Instagram shopping denied: Product Unavailable on Your Website

[AkaneY]

Hi everyone! I've been having an issue on connecting Istrangram shopping with my Shopify store. I've tried many solutions that I found online but nothing worked so far. I'm hoping to find someone would lead me in the right direction or in a similar situation.

I opened my Shopify store which connected to print-on-demand order fulfilment company Printful. I connected the Shopify Catalog with Facebook via Shopify app. It works perfectly and all items from the catalogue are available on my Facebook page. However, I couldn't get it approved from Instagram and they keep declining produced tagging. The reason is:

Product Unavailable on Your Website (To use Instagram Shopping, your products must be sold on the website connected to your account.)

My understanding of 'The website connected to your account' is that the website link on my Instagram profile. I put the correct shop link which is the same as the one connected to the Facebook page. All products are available on the shop with the direct purchase and I'm not really sure why I keep receiving the same results. I follow all guidelines and policies and I'm sure my shop qualifies for Instagram shopping.

I'm guessing an issue might be the website domain in which my own (not Shopify's), but already got it verified from Facebook. Once I disconnected everything and started it again, but I still keep receiving the same result from Instagram.

If someone knows the best solution please let me know, I would be greatly appreciated your help!

[AkaneY]

Thank you so much for sharing this! I've got loads of products in the catalogue already so I'm a bit hesitant to do that, but will follow the process and update once it's successful. Hope this will save many of us. 

[TheBee]

Thanks for the full update Tumilu.

I cannot try the work-around you found in my live shop, but really appreciate your work here to find the root.

I opened support case to Shopify to look into your findings and finding an permanent fix. Hope everyone would do the same so that it would get priority in the fix backlog.

[Tumilu]

I'm crossing my fingers 🙂 try and check out the Flexify app - it will create a catalog with the myshopify.com domain links (no matter which domain you set as primary), so you can simply connect THAT catalog to your commerce account on Facebook in step 3 and thus have an updating product feed :-))

[Shutter-Jack]

HI, 

I wanted to share with you my discovery not sure if it is the solution or luck but I got approved by Instagram.

Basically, I Unlinked my domain by contacting IG support like Tumilu mentioned in one of his posts.

and connected it again with https://www.shutterjackphotography.com/ 

Looks like https:// was the problem because before they were mixed in Instagram was http:// and website was https://

Not sure if that is the solution or not but it worked for me!

Hope it does for you as well.

[AkaneY]

Hi @Shutter-Jack, thanks for sharing your experience! May I ask if you had changed URLs of your catalogue as myshopify.com one, before getting approved IG with your own domain? I'm in the process of removing verified domain to switch myshopify.com domain but if I can keep my own domain it'd be best!

[Shutter-Jack]

Hey,

Nope, I use my own domain not .myshopify.com one

just double check this https and HTTP  worth trying 

[Tumilu]

Is your custom domain managed by Shopify? In my case https/http change did not work, but I am crossing my fingers for you guys!!

[Shutter-Jack]

@Tumilu yes, bought it with them. 

[Tumilu]

Ah, that is a different issue then. My domain was registered with another service.

Just to update you guys once more - when i transfered one of my additional domains to Shopify (so it is now Shopify-managed), I reconnected it to Instagram without a problem. My specific issue is I cannot transfer THE main domain I use, but I went around the issue again with the steps I provided a few replies back. Worked like a charms again (phew).

So it seems to me the problem lies primarily in submitting to IG domains that are not managed by Shopify.

[Erintidey]

Hello, how did you contact Instagram support and change your domain?

I am experiencing all the issues you guys are 2 months on now, just don’t know what to do!

[Shutter-Jack]

4. Write to FB IG Partner Support here: https://www.facebook.com/help/contact/644690422793138  and ask them to UNLINK your Instagram account from your private domain by choosing the option: "I have not been approved, but want to change my domain". After 1-3 days, an e-mail will arrive for you to reply with a text of "I consent to...." blablabla. You copy the text they send you and e-mail them back. After 12-36 hours you will get a confirmation that the Instagram Shop is unlinked from your private domain

[Erintidey]

Thank you so much! So you suggest unlinking your domain and going again
should work?

[Shutter-Jack]

It worked for me so I can't guarantee it will work for you but worth trying!

Copy your website from the browser and apply with the copied address.

Good Luck!

[Tumilu]

If your domain is shopify-managed, it might work. If it is not, try the guide I wrote a few posts back.

[Erintidey]

Hello! I don’t suppose you could email me and try talk me through how to do this can you? 

im so new to all this and have been also battling with trying to get Instagram shopping for 2 months. 
I’m getting confused at some of the steps. 

[Shutter-Jack]

did you buy a domain with Shopify? 

[Erintidey]

No- I brought it via google domains
🙂

[Tumilu]

Please then check out the guide I wrote on the bottom od page 2. Hopefully it works in your case too.

[Erintidey]

Thanks so much! I will and I’ll let you know if it does! You could be the
genius who figures this mess out hah!

[AkaneY]

I've got great news guys - my shop finally approved for IG shopping! I followed the steps by @Tumilu and change the catalogue domain from own domain which is not managed by Shopify to myshopify.com with Flexify app as my catalogue was already huge. And I set myshopify.com as the primary domain, sent the domain change request to FB, and after that request automatically handled to IG and got approved.

Initially, I didn't want to use Flexify app as its free plan has the limit number of products(up to 1000), and considering my catalogue will keep expanding in the future it's not a sustainable solution. But I decided to go with it as once I changed the catalogue domain by deleting Facebook app from Shopify, set the primal domain as myshopify.com and reinstalled the app, hoping it'll generate new catalogue with myshopify.com which was set as the primary as that time. But apparently, the original Shopify catalogue (with my own domain) was kept alive even after deleting Facebook app and it was back on board when I reinstall the app.

Not sure if I can manually delete Shopify catalogue when deleting Facebook app. But Flexfy did work and when the products exceed +1000 I will need to manually change the domain of each product page, which should be a hustle, or to pay for the monthly plan($29/month〜).

And after got approved and did some test taggings, I changed the url which is set on both Facebook page and Instagram account from myshopify.com to own domain, and tagging still works. So I guess the main problem is the catalogue with own domain attached, as @Tumilu said.

In later time I'll change shop's primaly domain to own domain(while keeping the catalogue domain as myshopify.com) to see if the taggings are still working or not, and update here once I'll see any changes 🙂🙂