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

Migrate from Lazada to PrestaShop: A Comprehensive Step-by-Step Guide

Transitioning your e-commerce store from a marketplace like Lazada to a self-hosted platform such as PrestaShop is a strategic move that offers unparalleled control, customization, and scalability for your online business. While Lazada provides a robust ecosystem for sellers, moving to PrestaShop empowers you with full ownership over your store's design, functionality, and data, enhancing your brand identity and long-term growth potential. This detailed guide will walk you through the entire replatforming process, ensuring a smooth and successful data transfer from your Lazada store (via CSV export) to your new PrestaShop installation.

Prerequisites for Migration

Before you embark on your migration journey from Lazada to PrestaShop, it's crucial to prepare both your source (Lazada) and target (PrestaShop) environments. Proper preparation minimizes downtime, prevents data loss, and ensures a seamless transition.

• For Your Lazada Store (Source):
  • Data Export Access: As Lazada does not typically offer direct API access for third-party migration tools, you will need to manually export your store's data into CSV (Comma Separated Values) files. This includes essential entities such as Products, Product Categories, Customers, Orders, Product Reviews, Manufacturers, and any other relevant information.
  • Data Cleaning: Before exporting, take this opportunity to clean up your Lazada data. Remove any outdated products, inactive customer accounts, or redundant information to ensure you're only migrating valuable data to your new PrestaShop store.
  • Comprehensive Data Backup: Always perform a complete backup of your Lazada data before initiating any export process.
• For Your PrestaShop Store (Target):
  • Fresh PrestaShop Installation: Ensure you have a clean, newly installed PrestaShop store. We recommend using the latest stable version of PrestaShop to leverage its most current features and security updates. For more details on preparing your new store, refer to our guide on preparing your target store.
  • Admin and FTP/SFTP Access: You'll need full administrative access to your PrestaShop backend and FTP/SFTP access to your store's root directory. This is essential for installing the necessary connection bridge and modules.
  • Cart2Cart Universal PrestaShop Migration Module: The migration process requires the installation of the Cart2Cart Universal PrestaShop Migration module. This module facilitates the connection and data transfer to your PrestaShop instance.
  • Hosting Environment: Verify that your hosting environment meets PrestaShop's system requirements to ensure optimal performance post-migration.

Performing the Migration: A Step-by-Step Guide

Follow these detailed steps to successfully transfer your valuable e-commerce data from Lazada to PrestaShop. This guide uses a specialized migration wizard to streamline the process.

Step 1: Initiate Your Migration

Begin by accessing the migration wizard. If you're new, you'll typically sign up and be directed to a dashboard to start a new migration. Here, you'll find options to begin the self-service migration.

Step 2: Configure Your Source Store (Lazada via CSV)

This critical step involves setting up the source from which your data will be extracted. Since Lazada does not support direct API integration with most migration tools, your Lazada data will be transferred via CSV files.

• Select Source Cart: From the dropdown menu, choose "CSV File to Cart" as your Source Cart type.
• Upload CSV Files: You will be prompted to upload the CSV files containing your Lazada store's data. Ensure these files are correctly formatted and contain all the essential entities you wish to migrate, such as Products, Products_Categories, Products_Manufacturers, Products_Reviews, Customers, Orders, Invoices, Taxes, Stores, Coupons, CMS_Pages, and Blogs_Posts.

Step 3: Set Up Your Target Store (PrestaShop)

Now, connect your newly installed PrestaShop store as the destination for your data.

• Select Target Cart: Choose "PrestaShop" from the list of target platforms.
• Provide Admin URL: Enter the full Admin URL of your PrestaShop store.
• Choose Connection Method: The recommended method for PrestaShop is to Upload Connection Bridge. This involves downloading a bridge file, extracting the 'bridge2cart' folder, and uploading it to the root directory of your PrestaShop installation via FTP/SFTP. This process works in conjunction with the required Cart2Cart Universal PrestaShop Migration module. For more information on where to find your root folder, consult our guide on root folders. Rest assured, providing your access details is safe; learn more about data security in our FAQ.

Step 4: Select Data Entities for Migration

This step allows you to specify exactly which types of data you want to transfer from your Lazada CSV files to PrestaShop. You can select all available entities or choose them individually for a more tailored data transfer.

• Entity Selection: Tick the checkboxes next to the data types you wish to migrate. This typically includes Products, Product Categories, Product Manufacturers, Product Reviews, Customers, Orders, Invoices, Taxes, Stores, Coupons, CMS Pages, and Blogs/Blog Posts.

Step 5: Configure Data Mapping & Additional Options

This is where you refine how your Lazada data will fit into PrestaShop's structure and select crucial migration settings.

• Data Mapping: Match customer groups and order statuses from your Lazada data to their corresponding fields in PrestaShop. This ensures data integrity and consistency for your customer data and order management.

• Additional Options: Enhance your migration with various crucial features. These include:
  • Preserve Product IDs, Preserve Orders IDs, Preserve Customers IDs: Highly recommended for maintaining SEO rankings, link equity, and internal system references. Learn more about how Preserve IDs options can be used.
  • Migrate Images in Description: Ensures all embedded images in product descriptions or CMS pages are transferred.
  • Create 301 SEO URLs: Essential for maintaining your search engine optimization efforts by automatically redirecting old Lazada URLs to their new PrestaShop counterparts, preventing broken links and preserving link equity.
  • Password Migration: Allows customers to log in to the new store using their existing credentials (if technically feasible with CSV import).
  • Clear Target Store Data: If your PrestaShop store contains sample data, you can choose to clear current data on the target store before the migration begins.

Step 6: Run a Free Demo Migration (Highly Recommended)

Before committing to a full transfer, perform a demo migration. This migrates a limited number of entities (e.g., 10-20 products, customers, and orders) to your PrestaShop store.

• Review and Verify: Use the demo results to check data integrity, verify mapping accuracy, and identify any potential issues or adjustments needed. This is a critical step to ensure a smooth full migration.

Step 7: Perform the Full Migration

Once you are satisfied with the demo results, proceed with the full data transfer. The wizard will display a summary of your selected entities and the total migration cost.

• Initiate Full Transfer: Confirm your selections and launch the full migration process.
• Consider Migration Insurance: For added peace of mind, you might consider a Migration Insurance Service, which offers a set number of remigrations for a specific period. Learn more about how Migration Insurance works.

Post-Migration Steps

Successfully migrating your data is a significant milestone, but the process isn't complete until you've performed essential post-migration tasks to ensure your new PrestaShop store is fully operational and optimized.

• Thorough Data Review: Meticulously review all migrated data. Check product listings (SKUs, variants, images, descriptions), customer accounts, order histories, and reviews to confirm everything transferred accurately and appears as expected on your PrestaShop front end.
• Configure SEO and Redirects: Verify that all 301 redirects are functioning correctly to preserve your SEO rankings and link equity. Update your sitemap, submit it to search engines, and set up Google Analytics and Search Console for your new PrestaShop domain.
• Extensive Store Functionality Testing: Conduct comprehensive tests of all core e-commerce functionalities. This includes placing test orders (checking payment gateways, shipping options, and inventory updates), customer registration, login, account management, site search, filters, and sorting.
• Install Essential PrestaShop Modules and Themes: Customize your new PrestaShop store's design and functionality. Install any necessary modules for marketing, analytics, security, or specific features that enhance the user experience and replicate functionalities you might have valued on Lazada.
• Update DNS and Go Live: Once you're confident in your new store's performance and data integrity, update your Domain Name System (DNS) records to point your domain to the PrestaShop server. Monitor your site closely for any immediate issues post-launch.
• Customer Notification: Inform your customers about your new platform. If customer passwords were not migrated (or require resetting), provide clear instructions on how they can access their accounts on the new PrestaShop store.
• Ongoing Maintenance: Establish a routine for regular backups, monitor your store's performance, and keep PrestaShop and all installed modules updated to ensure security and optimal operation. Consider services like Recent Data Migration Service for migrating new orders or updates that occurred on Lazada during the migration window, or our Cart2Cart Remigration Service if you need to rerun parts of the migration.