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Tented connects to Shopify so every customer in a segment you choose gets a personalized landing page built from one of your approved templates. Tented saves the page link, a short summary, and two ready-made sentences to each customer as metafields, so Shopify Email, your theme, and other apps can use them. Tented can also keep your Shopify customers in People, including their email marketing consent. This guide covers connecting your store, choosing a segment, syncing customers, using the metafields in Shopify, and what to expect afterwards.

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Prerequisites

Before you begin, make sure you have:
  • Admin access to your Tented workspace. Connecting, changing settings, and disconnecting are admin-only.
  • An approved tent template in Tented, to create pages. Pages are generated from a template’s approved version. You can connect your store and sync customers before you have one; see Templates when you’re ready.
  • Permission to install apps in your Shopify store. Store owners have it; staff need permission to install apps.
  • AI credits. Each generated page uses half a credit.

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Step 1: Connect Shopify

You install Tented from the Shopify App Store, and Shopify brings you back to Tented to finish setup.
  1. In Tented, open Settings → Integrations.
  2. On the Shopify tile, select Install, then Install from the Shopify App Store.
  3. In Shopify, select Install, review the access Tented asks for, and approve it.
  4. Shopify sends you back to Tented. Sign in (or create your Tented account) if you aren’t already, and the Shopify setup opens with your store connected. It shows the store you installed Tented in and the workspace it’s joining; if you didn’t just install Tented in that store, close it without connecting.
The Shopify tile on the Integrations page, before connecting. You can also start in Shopify: find Tented in the Shopify App Store and install it. If Tented is already installed, open it from Apps in your Shopify admin to finish connecting. Tented asks for permission to read and update customers, and to read orders and products. It uses them to read customers and segments, write the page link to each customer, keep contacts in sync if you turn that on, add a customer’s recent purchases to their page, and sync your product catalog.
One Shopify store can feed one Tented workspace. To connect a different store, disconnect the current one first.

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Step 2: Choose a segment

The Pages step sets what Tented generates.
  • Tented template: the approved template each page starts from. Tented picks your most recently approved template; change it if you like. No approved template yet? Connect anyway to sync customers, and choose a template and a segment in Edit settings later.
  • Automatically create pages for: pick a Shopify customer segment, or leave it on No automatic pages to only connect for now. Each segment shows how many customers are in it.
The segment picker, listing each Shopify segment with its number of customers. Every customer in the segment gets a page, including customers already in it when you choose it. After that, Tented checks the segment about every 15 minutes (or straight away when you select Sync now on the tile) and creates a page for each new member. A customer who already has a page is not given another. The Pages step: the template, the chosen segment, and the metafields Tented saves to each customer. Pages are personalized with what Shopify has on the customer: name, company, city and country, customer tags, number of orders, when they became a customer, and what they bought recently. Email addresses, phone numbers, street addresses, notes, and amounts spent are never put on a page, because pages are public.
Build the segment in Shopify first (Customers → Segments), for example “customers who haven’t purchased” or “bought in the last 90 days”, then pick it here.

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Advanced

Expand Advanced to change the copy Tented works from: The Advanced section with the page generation prompt, the link sentence, and the follow-up sentence.
  • Page generation prompt: the instructions each page is generated with. {{shopify.rowData}} is replaced with what Shopify has on the customer (see above).
  • Link sentence: saved to the customer as tented.page_offer. Use {{url}}, {{first_name}}, {{last_name}}, {{company_name}}, and {{summary}}. Leave it empty to skip it.
  • Follow-up sentence: saved as tented.page_reference for a later email.
Select Next: Contacts to choose whether to sync customers (below), then Connect.

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Syncing customers (optional)

Tented can also keep your Shopify customers in People, so lists, flows, and emails in Tented work off the same people as your store. You choose this during setup on the Contacts step, and can change it later with Edit next to Contacts on the Shopify tile. Pick one of three options:
  • Don’t sync contacts. Customers stay in Shopify. Pages still work.
  • Import Shopify customers into Tented. Customers appear in People and are kept up to date about every 15 minutes. Tented only writes back one thing: when someone unsubscribes in Tented, their Shopify email marketing status becomes Unsubscribed, so Shopify stops emailing them too.
  • Keep Tented and Shopify in sync. Changes flow both ways: Shopify changes come in, and Tented edits and new Tented contacts go back to Shopify as customers.
The Contacts step: the sync mode, the preview of what saving does, and the mapping sections. Once you pick an option the three cards fold to one line; Change opens them again. Below it, the step shows what saving will do: how many customers it will import from the store or segment and, with two-way sync, how many Tented contacts it will send to Shopify and roughly how long that takes. A send of 10,000 contacts or more asks you to confirm it first. On a sync that is already running the panel shows how many contacts are linked and when it last ran, and switches to What changes when you save once you change the mapping. The mapping is four sections, each with its own add and remove controls. Shopify fields carry the Shopify logo, Tented fields the Tented mark.

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Match contacts by

How a Shopify customer is matched to a Tented contact. A customer already synced stays linked, whatever their email or phone now say. Otherwise Tented looks for a contact with the same email; only when the customer has no email, or no contact has it, does Tented look for the same phone number. No match makes a new contact. The order is fixed. Shopify’s Email and Phone are mapped by default; keep at least one.

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Mapping for Tented fields

Shopify’s standard customer fields (first and last name, company, address, and email and SMS consent) are matched to Tented’s fields for you. Each row names the Shopify field, the Tented field it fills, and what happens when the Tented contact already has a value: Overwrite or Do nothing. With two-way sync the rule works the same way in the other direction: a Do nothing field is only filled in on Shopify’s side, never replaced. Add a field maps any other Shopify field onto a Tented field, standard or custom; a custom field of your own stays yours when Shopify is disconnected. Company and address come from the customer’s default address in Shopify and are read-only: Tented doesn’t change them in Shopify. Shopify keeps a marketing consent status for each customer’s email and phone. Tented keeps unsubscribes in step with it, and the newest change wins:
  • Unsubscribes from Shopify. A customer whose email marketing status becomes Unsubscribed in Shopify is unsubscribed in Tented. The Unsubscribes section shows this as the one Shopify field that unsubscribes a contact; Shopify has a single opt-out, so there is nothing to add.
  • Resubscribes in Shopify. If that customer later subscribes again in Shopify, they’re no longer unsubscribed in Tented either.
  • Unsubscribes from Tented. A contact who unsubscribes in Tented (from an email’s unsubscribe link, or by hand) has their Shopify email marketing status set to Unsubscribed, so Shopify Email, Flow and other apps stop mailing them too. This happens with import and with two-way sync, for contacts linked to a Shopify customer.
  • Removing Unsubscribed in Tented changes Tented only. Shopify can’t set a customer back to “not subscribed”, only mark them subscribed, which needs their consent. So their Shopify status stays Unsubscribed until they subscribe again in Shopify.
  • Consent. Shopify’s email and SMS consent fill Marketing Email Subscribed and Marketing SMS Subscribed on each contact: Yes when the status is Subscribed, No when it is Unsubscribed. A customer who never subscribed, or whose double opt-in is still pending, leaves the field empty, so a customer Tented creates in Shopify with two-way sync keeps whatever the contact already had. Tented doesn’t hold back sends based on these fields. Where you need opt-in consent, filter the audience by Marketing Email Subscribed.
Consent changes made in Shopify reach Tented within minutes: Shopify tells Tented about each one as it happens, and the next sync applies it.

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Create new Shopify custom fields

Other customer data can come in as fields of their own, in a Shopify fields group on every contact. Select Add a Shopify field and pick what you want: email or SMS marketing status, tags, note, number of orders, amount spent, last order date, customer since, language, account status, and any customer metafields your store has defined. For each field choose:
  • Read-only. Shopify owns the value; it shows on the contact but can’t be edited in Tented.
  • Editable. Available with two-way sync for tags, note, and your own metafields. Edits in Tented are sent back to Shopify.
Order counts, amounts, dates, and other fields Shopify calculates are always read-only. These fields are deleted when the integration is disconnected. Each one uses a custom field slot from your workspace’s allowance; the section shows how many are left. The Create new Shopify custom fields section, and the segment the sync is limited to. Once a contact is linked to a Shopify customer, that link is what identifies it. An email or phone changed in Shopify updates the same Tented contact rather than creating another.

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Limiting the sync to a segment

Only customers in this Shopify segment limits the sync to one segment; leave it on All customers to sync the whole store. Customers in the segment come in and, with two-way sync, go back. A customer who leaves the segment stops syncing from their next change onward, and picks up again when they rejoin. Contacts created in Tented are the one exception: once Tented has created them in Shopify they stay in step whether or not they’re in the segment. Contacts that came from a list import or another integration are not sent to Shopify while the sync is limited to a segment.
With two-way sync, contacts Tented creates in Shopify are new customers there, and they join any segment whose conditions they match. If you create pages for that segment, they get pages too.

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The first sync

The first sync reads every customer in the store (or the chosen segment) and imports them in one run. It shows in People → Past imports as a Shopify initial sync. After that, Tented picks up changes about every 15 minutes. Contacts created by the sync show Shopify as their source. Before you save, the Contacts step shows what the sync will do: how many customers it will import from the store or segment, and, with two-way sync, how many Tented contacts it will send to Shopify and roughly how long that takes at Shopify’s limits. A send of 10,000 contacts or more asks you to confirm it first. To send fewer, choose a segment, or import only. The Contacts line on the Shopify tile shows the sync mode, how many contacts are linked, and when the last sync ran. While the first sync runs it shows the stage and how far along it is: reading customers from Shopify, importing them, then (two-way) sending Tented’s contacts to Shopify, with a rough time left. A store with 5,000 customers or more is read as one Shopify bulk operation rather than page by page, and a two-way sync of 5,000 contacts or more goes out as Shopify bulk jobs, neither of which Shopify rate limits, so a large first sync takes minutes to hours instead of days. When Shopify limits how fast Tented can read or send, the line says so and the sync continues on its own; that is not an error. If Shopify refuses a contact, the tile shows how many weren’t accepted and why; a refused contact is sent again the next time it changes in Tented.

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Using the page link in Shopify

Tented saves five customer metafields in the tented namespace to every customer it makes a page for. They show under Metafields on the customer in Shopify. A customer in Shopify with the five Tented metafields filled in. Use them anywhere Shopify supports Liquid for customers, such as Shopify Email, notification templates, or your theme:
To show the link only to customers who have a page, wrap it in a check:
To email only those customers, send to the segment you chose in Step 2: its members are the customers Tented makes pages for. A customer who just joined gets their page within about 15 minutes, so the check above keeps the email tidy in the meantime.

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Order and cart triggers in Flows

Once Shopify is connected, triggered flows can start from what happens in your store. Three triggers are added to the trigger picker:
  • Shopify: Order placed: when a customer places an order.
  • Shopify: Order fulfilled: when an order is marked fulfilled.
  • Shopify: Checkout abandoned: when a checkout sits unfinished. Choose how long to wait before the flow starts: from 15 minutes up to 1 day, with 1 hour as the default.
The triggers appear in the picker only while Shopify is connected. A flow that already uses one keeps it, but is paused if you disconnect (see below). Tented matches the customer to a contact by their Shopify customer, then by email. If neither exists in People, Tented creates the contact (with Shopify as the source) and enrolls them. Each order or checkout enrolls a contact once, even if Shopify sends the event again. Test orders and orders imported from another platform (created more than a day before Shopify reports them) don’t start flows, so a migration doesn’t email your whole order history. A checkout that is completed before the delay ends never triggers the flow, so customers who finish buying aren’t sent a reminder.

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Order details in your flow

Each trigger hands the details to the run as {{campaign.dynamic.*}} tokens, which you can use in emails and in the Create Tent prompt: For example, a recovery email can link its button to {{campaign.dynamic.checkoutUrl}} so the customer lands back in their cart. A Create Tent step in the flow receives the order or cart details automatically, including the products, quantities, and prices, so you don’t need to type the tokens into its prompt. The same privacy rules apply as for other pages: email addresses, phone numbers, and street addresses are not put on a page.

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If Shopify is disconnected

If you disconnect Shopify, or uninstall Tented in Shopify, flows that use a Shopify trigger are paused. The flow shows why it paused. Reconnecting does not restart them: reconnect Shopify, then select Activate on each flow again.

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Products

Tented reads your Shopify products so pages and emails can use your catalog. For each product it keeps the title, description, vendor, type, tags, images, variants (with price and availability), and the product’s link on your store. Products are copied when you connect, and stay current as you add, change, or delete products in Shopify. The Products line on the Shopify tile shows how many products are synced and when. Select Sync now on that line to refresh them straight away. Today, products enrich the order details on your pages: an order’s items come with the product’s name, image, and link. Product blocks in emails will build on the same catalog later. Stores connected before products were added need to approve the new permission once. If the tile says Reconnect Shopify to sync products, select Reconnect and approve access in Shopify. Disconnecting Shopify removes the products Tented synced. Your products in Shopify are not changed.

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Create a page from Shopify Flow

Tented adds an action to Shopify Flow, Create Tented page, so a Shopify workflow can create a customer’s personalized page whenever you want, for example when an order is delivered or a customer is tagged. In Shopify Flow, add an action and choose Create Tented page. It has three fields:
  • Customer: the customer the page is for. Required.
  • Order: an order to build the page around. Optional. The page uses the order’s items, totals, and shipping details.
  • Instructions for this page: what the page should focus on, in plain words. Optional. Tented follows these as instructions, so keep them to text you wrote yourself rather than Flow variables that customers fill in, such as an order note.
When the workflow runs, Tented creates the customer’s page from your Tented template, or refreshes it if they already have one. The action finishes only once the page is ready and its link is saved, so Shopify Flow waits (usually a minute or two) and the steps after it can use the link straight away. If the page can’t be built, the action fails and Flow shows the reason. The page link is saved to the customer as tented.page_url, as with segment pages. If you chose an order, the link is also saved on the order as tented.page_url, so an order confirmation or shipping email can use it:
The action works with No automatic pages too, so you can leave segments off and create pages only from Flow. It needs the store connected to Tented and a template chosen in Settings → Integrations → Shopify. If Flow reports that the store isn’t connected or that no template is chosen, fix that in Tented and run the workflow again. Shopify lets Tented read orders from the last 60 days, so an older order is left off the page.

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Using your products in Tented

The connection also keeps a copy of your store’s products and collections in Tented, current as they change in Shopify.
  • Content > Assets > Products lists the catalog by collection, with each product’s price and status, and a Sync now button. See Managing Your Assets.
  • In the editor chat, ask for products in plain words or with the /products command, confirm the matches Tented shows you, and they’re added to your page or email with prices and links. Name a product in an image request and its photo becomes the reference. See Adding Products from Shopify.
Stores connected before Tented could read products need to grant that access once: select Reconnect Shopify on the tile and approve the updated permissions. Until then the Products view asks you to reconnect.

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What happens after connecting

  • The Shopify tile shows Connected, the store, and which segment creates pages automatically.
  • Pages are published at readable URLs under your Tented domain, such as https://your-domain/for-ada-from-analytical-engines.
  • Select View activity on the tile to see each sync, how many pages were created, and any customers Tented skipped and why. When contact sync is on, the same dialog lists each contact sync pass: the initial sync and every pass of changes since, with the contacts imported, sent to Shopify, and refused, and the reason when a pass stopped early. Sync now checks your segment straight away instead of waiting for the next pass.
  • Generated tents appear in Content > Tents with Shopify Integration as the creator. Turn on Hide integration tents in the filter bar to keep them out of the way.
The Shopify tile once connected: store, segment, contact sync status, and last sync.

