A collection is a group of products you pick by hand — for a season, an occasion or a look, such as Layal Boutique’s Summer linen, Eid edit and Gifts under 30 JOD. This article shows you how to add one, with its image, its search engine details and its translation, and then choose its products.
Collections and categories: the difference
| Category | Collection | |
|---|---|---|
| What it says | What a product is: dresses, bags, shoes. | What a product is for right now: summer, Eid, gifts. |
| Products | Each product is in one category. | A product can be in any number of collections. |
| Shape | A tree, with subcategories. | A simple list, with no sub-collections. |
| Order of products | Customers sort the category page themselves. | The order you choose. |
| Hide it | No. | Yes, without deleting it. |
So a linen dress stays in Dresses, and you can also put it in Summer linen and Gifts under 30 JOD. See organise products into categories for categories.
On your storefront, each visible collection has its own page, at your store’s address followed by /collection/ and the collection’s link. The page shows the collection’s image, name and description, then its products in your order, then your other collections. The Collection rail section of your home page shows your visible collections as large picture tiles under Shop the collections; you switch it on and place it in the Storefront Studio — see arrange your homepage sections.
Collections are on every plan. Adding one needs the permission to create products, changing one or its products needs the permission to edit products, and deleting one needs the permission to delete products. The store owner and store managers have all three; sales staff can only look. See staff roles and permissions.
Add a collection
This short video adds Satin evenings, with its Arabic translation and its first three products:
- In the sidebar, open Products, then select Collections (open your collections (opens in a new tab)).
The page lists your collections. Each row shows the collection’s image, its name and description, how many products it holds, its sort order (such as #1), its link, and the buttons Manage products, the pencil (Edit) and the bin (Delete). A hidden collection is faded and carries an Inactive chip.
The product count includes drafts and archived products. Your storefront shows only the products whose status is Active.
A store with no collections yet shows No collections yet and its own Add collection button. It does the same as the one at the top.
- Select Add collection at the top of the page.
The Add collection window opens. Its first part, Details & visibility, has a chip with your store’s main language, such as English. The name and description you type here are in that language.
- In Name, type the collection’s name as customers should see it, such as Satin evenings. The name is required and can be up to 200 characters.
As you type, the console shows the Link it builds from the name, such as satin-evenings. You cannot type it yourself. It follows the same rules as a category’s link: lower case, Latin and Arabic letters and digits kept, every space or other character a hyphen, and -2, -3 added when you save if another collection already has the same link. The preview does not show that suffix. A collection you deleted no longer counts: its name and link are free again.
- In Description, say what the collection gathers. It is optional. It shows under the name on the collection’s page and in your list.
If you select Save with no name, the Name field turns red and says Enter a collection name., and a message says Fill in every required field.
Image and search engine details
Scroll down in the window. Under Products in this collection, the console reminds you: “Save the collection first — the product picker opens right after.”
- Under Collection image, select Upload image and choose a photo. It is optional. The button says Uploading… until the photo appears; Remove takes it off.
The photo can be a JPG, PNG, WebP or GIF of up to 10 MB, and it counts towards your plan’s storage. It is the tile in your home page’s collection rail, the picture at the top of the collection’s page, and the picture shown when someone shares the collection’s link. The rail crops it to different shapes depending on how many collections you show, so choose a wide photo with the subject in the middle. Without an image, the tile shows the collection’s name on a plain background. If the upload fails, a message says Could not upload the image. Try again., or why it was refused.
- Under SEO, type a Search title and a Search description. Both are optional and in your main language.
- Search title is the title of the collection’s page, in the browser tab and in search results. It is used exactly as you type it, so add your store’s name if you want it, as in Satin evenings | Layal Boutique. Left empty, the title is the collection’s name followed by your store’s name. Up to 160 characters.
- Search description is the line search engines show under the title. Left empty, they get the collection’s description, or your store’s description when there is none. Up to 320 characters.
Tip
Search engines usually show about 60 characters of a title and 155 of a description. Put the words customers search for first, such as “satin dresses”.
