Keeping your customers happy and receiving their subscription products on time can be tricky. But here at Stay, we create tools that are simple to use and make complex issues facing our clients easier to manage. Because of that overall mission, we have a few different tools and settings that can be used to stay on top of your out-of-stock products.
Using Stay's "Mark As Out of Stock" Feature
We've spoken to our clients, and one of the biggest pain points we've uncovered is that customers want to know if their subscription product is out of stock before they are billed. While we provide easy-to-use billing settings that help manage inventory issues upon billing, we have added new features to address the stock outages before any billing attempt.
How to Mark Your Products as Out of Stock
Navigate to the "Customize Portal" section of the Merchant Portal.
Go to "Products".
Scroll to the product you wish to set as Out of Stock.
If the OOS product is not currently added within Stay, go to "Add/Remove Products" and search for the product. Select the product and hit "OK".
Once the desired product is added to Stay Ai, tap "Mark as Out of Stock".
A modal will open where you can either toggle all variants, or specifically select one-off variants, that should be marked as out of stock. Make your selections and hit "OK".
Submit your changes.
You will now see the selected products and variants with an out-of-stock identifier, as well as a call to action to Swap the product from within the customer portal!
While the setup is as simple as that, here are some key questions we've answered to help you use this feature:
What if the OOS product is selected to display in the Carousel or View All Products Catalog?
The products and variants that you have marked as out of stock will be prevented from being added as new additions to upcoming orders. They will still be visible within the catalog or carousel, with an indicator displaying that the item is not in stock, and the "Add" options disabled.
If you have excluded the OOS variant or product from appearing in the carousel or Product Catalog, marking it Out of Stock will not have any impact on it.
In this case, only subscribers with this product on their upcoming order as a subscription or one-time product will see the OOS treatment and Swap call to action.
Can I send an email notification that lets customers know which products were out of stock?
You bet! Here is how you can set that up using Stay Ai's email builder:
Navigate to Notifications --> Email within the Merchant Portal
Open the "Item Out of Stock" email template
Within a text block, you can embed a Merge Tag titled "OOS Items". This tag pulls in the Product Image, Product Name, Variant Name, Delivery Frequency, and Price for any items that are marked as out of stock.
Please Note: If using the "OOS Items" Merge Tag within the Item Out of Stock email template, the merge tag will pull in both items that are "Marked as Out of Stock" within Stay, as well as products that are deemed OOS by our billing logic.
Will Stay's OOS flag be automatically removed when the comes back in stock in Shopify?
No, our OOS feature does not interact with Shopify so any products that come back into stock must be manually unflagged.
What if a product comes back in stock in Shopify while it is marked OOS in Stay?
If a product comes back in stock in Shopify, any orders containing that product will still be processed even if Stay's OOS flag is still enabled.
Will failed orders due to OOS be retried as soon as the flag is removed?
No. Orders that fail due to OOS products are retried according to your Billing settings. If you'd like to retry orders outside of that schedule, this will need to be done manually.
How does the OOS flag feature work with bundles?
The OOS flag does not impact bundles. Flagged products within a bundle will not be marked.
How does the OOS flag feature work with Get it Now?
While any line item in an order is marked OOS, Get it Now will not be processed. Customers must remove the OOS flagged product in order for a Get it Now order to be completed.
If the OOS flagged product is within a bundle, Get it Now will process as usual.
Will the OOS flag prevent customers from adding the product to their order?
No. Customers can still add the product to their order as long as the Add One, Subscription, and Swap boxes are checked. If you do not want customers to be able to add this product, uncheck those boxes.
For any questions or concerns regarding this feature, please reach out to your Customer Success representative.