The Product Manager is organized similar to the Category Manager in that it will show you the Home level first, with the subcategories assigned at this level. Click on a category name to open it and view any products in that category and/or subcategories. Like the Category Manager, you have some search fields and filters to use to locate your products:
Name – search box for the name of the product. Any portion of the namewill match.
SKU – search box for the product SKU number. Again, any portion of theSKU will match.
Display – Sets whether the product will display in the store. Products with display turned off will not show up in searches, as related products, inproduct teaser boxes, etc.
New – Show products which are marked as new, or not new
Sale – Show products which are marked as on sale, or not on sale
Hot – Show products which are marked as ‘hot’ or not ‘hot’.
Type – Sort by the type of product. Default product types are product (normal products), membership (used for selling access to site areas) and download (for downloadable software products).
All – This link allows you to show all products in your site
Uncategorized – This link will show a list of products not currently assigned to any category in the store.
When displaying the list of products, either from browsing or by a search, the corresponding value for each of the search fields will be shown for each product. In addition, the ID field will have a link to Edit the product, and mousing over this field will pop-up a menu to jump to each of the individual product edit tabs. You can also click the name of the product to view it in the store (if turned on) and can click Copy to create a duplicate of the product. Copied products will automatically have their display turned off so they do not show up in the store until you have applied any edits and approved them to be shown. See below for more information on the Copy feature.
As in the Category Manager, you’ll find some additional links and options. After using a search, you’ll see the link to return to the Browse Categories view. While browsing, you will have a link to add a New Product to the current category (or home level for uncategorized products). Finally, while in the list view, you will have a link to switch to the List Edit.
The List Edit gives you a form to perform quick edits on all the products in the list at once. The fields include the following:
Price – The base price for the product.
Retail – The retail price for the product.
Wholesale – The wholesale price for the product.
#Stock – Current number in stock
Opt #s – If you are tracking inventory at the option level for this product, this allows you to edit the number in stock from the List Edit rather than having to go into the option. Enter the number in stock for the options in the order they are entered for the product, with a comma (,) separating each. You must enter a value for each option or you will receive an error message.
Priority – Used for sorting the products on the subcategory pages. 1 is the highest priority, then 2 and so on down. Use 0 or leave blank for any product that should be left in the default sort order.
Display – Toggles the product on and off in the store.
New – Marks the product as new using the image defined in your color palette. There are also special pages and tags you can use for displaying these products.
Sale – Marks the product as on sale. Like New products, these can be displayed in special places in your site.
Hot – Marks the product as ‘Hot’. Another setting to use for highlighting certain products.