Visible in the storefront: hide a collection without deleting it
The Visible in the storefront switch decides whether customers can see the collection. As the console says, “Inactive collections stay in the console but are hidden from customers.”
When it is off:
- the collection leaves the collection rail and the list of collections at the foot of other collection pages;
- its own page says Collection not found.;
- in your console, its row is faded and carries an Inactive chip;
- its products are not touched, and still show everywhere else in your storefront.
Turn it on again and the collection is back, with its products in the same order. This is the way to put a seasonal collection away until next year — for example Ramadan evenings.
The switch starts on in the Add collection window. To prepare a new collection out of sight — fill it with products, check its picture — turn the switch off before you select Save:
The collection is created hidden. In your list it is faded and carries the Inactive chip, like Ramadan evenings, and customers cannot see it until you turn the switch on in its pencil (Edit) window.
Sort order: where it sits among your collections
Sort order decides where the collection sits among the others. As the hint says, “Lower numbers appear first in the storefront.” It is a whole number from 0 up.
- A new collection gets the number after your highest one, so it goes last. Change it to move the collection forward.
- Collections with the same number are sorted by name.
- The same order is used in your console list, where each row shows its number, such as #0.
To swap two collections, edit each one and give them each other’s numbers.
The translation, by hand or with AI (Starter and up)
The Translations section appears only when your store sells in more than one language — see set your store’s languages. There is one card for each of your other languages, such as العربية, with four fields: Name, Description, Search title and Search description. The card shows how many of the fields you wrote in your main language are written in it too, such as 4/4 completed and Complete, or how many are missing.
- Select the language card to open it.
- Type the fields in that language. Or let the console fill the empty ones:
- Generate missing — AI writes them from your main language. It is on Starter and up and uses AI translation credits — see how AI credits work. While it works, the button says Translating…; then Missing translations filled. appears.
- Copy missing from primary — copies your main-language text into the empty fields as it is, for you to translate over. It works on every plan.
Both fill only empty fields. Anything you already typed in that language stays.
If AI could not fill everything, or your translation credits for the month are used up, a message tells you why — see what each translation message means. Try again, or type the rest yourself.
Below Starter, Generate missing shows a padlock when there is something to translate; selecting it names the plan that includes AI translation, with a See plans link. See plans and what each includes.
If you leave a field empty in a language, customers who browse in that language see the text you did write — the English, when there is some.
Save, then choose its products
- Select Save at the bottom of the window. It says Saving… while it works.
Collection created. appears and, straight away, the Choose products window opens for the new collection. It starts empty: the right-hand side says No products yet.
- Add the products and put them in order, then select Save products. Every step is in choose and arrange a collection’s products.
The collection now shows in your list with its product count.
If you close the Choose products window without adding anything, the collection is still saved, with 0 products. Open it again any time with Manage products.
Until it holds at least one Active product, customers who open the collection read This collection is empty for now., and its tile still shows in your home page’s collection rail. Hide it while you fill it — see Visible in the storefront.
If the collection itself cannot be saved, a message says Could not save changes. — or the reason, when the store gives one — and the window stays open with what you typed.
Cancel, the close button and the Esc key close the window without saving and without asking.
Find a collection
Type in Search collections… at the top of the list. The list narrows as you type, to collections whose name, description or link contains your words, in the language you use the console in. The count shows the matches out of the total, such as 1 / 5.
When nothing matches, the page says No matching collections. Select Clear search to see them all again.
When the list is long or does not load
The page loads your first 100 collections, in sort order. If you have more, a line under the list says how many are shown out of how many there are — Showing the first collections: followed by the two numbers. The search looks only through the collections on the page.
Collections beyond the first 100 do not appear on the page, so you cannot open them from here until the list is shorter. Delete the collections you no longer use — see delete a collection. Deleting a collection never deletes its products.
If the page cannot load your collections, it says Could not load data. Select Try again. If it keeps happening, check your connection, then reload the page.
Next, choose and arrange the collection’s products, then add the collection rail to your home page.