Connecting with suppliers

Building your supplier network is the first step to gaining supply chain visibility. This guide covers how to invite suppliers, track their progress, and manage your connections.

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How connections work

A connection is a relationship between your company (the buyer) and a supplier. Once active, the supplier can share product data with you according to their share policy. Either party can initiate a connection, but it only becomes active when both accept.

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Inviting suppliers

Most buyers start by inviting their existing suppliers to join LinkXG.

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Go to Suppliers

From the main navigation, select Suppliers, then Invite suppliers.

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Three ways to add suppliers

Manual entry — Add suppliers one at a time. Enter the company name and a contact email address for each supplier. CSV upload — Upload a spreadsheet with your supplier list. The platform guides you through mapping columns for company name and contact email. API integration — For larger deployments, push supplier data from your internal systems via the API.

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What to provide for each supplier

The context note appears in the invitation email. Keep it short and specific, for example: “We need product specifications for our compliance reporting.”

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Review before sending

Before invitations go out, you see a preview showing:

• How many suppliers will be invited
• Any validation errors (missing emails, duplicates)
• Warnings for potential issues

Fix any errors, then select Send invites.

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What suppliers receive

Your suppliers receive a professional email explaining that you have requested them on LinkXG. The email includes:

• Your company name
• Your context note (if provided)
• A brief explanation of what LinkXG is
• A clear statement that they are not required to pay or share data immediately
• A link to create their free supplier account

If multiple customers have requested the same supplier, the email reflects this: “3 customers you work with are requesting you on LinkXG.” The platform handles reminders automatically. If a supplier does not respond, gentle reminders are sent at day 5 and day 14. After day 30, reminders stop and you are notified.

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Tracking invitations

Go to Suppliers to see your invite tracker. Each supplier shows one of the following statuses:

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When suppliers do not respond

At day 30, reminders stop automatically. The platform notifies you with options:

• Replace contact email — Perhaps you had the wrong contact
• Mark for manual follow-up — Export a list of non-responders to chase through other channels

This prevents LinkXG from becoming noise that suppliers learn to ignore.

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Connecting with existing suppliers

If a supplier is already on LinkXG (perhaps invited by another customer), you can connect with them directly. Go to Suppliers and select Find suppliers. Search by company name. If they are on the platform, you can send a connection request. The supplier will see your request and can accept or decline.

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Managing active connections

Once a connection is active, it appears in your Suppliers list with status “Connected”. Select a supplier to see:

• Supplier information — Company name, location, when you connected
• Shared products — What products this supplier has shared with you
• Activity — Recent data access and updates

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Connection health

LinkXG shows indicators of connection health:

• Data freshness — When the supplier last updated their products
• Completeness — How comprehensive the supplier’s data is
• Sharing scope — Whether the supplier is sharing all products or a subset

If a supplier’s data is stale or incomplete, you can request an update through the platform.

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Disconnecting from a supplier

If you no longer need a supplier connection, you can disconnect. Go to the supplier’s connection details and select Disconnect. Disconnecting:

• Immediately removes your access to their shared data
• Preserves audit records of past access
• Cannot be undone (you would need to send a new connection request)

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Common questions

What if the supplier already has a LinkXG account? If they are already on the platform, your invitation becomes a connection request to their existing account. They do not need to create a new one. Can a supplier see my other suppliers? No. Your supplier relationships are private. Supplier A cannot see that you also work with Supplier B. What if a supplier declines? You will see their status as “Declined” in your invite tracker. Common reasons include unfamiliarity with the platform or concerns about data sharing. Consider reaching out directly to address their concerns. Can I see what a supplier shares with other customers? No. You only see what they share with you. Their relationships with other customers are private.

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Next steps