How to create a promotion in the Merchant Promotions Platform using a CSV file

Wish created the Merchant Promotions Platform (rolling out spring 2022) to expand promotion offerings, with a series of promotion tools to be released throughout 2022 and beyond. 

Currently, there are two process flows to build a promotion in the Merchant Promotions Platform: manual input or CSV file upload. This article focuses on the CSV file upload. However, please be sure to first read the following Help Center articles to learn important information about how the Merchant Promotions Platform works:

• How to navigate the Merchant Promotions Platform (includes information on manually building a promotion)
• Merchant Promotions Platform frequently asked questions

It is the merchant’s responsibility to ensure all promotions comply with Wish’s terms, policies, and applicable law, consistent with section 6 of the Merchant Terms of Service. 

Get started

Promotions are built in the Merchant Promotions Platform: Merchant Dashboard > Promotions > Merchant Promotions. Once there, the Promotions page opens; click Create a Promotion.

Note: Once a merchant has an active promotion, the Promotions landing page will reflect its active promotions as well as offer tabs to pending promotions and promotion history.

Choose the option to Upload via CSV to run either a Discount or Flash Sale and quickly bulk upload the products you want to include via a CSV file. 

Create a promotion

1. Choose promotion type from the drop-down list.

• To learn more about the promotion types–especially the eligibility requirements of each–go to the question, “How do promotion types differ from one another?” in the article, “Merchant Promotions Platform frequently asked questions.”

2. Enter Promotion details

• Promotion name - The promotion name is for the merchant (it is not user facing) to help differentiate and keep track of each promotion. Example, “Fall Sale 2021” or “Summer Flash Sale 2021.” A brief yet clear and unique name also helps merchants identify/search promotions when viewing Pending Promotions, Active Promotions, History, and Promotion Performance. 

• Start and End date vs. Preferred week - Discount promotions span days, unlike Flash Sale promotions, which span only hours. Therefore, the options for “Enter promotion details” date and times vary between the two promotions.
  • Discount allows a date range to be chosen. (Date and time ranges are in Pacific Time.)
  • Flash Sale runs for limited hours, so merchants choose a preferred week (as shown in the screenshot below), and Wish optimizes the best day and time of the merchant’s chosen week to run the Flash Sale. This aims to help ensure that a merchant’s Flash Sale runs at the most advantageous time (i.e., when there is likely to be the most user traffic) and to help avoid multiple Flash Sale promotions running simultaneously. 

Wish provides the optimized run time of the promotion upon approval of the promotion. 

• Countries - The “Countries” field defaults to all of the countries a merchant sells to, and promotions can be targeted by selecting or deselecting a country. (At least one country must be chosen to proceed with building the promotion.) This section can be edited during the promotion creation process, but countries cannot be edited once the promotion is submitted. 

3. Upload your formatted CSV file. The Merchant Promotions Platform provides both an example for how to format a CSV file and a template to download.

Promotion columns include:

• Product ID
• Product Name
• Variation ID - Required; there can be multiple Variation IDs for one Product ID
• Variation Name
• Discount % off - The % discount applies to both product price and shipping price.
• Quantity

Example:

IMPORTANT: Be sure products adhere to all eligibility requirements for a promotion type. Find the table of promotion product requirements under, “How do promotion types differ from one another?” in the article, “Merchant Promotions Platform frequently asked questions.”

4. Confirm promotion by reviewing the promotion data to ensure the right products, product variations, percentage discounts, and quantity were uploaded.

• Click the chevron symbol at left (under Product/Variation ID) to view product variations.
• Quantity set for each product must adhere to the promotion’s eligibility requirements. If the CSV file Quantity field is incorrectly populated or does not align with the Merchant Promotions Platform inventory, it can have varying results when displayed in the Merchant Promotions Platform:

• Rejected products, found under the product list (as shown below), are products that do not meet the promotions eligibility requirements.

To fix rejected products, or anything found to have uploaded incorrectly, merchants must go back to the CSV file, update the rejected data or remove the product altogether, and then repeat, “Upload your formatted CSV file.”

5. Click Submit Promotion once everything is confirmed correct and complete. After submitting a promotion, it can take up to 24 hours for Wish approval. During that time, promotions live in the Pending Promotion tab on the Promotions landing page.

To learn more about the Pending Promotion tab, Active Promotions tab, History tab, how to view promotion details and performance, modify/cancel a promotion, and more, please visit, “How to navigate the Merchant Promotions Platform.”