify variant to your POS. Associated products, grids, and matrices are then linked to Shopify products. A product will NOT be linked if multiple matches are found, or if no match is found in your POS.
Learn more: How Mortar links products
Products are managed using tags
Mortar uses action tags to manage Shopify products directly in your POS. You do not need to log into Mortar to manage products; simply apply a tag to the product in POS.
Action tags control product creation, deletion, and status on Shopify. Tags should be applied to both the matrix/grid and the items in the matrix/grid. These tags have no impact when removed from a product, only when added.
Tag | Action |
add | Creates the product or variant in Shopify |
delete | Deletes the linked product and/or individual variants in Shopify |
archive | Archives the linked product and variants on Shopify and stops updates |
active | Updates product status to active in Shopify |
Learn more: Using tags to manage Shopify products
The Products page
You can review product links on the Mortar Products page. Products have a status of either Linked, Unlinked, or Priority. You can download an export of the products that need fixing from the Products page.
During onboarding, product links can be updated by pressing the "Refresh" button.
After Mortar is activated, Mortar links continuously and refreshes the Products page every 30 seconds so you can identify any Priority products in real-time.
Mortar products page
Tip: You can also check product links by selecting the "Show in POS" action from the More Actions menu on any Shopify Product or Variant.
Priority products
In Mortar, unlinked Shopify variants that have inventory in Shopify are referred to as "Priority products". These products are most likely to cause oversales because their inventory will be inaccurate and available for sale.
Fixing Priority products ensures accurate inventory. Usually, you can fix them by ensuring their SKU, UPC, etc matches in each platform. You can download an export of the Priority products that need fixing from the Product page.
Warning: Priority products will not sync. The "No Product Found" product will be substituted for any unlinked or priority product included on a Shopify order.
Learn more: How to fix Priority products
Merchandising products
Mortar allows you to control which product details update to Shopify, allowing you to merchandise products in Shopify differently than in-store. You can enable update for each Product and variant detail from pricing to product description to tags.
Learn more: Changing product and variant settings
Additionally, feature tags enable more merchandising and control:
groupbycolor - automatically creates a separate Shopify product for each colorway option in your matrix/grid. Learn more
noinventory - disables inventory updates for a specific Shopify variant. Learn more
instock - allows products to "continue selling even when out of stock" on Shopify.
Learn more: Using feature tags
No product found
The "No Product Found" product is included as a line item when an unlinked product is sold or returned on a Shopify order. Using the "No Product Found" product allows the transaction added to your POS to be complete and financially balanced.
SKU missing in your POS
If a matching SKU is not found in your POS, the "No Product Found" is used.
Linking products to more than one Shopify site
You can install Mortar on multiple Shopify sites and link them to a single POS account. Existing products will link automatically. You can use tags to control which sites new products integrate to using the Multi-site tag setting.
To link to multiple Shopify sites:
Define a tag you want to use for the current Shopify site in the Multi-site tag setting. Do this for each Shopify site in their respective Mortar account.
Apply the Multi-site tags desired on any product/grid/matrix with another action tag like "add", "delete", etc.
Learn more: Syncing to multiple Shopify sites
Product management best practices
To help you manage your products efficiently and ensuring they work smoothly with both your POS system and Shopify we recommend the following best practices.
Create products in your POS, first.
Complete all your product details, like descriptions, images, and weights, before applying the "add" tag to create a product on Shopify.
Only enable updates for product details that require frequent updates. A good example might be prices. Updates will overwrite product details in Shopify.
Similarly, if you need to update certain details in bulk, turn on update for those specific details before importing product changes to POS, then turn off update for those details after the changes have finished updating to Shopify.
How to troubleshoot products
If a Shopify product did not update:
What detail were you expecting to update?
Search products page or "Show in POS" to confirm variant is linked to POS
Check settings, update setting if needed
Resave in POS or Resync using Resync inventory or Resync Product Details action
Learn more: Updates to products are not showing up
If a POS product was not added to Shopify:
Confirm product is tagged with the "add" tag
Check product on the Mortar products page for "From POS" tab
Check for a problem with variant options. Comm
Learn more: Trouble adding a product to Shopify
Additional troubleshooting tools
When you install Mortar, additional tools are added to Shopify's "More actions" button.
Mortar product actions
Selecting the More actions button in Shopify reveals the Mortar product actions
"View in POS"
When Mortar links Shopify products to your POS, it creates a shortcut to view your product in your POS. Use the "View in POS" button to view the product in a new browser window in your POS.
Learn more: Viewing Shopify products in your POS
"Resync inventory to Shopify" action
To force an inventory update for select product variants, use the "Resync inventory" bulk action to refresh available inventory on Shopify.
Learn more: Resync inventory to Shopify on-demand
"Resync product and variant details" action
To force an update of details for select products and variants, use the "Resync products & variants" bulk action to resync info like price, cost, descriptions, and more.
Learn more: Resync product and variant details on-demand
"Unlink from Inventory Source" action
You can unlink a Shopify product from the POS product it is linked to if the original SKU/Barcode was incorrect. Unlinking preserves the Shopify product's details, images, and SEO history while allowing it to be relinked to a different inventory source product.
Relink a product
Once a product is unlinked it is immediately ready for relinking. Pressing save on an unlinked POS product will retrigger Mortar linking.
Learn more: "Unlink from POS" action
Asking for help
If you've tried troubleshooting and need more help, please find a specific example order and contact our support team.
Learn more: Contacting support