Product's E-Commerce Categories

Assigning the correct categories to every product is critical for helping customers find the products they need.

This document has four sections:

• How Categories Work
• Multiple Category Products (Rompers)
• Rules of Thumb
• Answers to Frequently Asked Questions

How Categories Work

Each product must be assigned to at least one category. Without a category, a product will not be visible on the website.

A product can be — and often should be — assigned to more than one category.

Categories are organized as a hierarchy, like an outline:

1. All Products
   1. Language
      1. Phonics
      2. Reading
   2. Math
      1. Early Math
      2. Number Sense
      3. Addition & Subtraction
         1. Addition
         2. Subtraction
      4. Multiplication & Division
   3. Science & STEM

We can visualize part of this hierarchy with this tree-like illustration (focusing on the Math branch):

We can also visualize the same information in a format that looks more like a Venn diagram:

The website presents the category hierarchy as an outline:

As a customer navigates deeper into the hierarchy, products are eliminated. For example:

• When the customer chooses Math, Language and Science products are eliminated
• When they further choose Addition & Subtraction, Early Math, Number Sense, and Multiplication & Division products are also eliminated
• Finally, if they choose Addition, then Subtraction products are also eliminated.

In short, if we want a product like "Addition Flashcards" to be visible in the Addition node of the hierarchy, then we need to put it there. We can't just assign it to the Math node, because a customer will not see it when they select the Addition category.

A customer can also see products that are in category nodes within/under their current node.

If a customer navigates to the Addition & Subtraction node, they will see products that are assigned to that node as well as products assigned to the Addition node and products assigned to the Subtraction node.

Adding products to the illustrations above, we can see how products are shown or hidden as a customer navigates the category hierarchy.

Remember that a customer doesn't always follow such a linear step-by-step navigation.

They might click directly on the Addition category in the mega-menu. Or they might be following an email link directly to the Multiplication category.

Multiple Category Products

For many products the category assignment is obvious. Telescopes go in Astronomy. Student of the Month Certificates go in Certificates.

Some products meet more than one learning objective. How do we assign categories for those products?

I like to call these Rompers.

Are they shorts?
A shirt?
Or are they both??

Consider this fictional product:

When assigning the categories for this product, it will look like this:

Consider another fictional product:

We could assign this product to eight (or more!) categories, but that is probably not very helpful to the customer. We can predict that if they're looking for fractions, it's not the best product to show them since it only has a few pages on fractions.

Think about how to categorize this item:

This product has far fewer learning objectives than the previous math review example, and it does fit nicely into the categories we have created.

Product categories don't have to be branches within the same department.

So far our examples have all been within the same subject (Math). Consider a product like Math & Reading Warmups.

Decor type products present a unique opportunity. Think about an addition learning chart. Is it addition? or decor? or both?

When assigning the categories for this product, it will look like this:

Rules of Thumb

Consider these questions while assigning categories to products:

What is the primary subject for this product?

• Would the customer expect to see the product in this category?
• Would the customer be confused to see the product in this category?
• Will putting this product in this category prevent the customer from finding what they're looking for in the first two pages of results?

What percentage of this product fits this category?

Should I assign this product to multiple categories?

FAQ:

What is the purpose of the 'all ___' categories like 'all Math', or 'all Writing'?

The all categories overcome a shortcomming in CounterPoint. CounterPoint only lets you put products at the termination of an eCategory hierarchy.

Consider a product titled Math Skills for 3rd Grade. Because this book covers addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, time, money … it would make sense to just put it in the "Math" eCategory. But CounterPoint won't let you do that. You'd have to put it into all 17 Math categories!

The all Math Category in CounterPoint is a workaround. When you put the product into all Math, it will show up on the website in the 'root' Math category where you would expect.

Why does the first category look different?

The first category is the primary category, and that's why it looks different. You can drag-n-drop the categories to rearrange their order and change the primary category.

The order of the categories has no effect on the customer website, and is only relevant for assigning the primary category.

Only the primary category is provided to Google in the feed file.

E-Commerce Categories are used in other places besides the customer website. For example, an out of stock report can be filtered to show Math products. Multiple categories could cause duplication across some reports. For example, if a product showed up as out of stock in Math and Reading it might be accidentaly reordered twice.

To solve this potential problem, reports filter by only the primary category.

The output of many reports include a category column. The primary category is what will appear in the output.

Why does a category sometimes turn grey?

The product CDN can tell when a category is redundant — meaning it's a duplicate of or included in another category. Redundant categories are shown in grey. When the category is changed to one that's unique, it will change back to blue. Redundant categories are not saved.

I set a category for a product, but when I reloaded the page the category was gone.

The category that disappeared was deemed to be redundant and was automatically removed. See Why does a category sometimes turn grey?

I can't sort (change the order) of the categories.

If the list of categories includes a redundant category, sorting is temporarily disabled. Change the category to one that's unique and sorting will be reenabled. See Why does a category sometimes turn grey?

Deletion of categories is also disabled until the redundant category is fixed.

What categories should I assign for a product that could go in multiple categories?

Assigning many categories to a product is a good thing!

Assign every category where a customer could reasonably expect to find the product.

For example, consider a math chart. Some customers might expect to find it in Math, and some customers might expect to find it in Charts. So put it in both.

Why does the "Add a Category" button sometimes disapear?

Because there is already an All (root) category for this product. Change it to a more specific category and the add button will reappear.

Why does the "Drag here to delete" area sometimes disapear?

Every product must have at least one category. If there is only one category, you can not delete it.

Why is the "Apply" button in the inspection drawer disabled?

E-Commerce Categories can not be applied from the inspection drawer.