Expandly: Help & Support

Overview

In this guide, we will explain how to apply ghost stock levels to your products and listings in Expandly, to drive scarcity purchases, without the risk of running out of stock. 

What is ghost stock?

Scarcity is a well-known sales tactic used to drive sales. Whilst listing low quantities of stock on your sales channels will create urgency for your customers to buy your products, it can lead you to "sell out" quickly, when in reality you have plenty of stock in the background.

Expandly's ghost stock feature enables you to list a low quantity of stock on your sales channels while automatically updating this figure upon each sale, in accordance to your actual stock levels. 

This allows you to benefit from low stock figures on your sales channel listings, without worrying about constantly managing and updating your stock levels. 

Creating ghost stock when adding a product to Expandly

1. Follow the user guide on adding a product to Expandly. Stop when you get to the Sales Channel tab.

2. On the Sales Channel Tab, select the appropriate sales channel/account/country from the options within the Sales Channels section:

3. Complete any sales-channel specific information, if required -  for example Buy it Now and Best Offer information for eBay. If you do not add any sales-channel specific information, details will instead be taken from the Product Details tab.

4. In the Sales Channel Stock Level box, enter the ghost stock quantity that your wish to be displayed on the listing.

5. Complete your product by clicking and then either:

- this will save the product on Expandly. or;

- which will allow you to push the quantity change made the product across your sales channels (where ghost stock levels have been added) 

Upon a sale, Expandly will automatically reinstate the ghost stock level, as long as you have enough overall stock. Your ghost stock figures will also appear on the Listings Overview page. 

Adding ghost stock to an existing product

1. Click Products & Listings (left menu) and then Manage Products:

2. On the Manage Products page, find the product you want to add ghost stock to and click the edit icon. 

3. On the Edit Product page, click the tab.

4. On the Sales Channel Tab, select the appropriate sales channel/account/country from the options within the Sales Channels section:

5. Complete any sales-channel specific information, if required -  for example Buy it Now and Best Offer information for eBay. If you do not add any sales-channel specific information, details will instead be taken from the Product Details tab.

6. In the Sales Channel Stock Level box, enter the ghost stock quantity that your wish to be displayed on the listing.

7. Complete your product by clicking and then either:

- this will save the product on Expandly. or;

- which will allow you to list the product across your sales channels

Upon a sale, Expandly will automatically reinstate the ghost stock level, as long as you have enough overall stock. You ghost stock figures will also appear on the Listings Overview page. 

Adding ghost stock to an existing listing

1. Click Products & Listings (left menu) and then Manage Products:

2. On the Manage Products page, find the product you want to add ghost stock to and click the edit icon. 

3. On the Edit Product page, click the tab.

4. On the Sales Channel Tab, select the appropriate sales channel/account/country from the options within the Sales Channels section:

5. Complete any sales-channel specific information, if required -  for example Buy it Now and Best Offer information for eBay. If you do not add any sales-channel specific information, details will instead be taken from the Product Details tab.

6. In the Sales Channel Stock Level box, enter the ghost stock quantity that your wish to be displayed on the listing.

7. Complete your product by clicking  

- this will save the ghost stock level on Expandly and then upon a sale, Expandly will apply the ghost stock level to the listing for you and will automatically reinstate the ghost stock level, as long as you have enough overall stock. 

Applying Ghost Stock Levels to your products in bulk

1. Go to Settings (left menu) and then click Template Designer:

2. On your Templates page, click (top right). 

3. Give your template a Name and select 'Products CSV' from the Template Type drop-down:

4. Complete the template by using the keywords on the left (by clicking the keywords to insert). To ensure that Sales Channel Stock Levels can be updated via CSV, please ensure that you include the for each different sales channel/account that you wish to amend. This can be found by expanding the Sales Channel keyword drop-downs:

Please Note: To ensure product updates are successful, please ensure that the is always applies when creating Product CSV templates. 

5. Once complete, click (top right). 

6. Once your CSV template to update Sales Channel Stock Levels has been created, click Products & Listings (left menu) and then click Manage Products:

7. On your Manage Products page, using the filters available, find the product(s) you wish to add Sales Channel Stock Levels too and select using the left-hand tick box:

8. Click Bulk Actions and from the drop-down, select Export:

9. On the Select a Template pop up, select the Format and Template and then click :

10. On the CSV file, make the required changes to the SalesChannelStockLevel column fields and once done, save:

11. On the Manage Products page in Expandly, click Add Product and then from the drop-down, select Upload via CSV Or TXT:

12. On the Upload Products via CSV or TXT page, either drag the updated CSV file to the drop zone or :

13. Once the file has been imported, click to add the file to the queue. Dependant on the number of products you are wishing to update, it can take 10-15 minutes for the upload to complete and for the Sales Channel Stock Level information to update on your products. 

Upon a sale, Expandly will automatically reinstate the ghost stock level, as long as you have enough overall stock. Your ghost stock figures will also appear on the Listings Overview page. 

Removing sales channel stock levels previously added to products

1. Click Products & Listings (left menu) and then Manage Products

2. On the Manage Products page, find the product you want to remove a ghost stock level on and click the edit icon

3.  On the Edit Product page, click the tab

4. On the Sales Channel Tab, select the appropriate sales channel/account/country from the options within the Sales Channels section:

5. In the Sales Channel Stock Level box, remove the ghost stock quantity previously added in this field

7. Complete your product by clicking and then either:

- this will save the change on Expandly. or;

- which will push a revision to the selected channel listings and will reapply your actual available stock level instead of the ghost stock previously applied.

Need more help?

If you need more help, no problem. Get in touch, and we'll be happy to talk you through the steps. 

Multi-Channel eCommerce Software | Expandly