Amazon Vendor Central EDI or API Integration?

May 15, 2024 by Editor

Amazon EDI or SP-API? Choosing the right Vendor integration options

Amazon Vendor Central provides invaluable data for managing and growing your business with Amazon Retail. You can monitor retail KPIs, evaluate performance, identify operational improvement opportunities, and glean insights to shape your business strategy through vendor-specific dashboards.

However, understanding the best way to integrate this data — whether through EDI or the newer SP-API — can be challenging.

Why Choose Amazon Vendor Central API Over EDI?

While Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) has been a traditional method for managing supply chain messages, the Selling Partner API (SP-API) offers a more modern, efficient, and cost-effective solution. Here’s why:

  1. Lower Infrastructure and Development Costs: SP-API requires less infrastructure and development costs than EDI, making it a more cost-effective vendor choice.
  2. Ease of Use: SP-API is easier to use than EDI and does not require specialized knowledge. Your team can quickly adapt to the new system and leverage its benefits.
  3. Near Real-Time Processing: With SP-API, you can enjoy efficient near-real-time data processing, making timely decisions based on the most up-to-date information.
  4. Data Parity: SP-API ensures data parity across reports and Amazon Retail Analytics dashboards in Vendor Central, providing a consistent and reliable view of your business performance.
  5. Flexible Data Aggregation: SP-API allows you to specify and request data from different time range aggregations, such as daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, yearly, and trailing four weeks. This allows you to analyze your data at the granularity that matters most to your business.
  6. Easy Access to Historical Data: With SP-API, you can easily access data backfills for historical data, enabling you to analyze trends and make informed decisions based on past performance.

Amazon Cendor EDI Integration Overview

While SP-API is the preferred integration method, Amazon also offers EDI integration for vendors who wish to integrate their existing EDI system with Amazon’s. The EDI Integration feature provides a solution for integrating your company’s EDI system without the need to contact Amazon directly.

You will enter the relevant information for your EDI setup during the integration process and learn about Amazon’s EDI requirements. A series of tests will ensure that the entered information and your message mapping comply with Amazon’s requirements.

Supported Messages for EDI Integration The EDI Integration feature supports various message types and EDI standards for both Amazon Retail (warehouse orders) and Direct Fulfillment (direct to customer) business types. Some of the supported message types include:

  • Purchase orders
  • Purchase order acknowledgments
  • Advance shipment notifications
  • Invoices
  • Remittance advice
  • Cost and inventory feeds
  • Routing requests and instructions
  • Order fulfillment requests and responses
  • Inventory availability advice
  • Ship label requests and responses
  • Shipment status

EDI Integration Process The EDI Integration feature is divided into three sections: Home, the Messages dashboard, and the Connection dashboard. The process involves:

  1. Access the EDI Integration feature under the Integration (EDI/API) tab and start EDI for the desired vendor code.
  2. Selecting whether to set up a new connection or reuse one from another EDI-enabled Amazon vendor account.
  3. Configuring global settings and selecting supported message types to test and schedule for production.
  4. Setting up a connection endpoint using AS2, hosted SFTP, or VAN/EDI Service Provider as connectivity protocols.

Use Case: Looking at Amazon Retail Analytics

Amazon Retail Analytics (ARA) is a powerful vendor-specific dashboard that provides the data you need to manage and grow your business on Amazon Retail. With ARA, you can monitor key performance indicators (KPIs), evaluate your performance, identify improvement opportunities, and gain valuable insights to shape your business strategy.

Mapping Amazon Retail Analytics EDI Transactions to API Report Types

To help you transition from EDI to SP-API, Amazon maps EDI transactions to API report types. Here’s a quick overview:

Table 1: Mapping Amazon Retail Analytics EDI Transactions to API Report Types

Name                        | EDI Transaction Value            | API Report Type Value
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sales Diagnostic            | Sales (X12 852, EDIFACT SLSRPT)  | GET_VENDOR_SALES_REPORT
Inventory Health & Planning | Sales (X12 852, EDIFACT SLSRPT)  | GET_VENDOR_INVENTORY_REPORT
Forecasting                 | Forecasting (X12 830, EDIFACT DELFOR) | GET_VENDOR_FORECASTING_REPORT

Table 2: Mapping Amazon Retail Analytics Data Elements from EDI to API

Dataset       | EDI Report                          | EDI Data Element         | EDI Element Description       | API Report                   | API Element Description
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Sales         | Sales report (X12 852, EDIFACT SLSRPT) | X12: AMT*8T / EDIFACT: MOA+36E | ordered_product_sales       | GET_VENDOR_SALES_REPORT      | orderedRevenue
Sales         | Sales report (X12 852, EDIFACT SLSRPT) | X12: ZA*QS / EDIFACT: QTY+153  | customer_ordered_units      | GET_VENDOR_SALES_REPORT      | orderedUnits
Sales         | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*TS                     | shipped_units               | GET_VENDOR_SALES_REPORT      | shippedUnits
Sales         | n/a                                   | n/a                            | n/a                         | GET_VENDOR_SALES_REPORT      | shippedCogs
Sales         | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*QU                     | customer_return_units       | GET_VENDOR_SALES_REPORT      | customerReturns
Sales         | n/a                                   | n/a                            | n/a                         | GET_VENDOR_SALES_REPORT      | shippedRevenue
Traffic       | n/a                                   | n/a                            | n/a                         | GET_VENDOR_TRAFFIC_REPORT    | glanceViews
Net pure product margin | n/a                         | n/a                            | n/a                         | GET_VENDOR_NET_PURE_PRODUCT_MARGIN_REPORT | netPureProductMargin
Inventory     | Sales report (X12 852, EDIFACT SLSRPT) | X12: ZA*QA / EDIFACT: QTY+145  | sellable_on_hand_units      | GET_VENDOR_INVENTORY_REPORT  | sellableOnHandUnits
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*QE                     | quantity_ending_balance     | n/a                          | n/a
Inventory     | Sales report (X12 852, EDIFACT SLSRPT) | X12: ZA*QP / EDIFACT: QTY+21   | quantity_on_order           | GET_VENDOR_INVENTORY_REPORT  | openPurchaseOrderQuantity
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*DG                     | quantity_damaged            | GET_VENDOR_INVENTORY_REPORT  | unsellableOnHandUnits
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*HL                     | quantity_on_hold            | n/a                          | n/a
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*QO                     | quantity_oos                | GET_VENDOR_INVENTORY_REPORT  | unfilledCustomerOrderedUnits
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*QR                     | quantity_received           | GET_VENDOR_INVENTORY_REPORT  | netReceivedUnits
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*DS                     | days_supply_daily           | n/a                          | n/a
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*WS                     | weeks_supply_daily          | n/a                          | n/a
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*ST                     | sell_through                | GET_VENDOR_INVENTORY_REPORT  | sellThroughRate
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*FV                     | forecast_variance           | n/a                          | n/a
Inventory     | Sales and inventory report (X12 852)   | X12: ZA*QI                     | quantity_in_transit         | n/a                          | n/a
Inventory     | n/a                                   | n/a                            | n/a                         | GET_VENDOR_INVENTORY_REPORT  | [various inventory metrics]
Forecasting   | Forecast report (X12 830, EDIFACT DELFOR) | n/a                          | Mean forecast value (week 1-26) | GET_VENDOR_FORECASTING_REPORT | meanForecastUnits (week 1-26)
Forecasting   | n/a                                   | n/a                            | n/a                         | GET_VENDOR_FORECASTING_REPORT | [various forecast accuracy metrics]

How to Integrate with Amazon Retail Analytics Report APIs

There are two main pathways to take advantage of the SP-API, each suited for different enterprise needs. However, only one option allows vendors to get data flowing in minutes to a private, trusted data warehouse or lake: Openbridge!

1. DIY Integration

Why Choose This Path? Enterprises with strong internal development teams and a preference for full control over their data integration processes might opt for the DIY approach.

  • Review the Selling Partner API Developer Guide: Familiarize yourself with the documentation and requirements.
  • Complete Your Developer Profile: Apply for access to the Brand Analytics role on Vendor Central.
  • Set Up Development Environments: Establish development, staging, and production environments.
  • Select Coding Libraries and SDKs: Choose appropriate libraries and SDKs to facilitate integration.
  • Make API Calls: Start integrating with the vendor retail analytics reports.
  • Fetch SP-API Reports and Upload to S3 Bucket (1 week): Include any necessary JSON conversions.
  • Load Data from S3 to a Database (e.g., Redshift) (1 week): Utilize pre-existing solutions for efficiency.
  • Implement Monitoring and Error Handling: Set up systems to monitor performance and handle errors effectively.
  • Manage Change Control: Keep up with API updates and deprecations to ensure continued compatibility.
  • Backfill Historical Data (Optional): Use the documentation to understand the availability of historical data.

2. Openbridge: A Code-Free, Fully Automated Solution

Why Choose This Path? Enterprises seeking a rapid, hassle-free implementation with minimal setup time and no coding required will find Openbridge the perfect fit.

  • Automation Accelerates Insights: Seamlessly integrate data with tools like Tableau, Looker, Power BI, Google Data Studio, and AWS Quicksight for forecasting, analysis, reporting, and marketing efforts.
  • Unify Data in Your Cloud Warehouse: Consolidate data in a trusted, private data lake or cloud warehouse such as Snowflake, Azure Data Lake, AWS Redshift, AWS Redshift Spectrum, AWS Athena, and Google BigQuery.

Each pathway offers unique advantages depending on your enterprise’s needs, but only Openbridge provides a code-free, fully automated solution that gets your data up and running swiftly and securely.

Automate And Unify Your Vendor Central Data — Free For 30 Days

Openbridge automation extends beyond inventory to a broad collection of Amazon and non-Amazon data sources;

Start your journey towards data-driven growth and profit with Openbridge. Code-free, fully automated Selling Partner API integration simplifies your Amazon Vendor Central operations.

Ready to harness the power of your Amazon Vendor Central data?

→ Sign Up Now for Your Free 30-day Trial For Amazon Vendor Central Automation.

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