Use Flow to update a variant metafield when an order is created

[Richard687]

I'm trying (and failing) to create a Flow which is triggered when an order is created and updates a metafield on the variant for each line item. The aim is to have a metafield containing the date when the variant was last ordered.

After a few false starts, I created a Flow as follows:

(The "log output" actions can be ignored - they are for debugging.)

The "run code" action is fairly simple - it just takes the variant ID for each line item and returns an array of variant IDs:

However, the flow is getting stuck on the next action, when it tries to get product variant data. It is configured like this:

But the Flow log is showing this:

The "log output" action has the same code as the "get product variant data" query, and it produces output like this (but with real variant IDs):

id:gid\://shopify/ProductVariant/999999999 OR id:gid\://shopify/ProductVariant/999999999 OR id:gid\://shopify/ProductVariant/999999999 

That looks to me like a valid search query.

Where am I going wrong? Is my search query incorrect? Perhaps the colons should be escaped differently? Have I missed something somewhere else?

Perhaps I am over-complicating this (seemingly straightforward) task, and is there an easier/better way of doing it. Is there an easy way to pull the last purchase date of a variant via the Admin API instead of using Flow?

Any thoughts/suggestions would be very welcome.

[Kalen_Jordan · Accepted solution]

I think you want just the ID number not the full gid:

Might be helpful to test out queries in graphiql to troubleshoot.

[Richard687]

Of course, so simple! A small change to the Run Code action did the job:

Many thanks for your help 😊

[Kalen_Jordan]

Nice! You got it!

[Anthony__P]

How did you end up updating the variant metafields? Did you do it with an http request to an app or using the update variant metafield flow action?

[Richard687]

I used the "Update product variant metafield" action. Here's the final flow: