Category Merchandising allows store owners to apply Live Search Intelligent ranking rules to product categories and subcategories.
The feature is accessed in the Admin at Marketing > SEO & Search > Live Search > Category Merchandising.
Category Merchandising is available with Live Search 3.0.0 or higher. If you see the Category Merchandising tab but it is not populated with data, update the Live Search module.
The Category Merchandising view shows defined category rules, with columns for:
You can search for a category or subcategory in the “Search by category” field.
Category Merchandising uses the same ranking types as with individual products.
There are two types of ranking: Intelligent and Manual.
Intelligent ranking leverages storefront behavioral data analysis by Adobe Sensei to sort all products within chosen categories by a certain algorithm. Once an Intelligent ranking is chosen, the specific order of products is expected to change over time as the underlying data is reanalyzed by Adobe Sensei on an ongoing basis. For example, top trending products will automatically change over time as shopper preferences change.
Intelligent ranking methods are:
Manual ranking allows users to override the automatic product sort order by defining manual pin, boost, bury, and hide rules.
As a merchandiser, you might want to be able to select all of women’s wear categories to be sorted by “trending”. This includes the subcategories “Women’s pants”, “Women’s shirts”, and “Women’s accessories”. Men’s categories should not be affected. You can use inherited rankings to achieve this.
When selecting an Intelligent ranking method for a category or subcategory that has subcategories, you can turn on the Apply intelligent rankings to subcategories option. This applies the ranking method to all subcategories.
These subcategories now inherit that rule from the parent category (“Yes” in the Inherited Ranking column). In the Action column, the only available options are Edit Rule, and View Details. The Delete option is disabled for inherited rules on subcategories. Deleting subcategory inheritance requires undoing inheritance from the parent category.
Any category or subcategory can have only one Intelligent ranking applied at any one time. They may have additional Manual rankings applied as well.
If you apply an Intelligent ranking to a category and turn on the Apply intelligent ranking to subcategories option, any Intelligent ranking already applied to the subcategories are overwritten.
If you click View All, a dialog opens with details of the proposed changes.
When adding an Intelligent ranking directly to a category that has an inherited Intelligent ranking, the inheritance is overridden by the new Intelligent ranking.
When deleting the Intelligent ranking from the category, the inheritance is re-established.
In both scenarios, any Manual rankings are maintained.
If you remove an Intelligent ranking from a category, and the subcategory inheritance is selected, only the inherited Intelligent rankings are removed from the subcategories. Manual rankings are not subject to inheritance and will remain.
A dialog appears explaining which inherited subcategories are affected by any changes you make to a higher-level category.
To create a category rule:
Click the Add Rule button.
In the Select Category view, click through the categories and subcategories.
Select the checkbox to select the category you wish to rank.
Click Apply.
In the Add Category rule view, select the Intelligent ranking method you wish to apply to the category.
The Category Preview Page shows the actual results of the selected ranking, using your Live Search data.
Click Save and Publish to save the rule.
The Live Search service processes the rule and activates it on the store when finished.
To modify an existing rule:
The changes are reflected on the store when Live Search has processed the change.
To delete a category rule:
Manual ranking lets you override the product order determined by Intelligent Ranking rules (if any) and manually control where products appear within the results.
Events are actions that modify the search results when defined conditions are met. A manual ranking can have up to 25 events.
Create a manual ranking:
Set up an Intelligent ranking rule for a category as described above. The results of the query will appear in the Preview Category Page view. This uses your actual Live Search data to preview the results.
Click and drag a product in the Preview Category Page view. Drag and drop it at the desired position. The Product and Position fields are automatically populated in the Events pane.
You may also click the pin icon to pin a product to its current location. Use the ellipsis context menu to “Pin to top” or “Pin to bottom”.
To manually add an event: