VTEX to PrestaShop Migration - Step-by-Step Guide & Expert Services

A Comprehensive Guide to Transitioning from VTEX to PrestaShop

Migrating your e-commerce store is a strategic move that can unlock new opportunities for growth and efficiency. If you're considering a switch from VTEX to PrestaShop, this detailed guide is designed to help you navigate every step of the replatforming process. While VTEX offers a powerful, composable commerce platform, PrestaShop stands out as a robust, open-source solution known for its flexibility, extensive customization options, and strong community support.

This article will provide clear, actionable steps for a smooth data transfer, ensuring that your valuable products, customer data, orders, and other essential entities are moved efficiently to your new PrestaShop store. We'll leverage a CSV-based migration approach for your VTEX data, coupled with a specialized migration tool to facilitate the transition to PrestaShop.

Prerequisites for Migration

Before you begin the migration from VTEX to PrestaShop, it's crucial to prepare both your source and target platforms to ensure a seamless data transfer. Proper preparation minimizes potential issues and downtime, safeguarding your SEO rankings and user experience.

For Your VTEX (Source) Store:

• Data Export: Since VTEX is not directly integrated with standard migration bridges, the primary step involves exporting your store's data into CSV files. You will need to export essential entities such as:
  • Products (including SKUs, variants, descriptions, images, prices)
  • Product Categories
  • Customer Information (names, addresses, order history)
  • Order Details (statuses, invoices)
  • Reviews, CMS Pages, Blogs, and other relevant content.
  Ensure your CSV files are well-structured and contain all necessary metadata for a complete transfer. For detailed guidance on preparing your source store, refer to our FAQ on preparing your source store.
• Data Review: Thoroughly review your exported CSV files for accuracy and completeness. Identify any data inconsistencies or legacy data that you might not want to transfer.

For Your PrestaShop (Target) Store:

• Fresh PrestaShop Installation: Have a clean, new installation of PrestaShop ready on your hosting environment. Avoid installing a large number of modules or themes before the migration, as they can sometimes conflict with the migration process.
• Hosting Requirements: Ensure your hosting environment meets PrestaShop's technical requirements and provides sufficient resources for your expected store size and traffic.
• FTP/SFTP Access: You will need full FTP or SFTP access to your PrestaShop store's root directory to upload the Connection Bridge, which is the recommended method for establishing a secure connection for data transfer. For more information on your store's root folder, consult our FAQ about root folders.
• Plugin Requirement: For optimal performance and compatibility, the Cart2Cart Universal PrestaShop Migration module is required for your PrestaShop target store. This module facilitates the secure connection and data handling.
• Backup: Always perform a complete backup of your new PrestaShop store before initiating any data migration, even if it's a fresh installation.

For more general information on preparing your target store, you can visit our FAQ on preparing your target store.

Performing the Migration: A Step-by-Step Guide

This section outlines the process of transferring your VTEX data to PrestaShop using a specialized migration wizard. Each step is designed for clarity and ease of execution.

Step 1: Register or Log In

To begin, you'll need to access the migration wizard. If you're a new user, you'll register an account; otherwise, simply log in to your existing one. This is where your replatforming journey officially starts.

Step 2: Source Store Setup (VTEX via CSV)

Since direct API integration for VTEX isn't natively supported for this migration, we'll proceed using a CSV file export. Select "CSV File to Cart" as your Source Cart from the dropdown list. You will then upload the CSV files containing your VTEX data (products, customers, orders, etc.) to the migration wizard. This establishes the connection for retrieving all your essential e-commerce information.

Step 3: Target Store Setup (PrestaShop)

Now, it's time to configure your new PrestaShop store as the migration target. Select "PrestaShop" from the list of target shopping carts. You will then need to provide your PrestaShop Admin URL. The recommended connection method for PrestaShop is via the "Upload Connection Bridge". This involves downloading a small zip file, extracting the 'bridge2cart' folder, and uploading it to the root directory of your PrestaShop installation using FTP/SFTP access. This bridge ensures a secure and efficient data transfer.

Step 4: Select Data Entities

This crucial step allows you to define exactly what data you wish to transfer from your VTEX CSV files to your PrestaShop store. You can choose to migrate all available entities or select specific ones based on your needs. The platform supports a comprehensive list of entities, including:

• Products, Products_Categories, Products_Manufacturers, Products_Reviews
• Customers, Orders, Invoices, Taxes, Stores, Coupons
• CMS_Pages, Blogs, Blogs_Posts

Carefully review your selections to ensure all vital business data, such as product SKUs, customer data, and order history, are included in the transfer.

Step 5: Configure Additional Options & Data Mapping

In this step, you can fine-tune your migration with various additional options and crucial data mapping settings:

Additional Migration Options:

Enhance your data transfer with features such as:

• Clear Target Store Data: Useful if you want to remove any existing data from your new PrestaShop store before migration. Find more details here.
• Preserve IDs: Maintain original Product, Order, and Customer IDs to ensure consistency across systems. Learn more about preserving IDs.
• Create 301 Redirects: Automatically generate 301 redirects to preserve your SEO rankings and link equity from your old VTEX URLs to your new PrestaShop URLs. This is vital for maintaining traffic and avoiding broken links.
• Migrate Customer Passwords: Securely transfer customer passwords, providing a seamless login experience for your existing customer base.
• Migrate Images in Product Descriptions: Ensure all embedded images within your product descriptions are correctly transferred.
• Migrate Invoices: Move your invoice data along with your orders.
• Skip Custom Attributes: Choose to exclude custom product attributes if they are not needed in PrestaShop.

Data Mapping:

This critical feature ensures that various data fields, like customer groups and order statuses, are correctly matched between your source (CSV) and target (PrestaShop) stores. You’ll map your VTEX customer groups (e.g., 'Wholesale', 'Retail') to their corresponding roles in PrestaShop, and match order statuses (e.g., 'Pending payment', 'Processing', 'Shipped') to ensure data integrity and accurate reporting on your new platform.

Step 6: Run Free Demo Migration

Before committing to a full migration, we highly recommend performing a free demo migration. This transfers a limited number of entities (e.g., 10 products, 10 customers, 10 orders) to your PrestaShop store, allowing you to:

• Verify the connection between the platforms.
• Review how your data (SKUs, variants, descriptions, images, customer data) appears in the new environment.
• Identify and address any potential issues or adjustments needed before the full transfer.

Step 7: Initiate Full Migration

Once you're satisfied with the results of your demo migration, you can proceed with the full data transfer. Review your selections, estimated cost, and consider adding Migration Insurance for added peace of mind, which offers options for remigrations if needed. Initiate the full migration, and the service will handle the complete transfer of all your selected data to your PrestaShop store.

Post-Migration Steps

Completing the data transfer is a significant milestone, but a few crucial post-migration steps are necessary to ensure your new PrestaShop store is fully functional, optimized, and ready for your customers.

1. Thorough Data Review: Log into your PrestaShop admin panel and meticulously check all migrated data. Verify products (SKUs, images, descriptions, prices), product categories, customer accounts, order history, and CMS pages. Ensure data integrity and that everything appears as expected.
2. Configure SEO and Redirects: While the migration tool can create 301 redirects, it's vital to:
   • Verify 301 Redirects: Test a selection of old VTEX URLs to confirm they correctly redirect to their new PrestaShop counterparts, preserving your link equity and SEO rankings.
   • Update Sitemaps: Generate and submit new XML sitemaps to search engines (Google Search Console, Bing Webmaster Tools).
   • Check Meta Data: Ensure product and category meta titles and descriptions are correctly transferred and optimized.
3. Install Theme and Extensions: Customize your PrestaShop store by installing your chosen theme and any necessary modules or extensions. These might include payment gateways, shipping modules, marketing tools, and performance optimization plugins.
4. Test All Store Functionalities: Conduct comprehensive testing of all critical store functionalities:
   • Checkout Process: Perform test purchases from product selection to payment and order confirmation.
   • Payment Gateways: Ensure all payment methods are configured and working correctly.
   • Shipping Options: Verify shipping calculations and methods.
   • Customer Accounts: Test login, registration, password recovery, and order history access.
   • Search and Navigation: Ensure products are easily discoverable and navigation is intuitive.
5. Update DNS Settings: Once you're confident that your new PrestaShop store is fully operational, update your domain's DNS settings to point to your new PrestaShop hosting. This is the final step to make your new store live to the public. Be mindful of DNS propagation times.
6. Consider a Recent Data Migration: If there was ongoing activity on your VTEX store during the migration, you might have new orders or customer registrations. A Recent Data Migration Service can help transfer these latest updates, ensuring no data is lost.

By diligently following these post-migration steps, you can ensure a successful transition from VTEX to PrestaShop, providing a seamless experience for your customers and a powerful new platform for your business.