I know this is an old post, but today is January 2023 and I am staring at the very same issue.
For the record, I solved (sort of) another 3 or 4 of these sync issues, but this one is killing me and the result is that the test products I am uploading end up active on the shop.
For the record, I built my own upload spreadsheet by taking the actual headers as they present in the Shopify bulk Upload screen (presented with a blue checkbox in the screenshots above) instead of the spreadsheet they tell you to use.
That solved several sync issues I had, but this one I haven’t found a solution yet.
I have worked with a lot of E-commerce carts and they all have some funky stuff you have to deal with, but Shopify is amongst the worse. It’s like the engineers that write the code are unaware there are people that have to write help pages or that what’s offered to users is almost completely detached from reality.
Take a look at this “Category” and “collection” mess down here:
We have a “Product Category” column in my homemade import spreadsheet. However, the only field I can sync is called “Collections”.
When uploaded, “Product Category” is automatically generated because there isn’t a column on the spreadsheet (the one I made or the one I downloaded) and while they use similar terminology they are not the same fields.
I don’t even know how to explain it, but it’s like having the worst bureaucracy you know of writing code. Byzantine is a compliment for these guys. I feel like I am tracking a serial killer instead of trying to upload products to a store.
Do they even read this forum? Because I know how this happened and someone needs to take charge of this and rewrite the help files AND the sample spreadsheet. If someone with my experience has to spend 2 days chasing an import that not only shows no error codes but makes the products completely disappear, I don’t what people that don’t have my experience are going to do. Hire someone?
That’s great because that’s the kind of work I often do, but I’d feel like I am stealing money and all because different departments don’t talk to each other at shopify.