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Plans and billing through Shopify

A workspace on the Free plan pays for Tented through Shopify from the moment a Shopify install reaches it: as soon as you open the install in Tented, before you finish connecting, Plans and usage shows Shopify’s plans instead of Tented’s own. Plans are chosen, changed, and cancelled on Shopify’s plan page, and charges appear on your Shopify invoice. A workspace that was already on a paid Tented plan keeps its existing billing. Right after you connect your store, Tented offers its plans: select Choose your plan in Shopify, or Stay on Free. Until you pick a plan, the first time you open Tented from your Shopify admin takes you to Shopify’s plan page (Free is one of the plans there). To choose or change a plan later, open Settings → Plans and usage (or Plans & Billing in the sidebar), pick a Shopify Max plan, and select Choose in Shopify. Shopify opens its plan page for your store, where you choose the same plan (Tented shows which one, for example “choose Max 3”). After you approve it, Shopify brings you back to Tented, which confirms the plan within a few seconds. Use Manage in Shopify on your current plan to change or cancel it. If you open Tented from Shopify while signed in to a different workspace than the one your store is connected to, Tented offers to switch to it. Shopify stores get Tented’s Max plans at 75% off, billed monthly, as Shopify Max 1 to 7: Shopify’s plan page and your Shopify invoice show them as Max 1 to Max 7. Every Shopify Max plan includes everything in Max: unlimited published tents, 100 AI credits each billing cycle, triggered flows, your own domain, and no “Made with Tented” branding.

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Extra AI credits

Max plans include 100 AI credits each billing cycle. To keep generating past them, set a limit under Extra AI credits in Settings → Plans and usage. Shopify bills $0.20 for each extra credit you use, and Tented never goes past your limit. Credits you don’t use cost nothing. Set the limit back to No extra credits to turn them off. If you run out of credits mid-cycle, Tented offers to raise the limit right where you are. A plan in its free trial has no Shopify billing cycle yet, so extra credits start with the first one.
Uninstalling Tented from your store, or disconnecting Shopify in Tented, ends its Shopify plan, and the workspace moves to Free. Reinstall to choose a plan again. A workspace that pays Tented directly keeps that subscription; uninstalling only disconnects the store.If a Tented payment goes through after your store is already on a paid Shopify plan (for example a checkout page you opened earlier), Tented cancels that Tented subscription and refunds the charge, and your Shopify plan is unchanged.
If your workspace already paid Tented directly before you connected your store, it keeps that billing. Don’t pick a plan in Shopify as well, or you’ll pay twice.

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Changing settings

Select Edit settings on the Shopify tile to change the template, the segment, the prompt, or the sentences on the Pages tab, or contact sync on the Contacts tab. Customers who already have a page are not given a new one when settings change.

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Disconnecting

Select Disable on the Shopify tile. Tented stops creating pages for customers who join the segment. Pages already generated, and the metafields already saved to your customers, are not deleted. If contact sync was on, the Shopify fields group and its values are removed from every contact; the contacts themselves, and their standard fields, stay in Tented. The confirmation names any lists or flows whose rules use those fields. Those keep running (a rule on a removed field matches nobody) and show Needs attention until you change the rule.

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Uninstalling the app in Shopify

If you uninstall Tented in Shopify (Settings → Apps), Shopify ends the store’s Tented plan and the Shopify tile shows Paused with Shopify access was revoked or the Tented app was uninstalled from the store within a minute. The metafields on your customers stay in Shopify. To pick up where you left off, reinstall Tented from the Shopify App Store, or select Reconnect Shopify on the tile and then Open Tented in your Shopify admin. Shopify asks you to approve access again and brings you back to Tented. Your segment, contact sync settings, and contact links are kept. Reinstalling starts a new install, so choose your plan again.
Shopify asks every app to delete a store’s data 48 hours after it’s uninstalled. If you haven’t reconnected by then, Tented disconnects the store for you: the Shopify fields and contact links are removed, as with Disable. Contacts and pages stay. Reconnect within 48 hours to keep everything as it was.

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Privacy requests

Tented handles the privacy requests Shopify sends on your customers’ behalf:
  • Customer erasure. When you erase a customer’s personal data in Shopify, Tented deletes that customer’s page. A contact the sync created in Tented is deleted; a contact that already existed in Tented is kept, but loses its link to Shopify and its Shopify field values, and two-way sync never adds it back to your store.
  • Customer data requests are recorded for your records. Tented holds the same customer data you can already see in People.

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Troubleshooting