Adding and Managing Products
Adding a product
Before adding your first product, let’s get familiar with how product categories, tags, and attributes work.
a. Product Categories
Product categories and tags work in much the same way as normal categories and tags. They can be created, edited, and selected at any time. This can be done when you first create a product or come back and edit it or the category/tag specifically.
b. Attributes
These can be added per product, or you can set up global attributes for the entire store to use (e.g., in layered navigation).
c. Product Types
With attributes and categories set up and stock management configured, we can begin adding products. When adding a product, the first thing to decide is what type of product it is.
Simple – covers most of any products you may sell. Simple products are shipped and have no options. For example, a book.
Grouped – a collection of related products that can be purchased individually and only consist of simple products. For example, a set of six drinking glasses.
Virtual – one that does not require shipping. For example, a service. Enabling this disables all shipping related fields such as shipping dimensions. A virtual product will also not trigger the shipping calculator in cart and checkout.
Downloadable – activates additional fields where you can provide a downloadable file. After a successful purchase, customers are given a downloadable file as a link in the order notification email. This is suitable, for example, for a digital album, PDF magazine, or photo.
External or Affiliate – one that you list and describe on your website but is sold elsewhere.
Variable– a product with variations, each of which may have a different SKU, price, stock option, etc. For example, a t-shirt available in different colors and/or sizes
Adding a simple product
- Go to Safhitak Store > Products > Add Product. You then have a familiar interface and should immediately feel at home.
- Enter a product Title and Description.
- Go to the Product Data panel and select downloadable (digital) or virtual (service) if applicable.
Note: Virtual products do not require shipping — an order with virtual products will not calculate shipping costs.
a. Product data
The Product Data meta box is where the majority of important data is added for your products.
General section
Price
- Regular Price – Item’s normal/regular price.
- Sale Price – Item’s discounted price that can then be scheduled for certain date ranges. The sale expires at 11:59 pm on the specified end date.
Inventory section
The inventory section allows you to manage stock for the product individually and define whether to allow back orders and more. It enables you to sell products and allow customers to add them to the cart to buy.
Enable Stock Management must be selected in Product Inventory Settings; otherwise, only the ‘Stock status’ option is visible in the Product Data Inventory box.
Options when stock management at the product level is disabled. You are responsible for updating the Stock Status.
Options when stock management at product level is enabled.
- Enter the Stock Quantity, and Safhitak auto-manages inventory and auto-updates Stock Status as Stock, Out of Stock, or On Back-order.
- Select whether to Allow Back-orders.
- Low stock threshold – Enter a number upon which you are notified.
- Tick the Sold Individually box to limit the product to one per order.
Shipping section
- Weight – Weight of the item.
- Dimensions – Length, width, and height for the item.
- Shipping Class – Shipping classes are used by certain shipping methods to group similar products.
Linked Products section
Using up-sells and cross-sells, you can cross promote your products. They can be added by searching for a particular product and selecting the product from the drop-down list:
After adding, they are listed in the input field:
Up-sells are displayed on the product details page. These are products that you may wish to encourage users to upgrade, based on the product they are currently viewing. For example, if the user is viewing the coffee product listing page, you may want to display tea kettles on that same page as an up-sell.
Cross-sells are products that are displayed with the cart and related to the user’s cart contents. As an example, if the user adds a Nintendo DS to their cart, you may want to suggest they purchase a spare stylus when they arrive at the cart page.
Grouping – Used to make a product part of a grouped product. More info below at: Grouped Products.
Attributes section
On the Attributes tab, you can assign details to a product. You will see a select box containing global attribute sets you created (e.g., platform). More at: Managing Product Categories, Tags, and Attributes.
Once you have chosen an attribute from the select box, click add and apply the terms attached to that attribute (e.g., Nintendo DS) to the product. You can hide the attribute on the front-end by leaving the Visible checkbox unticked.
Custom attributes can also be applied by choosing a Custom product attribute from the select box. These are added at the product level and won’t be available in layered navigation or other products.
Advanced section
- Purchase note – Enter an optional note to send the customer after they purchase the product.
- Menu order – Custom ordering position for this item.
- Enable Reviews – Enable/Disable customer reviews for this item.
b. Product short description
Add an excerpt. This typically appears next to product imagery on the listing page, and the long description appears in the Product Description tab.
c. Taxonomies
On the right-hand side of the Add New Product panel, there are product categories in which you can place your product, you can also assign product tags in the same way.
