If you have multiple stores with Shogun installed, you may wish to have some of the content synced between these stores. Our Sync feature allows you to do just this. 

An Advanced version of Syncing is currently available only to current users subscribed under Advanced.

Syncing has moved to a new location in App, you can now find it under the 'stores' heading in the dashboard.

Syncing is only available on select Shogun plans. Please check the Plans section of your Shogun settings for availability.

The Sync feature can copy over the following content between your stores,

The sync process starts on the Stores List page. This screen displays all your stores, including ones where you play the role of a collaborator.

Here, you can either enter the Sync Wizard via the Sync Stores button or switch to a different store. Here we also provide crucial details like the last updated date and syncing status of recent or ongoing sync operations.

The store you're currently using is labeled as "your active store.” This is your source store from which data is drawn for syncing. To access its dashboard, simply click the "Go to Store" button.

All your other stores, those under your username or ones where you are a collaborator, are displayed under "Your Other Stores." If you wish to make any of these your active store, just click the "Switch Store" button.

Syncing is automatically possible between stores if certain criteria are met.

With your source store set, you may start the syncing process by clicking the "Sync Stores" button on the Stores List.

Note: stores on Advanced will be able to sync to multiple stores at the same time, whereas stores with sync eligibility on older plans will only be able to sync to one store at a time.

Stores that do not meet syncing eligibility criteria are conveniently listed in a callout at the bottom of the page (seen above). If you'd like to sync to any of these stores, you'll have to upgrade them to the Shogun Advanced Plan.

Once you have your store or stores (for Advanced users) selected, you move on to select your items to sync.

For your convenience, you can choose to sync all pages or content of a specific type, or you can sync specific pages or items found in the source store.

The items that show up on this step are only those that have differences between your source store and your destination stores. We only want you to focus on what matters!

Previously Custom Elements and CMS Collections will always be copied over, however, with the improved version of sync found with Advanced, you can choose whether to copy over Custom Elements or CMS Collections.

Good question! Once they are synced to your destination store, there are a few things to note about your pages.

Synced pages on the destination store will be set to a draft state (unless you are an Advanced user, in which case you can choose to publish the content on sync).

Meta descriptions and feature images will be copied over when the pages are also synced.

After reviewing and selecting items, it's time to resolve potential conflicts.

This is accomplished in the final step of the Sync Wizard. Here, you'll see the stores you're about to sync to and a list of potential conflicts that may arise during your sync.

Conflicts can occur for various reasons, such as if a previously synced item has changed on either the destination or source store or if a product for a page doesn't exist on the destination store.

The Sync feature has a few system messages that you may come across when you are using this feature.

"Destination product not found" is a message that will appear if the destination store does not have the same product in its catalog. Adding the product to the destination store will allow you to sync this product page. In order to sync, it is required that there are products with matching handles in both the origin and destination stores. Shogun will use the handle of products to sync the content.

"Source and destination page changed after previous sync" is a message that will appear if the content that had been synced previously has been moved on either the source or destination store, indicating there is no longer parity between names and URLs.

The "source snippet version newer" message will appear when the version of the snippet in the destination store is newer than the version of the page on the current store.

"Destination pages limit reached" or "Page limit reached" is the message you will receive when you reach the page limit on the destination store for the content you are attempting to sync. In order to resolve this one you would need to either delete or un-import pages from the destination store, or upgrade, or purchase additional pages.

Should you choose to you can ignore some conflicts by keeping them deselected. These items will not be included in the sync, and only the items you've selected in the previous step will be synced.

For some conflicts, manual intervention is needed, such as in the example below:

These cannot be selected and will need your attention. Conflicts are divided into errors and warnings. Items with errors cannot be synced and the root cause will need to be resolved before they can be synced.

This is a good thing! This means that they have already been synced and are up to date.

Note that confirming a match across stores differs between our supported platforms.

With respect to Shopify, Shogun uses the product handle to determine a match across the storefront.

When it comes to BigCommerce, we use the product SKU.

If a page using Shopify Elements imported via our Shopify Page Importer is copied over to a new store using our Sync feature, they may stop working properly or display incorrectly. This is because assets that the section or app rely on to function may not be present in the new store, and as these would be stored in your theme Shogun is not able to copy them across as part of the sync. Shopify sections may also have hardcoded references to external assets (CSS, JavaScript), which won’t be able to get loaded in the destination stores because of security reasons.

As such we cannot guarantee that Shopify elements (and therefore pages using them) will work properly after being copied as part of sync. We encourage users to double check any pages using Shopify elements after a sync to make sure they're working properly, and make manual adjustments as needed.

Note that this is similar but different to the "Destination Product Not Found" error that can occur if you're using Shogun Product Box or Collection elements to display a product that is not in the destination store: In these cases you will see a system message warning you that the data is missing.

If you're ready, click "Sync to X Stores." to confirm the sync.

At this point, you can also click "Cancel," which will take you out of the Sync Wizard and back to the Stores screen.

Before continuing, you will be prompted a final confirmation before initiating the sync, which looks like this:

Note, as previously mentioned, that only stores subscribed to Advanced will be able to publish those pages on sync.

Once the syncing has successfully started, you'll be back at the Stores List, where you can monitor the status of your sync operation—whether it's in progress or completed.

Once you see the “Sync completed” status, you may switch to the store to review the synced items.

Syncing is currently only available in stores with actively paid plans that include the feature. Contact our support team (support@getshogun.com) with your store URLs to determine what upgrade options are available for syncing from development to live stores.