Salesforce Omni-Channel Inventory (OCI) is Salesforce’s inventory availability and fulfillment capability for managing inventory across multiple locations and sales channels.
It integrates seamlessly with Salesforce B2C Commerce, B2B Commerce, D2C Commerce, and Salesforce Order Management, so you can deliver a true end-to-end shopping experience on your ecommerce storefront.
How do Salesforce OMS handle Inventory visibility?
Salesforce Omni-Channel Inventory (OCI) combines the power of headless APIs and the flexibility of the Salesforce Platform to provide merchants and shoppers with a single source of truth for inventory availability.
Key concepts:
- Inventory Visibility: Provides a view of available inventory across stores, warehouses, and other locations.
- Available-to-Promise (ATP): Determines how much inventory can realistically be promised to customers.
- Inventory Reservations: Reserves inventory against orders to reduce overselling.
- Location-based Fulfillment: Helps determine where an order should be fulfilled based on inventory and fulfillment rules.
- Multi-channel Commerce: Supports inventory availability across ecommerce, stores, marketplaces, and other channels.
- Order Orchestration: Works with Salesforce Order Management to coordinate fulfillment and routing.
- Real-time Inventory: Helps expose inventory availability to customer-facing commerce experiences.
How does OCI use API service to get inventory availability?
Omnichannel Inventory service is a collection of APIs that you can use to get inventory availability data and manage reservations across all your fulfillment channels. Retrieve inventory updates from your back-office systems, such as WMS, ERP, and POS. Provide near real-time inventory availability to shoppers, and reserve inventory when shoppers submit orders. You can also share inventory availability by location and location group for order fulfillment.
Omnichannel Inventory APIs for B2B and D2C Commerce
Get near real-time inventory availability, streamlined reservation processing, and location-based order fulfillment with Salesforce APIs and Omnichannel Inventory. Provide customers with accurate inventory information and efficient order management.
Omnichannel Inventory Connect REST APIs
Connect your inventory management process by connecting your Omnichannel Inventory service to Salesforce Platform apps. Use the Connect REST APIs to import and upload inventory files, access real-time inventory availability, and manage reservations.
Omnichannel Inventory Headless API Endpoints
Connect your Omnichannel Inventory service to your storefront and order management systems using Salesforce Commerce API endpoints. Import and upload inventory files, retrieve inventory updates from your back-office system, provide real-time availability data, and manage reservations. Maintain accurate inventory levels and ensure product availability across multiple channels.
Omnichannel Inventory Integrations
Connect Omnichannel Inventory with B2C Commerce, B2B Commerce, Salesforce Order Management, and your back-end office systems to optimize fulfillment across your network of stores and distribution centers.
Reservation Tracking in Omnichannel Inventory
Reservation tracking simplifies the process of monitoring all reservation-related activities, from the moment that inventory is placed in a cart through fulfillment or cancellation. Each reservation has a unique ID that’s used to track actions associated with the reservation as it progresses through the fulfillment process.
Shipping Eligibility for a Product
You can make an item ineligible to ship from a specific location but make it available for in-store pickup. This feature provides merchants with more flexibility with how and from where an order is fulfilled.
How does Omnichannel Inventory App support Salesforce Order Management or B2B orders?
Use the Omnichannel Inventory app to view, add, and edit inventory SKU counts and manage locations, location groups, and location group assignments.
Get Started with the Omnichannel Inventory Console
Use to look up inventory availability, add and edit SKU counts, and manage locations, location groups, and location group assignments.
Customize the Omnichannel Inventory Console
Add custom tabs and fields, modify page layouts and components, and assign the app to particular user profiles.
Use Case: Maintain Accurate Inventory Counts to Improve Sales and Customer Satisfaction
Quickly and efficiently add or update individual records or import multiple records using a CSV or JSON file.
Search, Add, and Edit SKUs in the Omnichannel Inventory Console
Add inventory SKUs or edit existing inventory information.
Import and Delete Inventory in Bulk Using Omnichannel Inventory
Add inventory, update existing records, and delete records in bulk instead of using APIs or adding records individually. Modify records using either a CSV or JSON file.
Locations and Location Groups
Omnichannel Inventory aggregates inventory availability information across locations and location groups. Use the Omnichannel Inventory Console to add, edit, and delete locations, location groups, and location group assignments. Search, sort, and filter data in the list views, or customize the list views to show only the records or data that you want.
Share Data Using Omnichannel Inventory File-Based Data Kits
File-based data kits simplify and streamline the deployment and management of data streams between Omnichannel Inventory (OCI) and Data 360. Using data kits makes integrating data efficient and automatic.
How can OCI and warehouse management system work together?
OCI provides inventory visibility and availability, while a warehouse management system executes the physical movement of inventory. With Tejas Warehouse Management (TWM) a native system on Salesforce App Exchange, inventory identified through the Salesforce ecosystem can be translated into actionable warehouse operations.
OCI can determine the units available in a warehouse, while TWM can manage the operational process of locating those units, generating pick tasks, scanning them, packing the order, and shipping it.
With Tejas TWM, this creates a potentially strong positioning: OCI + Salesforce Order Management + TWM can provide an end-to-end inventory-to-warehouse execution architecture.
For more details, you can explore the following resources:
www.tejassoftware.com/en/services/salesforce-warehouse-management-system.aspx
appexchange.salesforce.com/appxListingDetail?listingId=c5f910ea-5f36-4605-8eb3-c6b6def6a1eb
The real value comes when these capabilities are connected into a single end-to-end architecture. We can transcend this end-to-end fulfillment with other Salesforce cloud installations.
Salesforce Commerce -> Salesforce OMS -> OCI -> TWM/WMS -> Pick -> Pack -> Ship.
This architecture connects the digital commerce experience with the physical warehouse.
Learn more about how TWM and Salesforce Omni-Channel Inventory can work together, including our joint success stories and real-world WMS implementations.
www.tejassoftware.com/en/services/services-joint-success-stories.aspx
Why This Matters
Many organizations have invested significantly in their commerce and order management platforms but still rely on disconnected warehouse processes. Integrating OCI with a Salesforce-native WMS such as TWM can help bridge that gap.
FAQs
What is Salesforce Omnichannel Inventory?
Omnichannel inventory refers to the unified management of stock levels across all your sales channels. This means having a single source of truth for the quantity and location of your products, regardless of whether they are sold online, in physical stores, through social media platforms, or any other channel.
Omnichannel Inventory App: A Salesforce console app allowing you to view inventory availability across locations and manage location groups.
What are key features of OCI?
A key feature of Salesforce Omni-Channel Inventory (OCI) is real-time inventory visibility, which tracks and retrieves on-hand, available-to-order, and future stock levels across multiple locations
How can we integrate OCI with WMS?
You can integrate Salesforce Omni-Channel Inventory (OCI) with a Warehouse Management System (WMS) by using OCI's REST APIs to sync real-time stock levels and fulfillment updates.
