Shopify Source

Shopify is a popular ecommerce platform that gives you all tools to start, run, and grow your business effectively. It offers online retailers a variety of services around digital payments, marketing, product shipping, customer engagement and retention, and more.

This guide will help you set up Shopify as a source in RudderStack.

Setup overview

Setting up the Shopify source involves two steps:

• Configuring the Shopify source in RudderStack
• Configuring the RudderStack app in your Shopify store

Configuring the Shopify source in RudderStack

1. Log in to your RudderStack dashboard and click Add Source.
2. From the list of Event Streams sources, select Shopify.
3. Assign a name to your source and click Continue.

Connection settings

• Disable client-side identifier: If enabled, RudderStack does not automatically track the client-side identify events by itself.

Enable this setting to set your own userId in the client-side events using RudderStack’s identify call.

For example, when you enable this flag and call rudderanalytics.identify('custom_userId'), RudderStack sets custom_userId as the client-side user ID instead of the userId set by the RudderStack Shopify tracker.

Your Shopify source is now configured. Go to the Setup tab and note the source Write key. This will be required later while configuring the RudderStack app on your Shopify store.

Configuring the RudderStack app in your Shopify store

To complete the configuration, you need to add and configure the RudderStack app in your Shopify store. Follow these steps:

1. Go to your Shopify store’s admin dashboard.
2. In the left sidebar, go to Apps > Customize your store:

3. Search for RudderStack.

4. In the search results, select the RudderStack app and click Add app. Alternatively, you can install the RudderStack app directly using this link.

5. After installation, you should be able to see the app in the Installed apps section:

6. Select the installed RudderStack app.
7. Enter the Source Write Key that you copied above and your RudderStack data plane URL:

8. Click Submit.

You can update these fields later with a different write key and data plane URL.

Event tracking and transformation

You can track user events using server-side and client-side tracking supported by Shopify.

Identity stitching enhancement for client-side and server-side tracking

RudderStack internally performs identity stitching and sets the same anonymousId and sessionId (generated automatically) for the same user in client-side and server-side events. You don’t need to take any action (like updating or reinstalling your RudderStack Shopify app) to use this feature.

Tracking server-side events

RudderStack uses the Shopify-provided webhooks for tracking events on the server-side.

The following table details the supported Shopify events and their corresponding topic mapping for identify calls:

The following table details the supported Shopify events and their corresponding topic mapping for track calls:

As of May 23, 2023, the carts_create event is deprecated. Instead, you can use the carts_update event that is fired whenever an update is made to a cart.

RudderStack also supports the following ecommerce events:

Any other events flowing through RudderStack except the track, identify, and the above-mentioned ecommerce events are discarded.

RudderStack captures user-related information from the traits object of the event payload. The product-specific information present in the above resources in line_items is mapped to the products array in the payload. For more information on the RudderStack event payload nomenclature, see Event Specification and Common Fields.

Required scopes

The RudderStack app requires the following scopes for tracking user events in the Shopify store:

read_checkouts, read_orders, read_customers, read_fulfillments, write_script_tags

The below is an example of server-side event transformed by RudderStack:

{
  "anonymousId": "bb35ad42-d59b-405c-b311-2daf98671c9c",
  "type": "identify",
  "context": {
    "integration": {
      "name": "SHOPIFY"
    },
    "ip": "[::1]",
    "sessionId": "57470820",
    "library": {
      "name": "unknown",
      "version": "unknown"
    }
  },
  "integrations": {
    "SHOPIFY": true
  },
  "messageId": "7cbc1a8c-597d-42f7-8a1e-a659700da011",
  "originalTimestamp": "2022-01-03T12:34:08.876+05:30",
  "receivedAt": "2022-01-03T12:34:04.763+05:30",
  "request_ip": "[::1]",
  "rudderId": "f31e31dd-00c2-4f77-96b5-0dd46839bc9c",
  "sentAt": "2022-01-03T12:34:08.876+05:30",
  "timestamp": "2021-12-29T09:45:20.000Z",
  "traits": {
    "acceptsMarketing": false,
    "acceptsMarketingUpdatedAt": "2021-12-29T15:15:20+05:30",
    "address": {
      "address1": "6649 N",
      "address2": "Blue Gum Street",
      "city": "New Orleans",
      "company": "Example Organization",
      "country": "USA",
      "country_code": "US",
      "country_name": "USA",
      "customer_id": 5747017285820,
      "default": true,
      "first_name": "Alex",
      "id": 6947581821116,
      "last_name": "Keener",
      "name": "Alex Keener",
      "phone": "8005550100",
      "province": "Louisiana",
      "province_code": "LA",
      "zip": "00000"
    },
    "addressList": [{
      "address1": "6649 N",
      "address2": "Blue Gum Street",
      "city": "New Orleans",
      "company": "Example Organization",
      "country": "USA",
      "country_code": "US",
      "country_name": "USA",
      "customer_id": 5747017285820,
      "default": true,
      "first_name": "Alex",
      "id": 6947581821116,
      "last_name": "Keener",
      "name": "Alex Keener",
      "phone": "8005550100",
      "province": "Louisiana",
      "province_code": "LA",
      "zip": "00000"
    }],
    "adminGraphqlApiId": "gid://shopify/Customer/5747017285820",
    "currency": "USD",
    "email": "alex@example.com",
    "firstName": "Alex",
    "lastName": "Keener",
    "note": "",
    "orderCount": 0,
    "phone": "8005550100",
    "smsMarketingConsent": {
      "consent_collected_from": "SHOPIFY",
      "consent_updated_at": null,
      "opt_in_level": "single_opt_in",
      "state": "not_subscribed"
    },
    "state": "disabled",
    "tags": "",
    "taxExempt": false,
    "taxExemptions": [],
    "totalSpent": "0.00",
    "verifiedEmail": true
  },
  "userId": "5747017285820"
}

Tracking client-side events

For tracking the client-side events, RudderStack inserts a JavaScript tracking code into every page of the respective Shopify store.

Note that:

• RudderStack supports the page event for every page visited on the Shopify store.
• It also supports Registration Viewed as a generic track event whenever the user views their account or registration page.
• RudderStack tracks the Login Viewed event only on the account/login page. It triggers the event if only if the user accesses this path.
• The following ecommerce events are also supported on client-side:

A sample client-side event transformed by RudderStack:

{
  "channel": "web",
  "context": {
    "app": {
      "build": "1.0.0",
      "name": "RudderLabs JavaScript SDK",
      "namespace": "com.rudderlabs.javascript",
      "version": "2.2.4"
    },
    "traits": {},
    "sessionId": "23342112",
    "library": {
      "name": "RudderLabs JavaScript SDK",
      "version": "2.2.4"
    },
    "userAgent": "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/98.0.4758.80 Safari/537.36",
    "os": {
      "name": "",
      "version": ""
    },
    "locale": "en-GB",
    "screen": {
      "density": 2,
      "width": 1440,
      "height": 900,
      "innerWidth": 1440,
      "innerHeight": 185
    },
    "campaign": {},
    "page": {
      "path": "/",
      "referrer": "$direct",
      "referring_domain": "",
      "search": "",
      "title": "rudderstack-store-final",
      "url": "https://rudderstack-store-final.myshopify.com/",
      "tab_url": "https://rudderstack-store-final.myshopify.com/",
      "initial_referrer": "$direct",
      "initial_referring_domain": ""
    }
  },
  "type": "page",
  "messageId": "0cd68548-8e0a-42d0-9745-c2a0b38092f2",
  "originalTimestamp": "2022-02-22T05:08:51.357Z",
  "anonymousId": "f4a8e9c1-b757-4565-a12c-0dd80619316d",
  "userId": "",
  "properties": {
    "path": "/",
    "referrer": "",
    "search": "",
    "title": "rudderstack-store-final",
    "url": "https://rudderstack-store-final.myshopify.com/",
    "category": "t",
    "referring_domain": "",
    "tab_url": "https://rudderstack-store-final.myshopify.com/",
    "initial_referrer": "$direct",
    "initial_referring_domain": ""
  },
  "integrations": {
    "All": true
  },
  "category": "t",
  "sentAt": "2022-02-22T05:08:51.357Z"
}

Best practices

Provide login functionality

Shopify provides the store owners the capability to either make user login compulsory or allow guest checkout in their stores. However, it is a best practice to prompt users to log in onto your platform. That way, RudderStack can fetch the user details and provide you with meaningful event data corresponding to the user’s journey on your platform.

Support for client-side calls

It is highly recommended not to make any drastic changes to your store structure to preserve data integrity. If you do so, RudderStack may track incorrect calls or miss them entirely, owing to the disparity between URL and triggered event.

Note the following additional details for ecommerce events tracked by RudderStack:

• Cart Viewed: It is recommended to keep the URL in [store-url]/cart format.
• Checkout Started: This event can be triggered in any of the following ways:
  • When Checkout button is clicked on the [store-url]/cart page.
  • When Buy it Now button is clicked on the product description page.
  • Using the pop-ups when adding a product.
• Product Added: This event is triggered when the Add to Cart button is clicked on a product description page with [store-url]/products/product_name format.
• Product Clicked: This event is triggered when you click a product entry on any page in the store.
• Product List Viewed: This event is triggered when user sees a product on a page.
• Product Viewed: This event is triggered when a product’s description page in [store-url]/products/product_name format is opened. It is an indicative of the product listing page being viewed.

Event listener conditions for Shopify tracker

FAQ

I’m getting a Registration Failed/Updated Failed error when I enter the data plane URL and the write key. What should I do?

When configuring the RudderStack app in your Shopify store, you need to enter your RudderStack data plane URL and the source write key obtained while setting up the Shopify source in RudderStack.

If you get a Registrated Failed or Update Failed error after entering the credentials, uninstall and reinstall the RudderStack app in your Shopify store and try again.

Where can I find the RudderStack data plane URL?

You can find the data plane URL in the home page of your RudderStack dashboard:

My app is behaving unexpectedly and no event is flowing. What should I do?

You can try deleting and reinstalling the app. If that does not work, you can contact us.

How to track events from multiple stores?

You need to have the app installed and configured properly in each of the stores.

Why does RudderStack not load the client-side SDK on all the Shopify store pages?

If you customize the page paths for a standard Shopify store, RudderStack will not be able to track user activity on them. This is a limitation of RudderStack’s client-side tracking capabilities. Hence, it is highly recommended not to make any drastic changes to your store structure.

What is the difference between browser_ip and requestIP?

The requestIP is the IP address of the Shopify backend server which pushes data to RudderStack, while browser_ip is the user’s IP address.

Is it possible to collect additional/custom fields from Shopify?

Yes, it is possible to collect additional/custom fields from Shopify by using identify and track calls.

Note that the rudderanalytics object of JS SDK (for example, rudderanalytics.track() or rudderanalytics.identify()) is already loaded on the window object of the store where the app is installed. Hence, the rudderanalytics object should not be loaded separately to collect additional/custom fields from Shopify.

How does RudderStack set the userId?

RudderStack fetches Shopify’s customerId and uses it as userId.

Does RudderStack persist anonymousId for future calls?

RudderStack persists anonymousId throughout a user’s journey (from visiting the store to placing an order). After the user places the order, a new journey starts; RudderStack then sets a new anonymousId and persists it throughout that journey.

After placing an order, the user/admin may sometimes need to update it. Hence, RudderStack persists the anonymousId for any post-order updates for up to 1 hour (tracked as server-side events).

How can I differentiate between the data collected from Shopify Cloud (Webhooks) and Shopify Device (web device mode)?

You can differentiate between the data collected in cloud and device mode by looking at the signature in payload:

• In the cloud mode, RudderStack subscribes to the Shopify webhooks to consume data from Shopify. The data collected from Shopify cloud has the following signature in the payload:

context ": {....
"library": {
  "name": "RudderStack Shopify Cloud",
  "version": "1.0.0"
  }
}

• In device mode, RudderStack loads its JavaScript SDK on every Shopify store page for web tracking. The data collected from the Shopify device mode has the following signature in the payload:

"context": {
  ....
  "library": {
    "name": "RudderLabs JavaScript SDK",
    "version": "2.4.2"
  }
}

Do I need to update or reinstall the RudderStack app in Shopify to use the identity stitching feature?

No, you do not need to take any action to use the identity stitching or Skip identify call enhancements.

Questions? Contact us by email or on Slack