Connectors for the Affiliated Distributors (AD) data feed

Affiliated Distributors (AD) provides an easy and cost-effective way to support distributors with consumerized product data via a data feed. If you subscribe to the AD Data Feed, you need to enable the connector in the Admin Console. Enabling the setting will create the default job for the AD Data Feed to work with Optimizely B2B Commerce.

This process remains the same when sourcing data from AD's CX1 or Enterworks instances.

If you are an Optimizely PIM customer, you do not need to follow these steps. See the Import Products into Optimizely PIM Using the Affiliated Distributors (AD) Data Feed article for more information on importing your AD Data Feed files into PIM.

The AD Data Feed Refresh job processes the .xlsx files received from AD as a part of their data feed. The ADDataFeed processor helps with converting the files into data mapped to B2B Commerce fields. The job completes the following steps:

  • Refresh Products
  • Refresh Attribute Types
  • Refresh Attribute Values
  • Refresh Product Attribute Values
  • Refresh Product Specifications
  • Refresh Product Images
  • Refresh Documents

You need to set up an SFTP or other storage location for your feed files before completing the steps below. AD does not provide a storage location, so you will need to provision this separately.

Enable the AD feed connector

  1. Go to Administration > System > Settings in the Admin Console.
  2. Search for Enable AD Feed Integration.
  3. Set the Enable AD Feed Integration toggle to YES. If Yes, the AD Feed integration connector will be enabled and the job definition will be created. Default value: No. This is a global setting.
  4. Click Save.
  5. Click YES and Save when the message appears to install the Integration Job Definition for the Affiliated Distributors connector.

Create the connection

  1. Go to Administration > Jobs > Connections.
  2. Click Add Integration Connection.
  3. Enter a name for your connection (that is Flat File or AD Feed) in the Name field.
  4. Select the connection type from the Type Name drop-down list (that is SFTP or FlatFile).
  5. Fill out the information for the type of connection you selected. See Create an Integration Connection for more details.
  6. Click Save.

Set the connection on the AD data feed refresh job

  1. Go to Administration > Jobs > Job Definitions.
  2. Click the Edit icon next to the AD Data Feed Refresh job.
  3. Select your connection from the Connection drop-down list.
  4. Click Save. See Creating and Editing Integration Jobs for more options on scheduling and configuring your job.