Set up a catalog for TikTok Product Sales

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Note TikTok recommends that you upload products at least 28 days before the campaign starts to optimize the product preview process.

Step 1: Create a TikTok catalog

  1. Before you start, complete all the tasks specified in Get started with TikTok shopping ads.

  2. In the main navigation, click Catalogs TikTok. 

  3. Select the TikTok Business center that you want to create the catalog for.
  4. Click Create Catalog.
  5. Define a name for the catalog and select the catalog vertical.
  6. Select the country and currency for the catalog. 
    In TikTok, you can only use each catalog to target one country.
    Note that you can't change these selections after catalog creation.
  7. Select the pixels and apps to track the events for this catalog.
    This allows products and audiences to be tracked correctly for the catalog and the campaigns using the catalog.
  8. Click Create Catalog.
    The feed list opens. Go on to add a feed.

Note When you create a new catalog, your user is set as the catalog authoriser.

Step 2: Add a feed to the catalog

The feed is where the catalog gets the information about your products.

See more information about the product parameters in TikTok's help.

To add a feed to a TikTok catalog:

  1. Click Add New Feed.
  2. Define a name for the feed.
  3. In Data source, enter the feed URL.
    If the feed is hosted on an SFTP server, add the URL in the following format: sftp://username:password@mydomain.com/path/to/file.csv
    When the username and password are added as part of the feed URL, Smartly may be unable to encode some special characters. Use only alphanumeric values for the username and password, or try to URL encode any non-URL-safe characters in the file path.
  4. To define the advanced settings for the feed, click Advanced settings. 
  5. Under Feed updates, define an update schedule for the feed.
  6. After the feed preview loads, map the fields coming from your data source (Feed fields) into the predefined Catalog fields in the Catalog mapping section.
    • If there are any missing or incorrect mappings, see Manual field mapping below for instructions on how to modify them.
    • The catalog fields marked with an asterisk (*) are required. Other fields are optional.
  7. Click Create New Feed.

Next, Smartly processes the feed according to the update schedule you defined. When the feed finishes processing, the catalog is ready to use.

Note The TikTok feed uploads overwrite the existing catalog product data, and existing items that are not in your data feed are deleted.

Manual field mapping

In Catalog mapping, you can fine-tune the feed content by mapping your data source feed fields to the predefined field names used in TikTok catalogs.

For example, if your product name is defined in the field called name in the data source, map that to the catalog field title, because that's where TikTok picks the names of the products.

Any feed fields that Smartly can't automatically map to catalog product fields are highlighted in red.

You can use dynamic fields, static text, and Liquid templating in the mappings. To use static text or Liquid templating, select Use Liquid template in the feed field menu.

The Preview value shows you a preview of what TikTok will see as the catalog values. Use the arrows above the column to preview the values for the products in your feed.

Note It's important that you reduce the number of errors at this point. Otherwise you may see unexpected or incorrect behavior when you launch campaigns using the catalog.

Example: Connect a Google Sheet as a data source

  1. Create a CSV link to your Google Sheet. See how to use Google Sheet to import a data source.
  2. Copy the CSV link and paste it to the Data source field in Smartly.
    Smartly now fetches a preview (sample) of your data source. The UI shows a notification below the URL field when the feed sample has been successfully fetched.
  3. Define advanced settings and adjust the catalog mapping.
  4. Save the feed configuration.

Extra fields

Sometimes you need additional fields for data that you want to use with image template or for field transformations with liquid templating, but don't need to send to TikTok. Or you might already have all the TikTok custom_label fields in use.

In these situations you can use the Smartly extra fields, extra_1 - extra_9. These fields allow you to map whatever data you want to those fields and use them with Image templates and with liquid templates for field transformations. These fields are not send to TikTok. At the moment, it is not possible to update the name of these fields.

Optional: Add Image Templates to the catalog

To make your TikTok dynamic carousel ads stand out in a creative way, add Image Templates to your catalog in the Image Templates tab. When you use an Image Template in the catalog, you need to also map the catalog fields to the Image Template fields.

Catalog Authentication for feed uploads

In order to do scheduled feed uploads to the TikTok catalog, Smartly needs to have a dedicated catalog authoriser to authenticate the uploads via API. Whenever, a processed feed is uploaded to TikTok, the authentication of the TikTok user account of this catalog authoriser is used. If the catalog authoriser is not set or if they are missing required permissions the uploading of the feed to TikTok will fail.

To set (or reset) the catalog authentication:

  1. Make sure you have the needed permissions to update the catalog.
  2. In the top navigation bar, click Catalogs > TikTok Catalogs.
  3. In Business Center, select the TikTok Business center that has the catalog you want to update.
  4. On the catalog list, find the catalog that you want to update and open the catalog view by clicking the catalog's name.
  5. Click Catalog settings.
  6. Click Change to current user. This will make you as the new catalog authoriser, wether the catalog already had an authoriser or not.
  7. he Catalog Authentication should now say "Authorized by you". On the next feed upload the authentication of your connected TikTok user account will be used.

Notes

  • You can only set the catalog authoriser to your current Smartly user. If the catalog should be authorised by someone else than you, ask them to do the above steps with their Smartly user.
  • When you create a new catalog, your user will be set as the catalog authoriser. Also when you claim a feed to connect an existing catalog to Smartly, your user will be set as the catalog authoriser.
  • The authentication of catalog authoriser is used for feed uploads, but all other actions, such as viewing or creating a catalog, are done with the authentication of the current Smartly user.

See also

If you have existing TikTok catalogs that you want to use in Smartly, see how to connect them to Smartly.

See more information on feed files and supported formats.

See also the FAQs related to TikTok catalogs and feeds.