Creating Category Hierarchies

Article
11/12/2009

You use the Catalog Editor module to create category hierarchies. Creating category hierarchies helps organize products in your catalogs and makes navigation on your Web site easier for your users.

You can create a category that has parent categories and/or child categories.

For example, the category CDs can have the child categories Rock, Rhythm and Blues, and Classical. The child categories can also contain child categories of their own. For example, the category Rock can contain the child categories Pop and Alternative.

Each category and product can have one primary parent category. The primary parent category provides a canonical path to a child category or product. In addition, if a product is in more than one category, and pricing is set at the category level, the price of the primary parent category overrides the price in all other categories that are using category pricing.

Note

You can nest categories five layers deep.

To assign parent and child categories

In Catalogs, click Catalog Editor.
In the Catalogs screen, select the catalog containing the categories to which you want to assign parent or child categories, and then click on the toolbar.
In the Catalog - <Catalog Name> screen, in the Categories section, select the category to which you want to assign parent or child categories, and then click Edit.
In the Assigned Categories section, select the category you want to assign as the primary parent category, and then click Set.
In the Available Child Categories box, select the category you want to add to the parent, and then click Add.

The category moves from the list in the Available box to the list in the Assigned Child Categories box.
To save the parent and child assignments and return to the Catalogs screen, click on the toolbar.
To publish the updated catalog, click on the toolbar.

The updated catalog is published on your Web site.

Creating Category Hierarchies

See Also

Additional resources