Importing & Exporting Data

To add items to your Animals you can either use the Add form to add one item at a time or you can use the more powerful Import form to add many items at once. Once you have added or imported an item, you can modify it or you can replace it with a new import.

Adding a Single Ad

Adding items is very straightforward. The main thing to know is you can only add one item at a time. Add, like Import, is found on the menu as well as on Animal Manager page.

Bulk Import

The alternative to adding items one by one is to Bulk Import using a Price List. Import allows you to create & manage all of your animals at the same time. In the past import was the most efficient way to manage a lot of data. However with the improvements to our animal manager, it’s really just as easy to edit them right in our system. For that reason, you no longer need to use import to be an effective MorphMarket user but this capability is still available. The video and text below explain how to do this.

Import 2.0 supports several formats: 

• Comma Separated Value (CSV)
• Tab Separated Value (TSV) 
• JSON (useful to programmers)

CSV and TSV are typical formats for tabular or table-like data, arranged into rows and columns. In tabular files, the first line or row of your input is the header. The header defines the list of fields which you are going to provide for each ad on the remaining lines of the input. In this way, you can define only the fields you care about and in whatever order you choose, as long as you are consistent.

For example, the the following is what a minimal input could look like, by providing all the required fields:

We recommend using the free spreadsheet Google Sheets (or a similar application like Excel). With Sheets, when you copy-and-paste the data it will be formatted as TSV. Here is a sample template. You cannot modify this spreadsheet, but from the menu select: File -> Make a Copy, and then you can edit. You can also continue to use a plain text editor by separating your values with commas (the CSV format), but it is much easier to manage this with a spreadsheet.

Supported Fields

The full list of supported fields and values is shown on the import page at the bottom.

Note that a handful of these fields will utilize the defaults set under your Ad Settings on your Seller Profile if they are not provided in your input.

Google Drive Photo Import

The Photo URLs field supports Google Drive Links.  To use these:

• To obtain the URL, use the "Share" option and "Copy Link"
• In the Share options for this item or the entire folder, make sure it has "General Access" set to "Anyone with link"

Importing Your Price List

Once you've created your Price List, there are a few ways to import.

• Copy and paste it into Import screen
• Click "upload file" and select your file
• Drag and drop your file onto the text area

There are two import modes available:

• Synchronize: Synchronize will align your input Price List to your Animals using Animal IDs, and update them using the Price List values. Most values will be overwritten by the input even if the input value is blank. Several fields including images and description will not be unset. Synchronize even searches sold, archived, and deleted ads, since Animal IDs are permanent, and will bring them back to an active state.
• Synchronize/Replace: Like, Sync, but in addition if any existing ads are not found in the listing being imported, it will archive them.

After importing, you will be prompted to correct any errors. Any lines which were not understood will be displayed in red. Make changes to these lines or remove them, and re-submit. Select the checkbox to ignore errors. It's recommended you modify your original copy and re-paste it in order to have it corrected for next time. Next, The system will next take you back to the Animal Manager where you should double-check for any mistakes.

Verifying Your Import

After you have imported, you will be returned to the Animal Manager where you should double-check for any mistakes. Modify any of your items which need changes or corrections. In particular, if you did not provide image URLs you will want to read the next section on how to add images.

Scheduling of Listings

When new listings are bulk imported or bulk changed to For Sale status for the first time, they are scheduled at times throughout the day. The system will try to schedule them a few minutes apart, but at a rate that will not exceed 24 hours. This process helps you to get more views on your ads by spreading them out throughout the results.

Tips on Migrating from 1.0 to 2.0

Import 1.0 is no longer supported, but if you were familiar with that here are a few tips:

• We recommend that you begin using a spreadsheet like Google Sheets or Excel to manage your price list. These programs allow you to easily work with data in rows and column and output the CSV and TSV data formats. It is possible create CSV with a text editor but it is not worth it. It is not difficult to learn and is highly useful. There are lots of resources on the web.
• Add a header as the first row in your price list. Headers were not used in Import 1.0. The header defines what type of data a column contains (e.g., Category, Title, Maturity, etc.).
• Make sure to use Animal IDs if you were not already. They are now required.
• Section headers are no longer supported, and these values should be copied across all rows.

Exporting Animals

You can Export various slices of your data. Previously the Export function on the Animal Manager would output all animals in your active collection, such as those For Sale and Not For Sale. Now, Export will output all of the animals currently displayed on your Animal Manager page. This means you can export any subset of your Animal data present or past. For example, you could export Sold animals with any set of filters by genetics, maturity, etc.