Create product templates in Optimizely PIM

Overview

Use product templates to define the major data elements that are required or recommended to populate for products within a family of products. This helps enforce data governance before publishing products to your website.

For example, a merchandiser may create a Faucet product template that contains essential data elements for that type of product (such as finish, handle type, and so on). The merchandiser can set which data is required, recommended or optional. Organize product templates into folders for quick categorization and easy access. 

B2B Commerce Storefront View

Your customers will not see product templates, because they are an organizational and data governance tool for you to use within Optimizely PIM.

Best Practices

It is important to remember that Product Templates are organizational tools for you to use to enforce governance practices and may mirror category hierarchies at your company. Consider what inventory of data you want to collect for a group of similar products. For example, you might set up your product templates under a folder structure of Power Tools, under which you have a folder for Saws, which contains templates for Circular Saws, Table Saws, and so on. By creating templates that mirror your categories, you will be able to leverage dynamic category rules to automate product to category assignments.

Product templates includes a starter template by default for you to use as a starting point for other templates. When creating a new template, the property groups and properties on the starter template are automatically included. Update your starter template to include all general product data that is likely to exist on products in any template (like brand, product line and manufacturer number), so that you do not need to add them to each template.

Because the template defines what properties to include for each product, you must assign a template to a product before it is editable. You can assign a product template to products from the product list, the product detail tab or during an import.

Use Case

Before she imports products, Carrie needs to create product templates using the property groups and properties she created. This will determine what information is required for similar products.

Carrie goes to Configure > Product Templates to create a Plumbing folder, and then a Faucet subfolder. She edits the Starter Template to add the Dimension and Brands property groups, since these should be a part of every product template.

Carrie then creates a Kitchen product template. By default, it already includes the Starter Template property groups, so Carrie just has to add the Common Attirbutes property group into the template and save it. She also creates a Bathroom product template which also includes the Common Attributes property group. She removes the Pull-out Sprayer property that does not apply to bathroom faucets and saves the template.

Product Templates List Page

Use the Product Templates list page to search for, filter, and select templates for editing, assigning properties, and assigning to categories. Product template folders and their product templates are listed in alphabetical order.

You can sort data by clicking column headers. Edit individual templates by clicking on the name, which takes you to the Product Template details page.

Product Template Folder Navigation

Type or click add filter - Enter a partial or full product template name to narrow the results to only folders or templates that match.

Expand all and Collapse all - Click to expand or collapse the entire product template tree.

Select folder - Select a folder in the product template tree to apply a parent folder filter. All child product templates of the parent folder display in the product templates list results.

Organize folders - You can drag and drop product templates between various template folders.

Product Template List Navigation

Editing - Click an individual product template record to view and edit its assigned properties.

Search by name - Enter a partial or full product template name to narrow the results across all product template folders.

Pagination - By default, 25 products display in the list, with options to view 50 or 100 per page. Go to other pages using the pagination controls under the list.

Organize Product Template Folders

Add Product Template Folders

  1. Click Configure in the task bar.
  2. Select the Product Templates tab.
  3. Click the Add Product Template Folder icon next to the Product Templates title to add a new product template folder. You will see all your product folders and templates listed in the tree.  
  4. Enter a title for your template folder. 
  5. Double click the title to edit it.
  6. Continue adding folders to this structure as needed. 

Delete Product Template Folders

  1. Hover over the folder and click the Delete icon. If you have any child folders or template within the folder, these items must be moved or deleted before you can delete the top-level folder.
  2. Verify the folder is deleted, which occurs if all sub-items were moved or deleted.

Organize Product Templates for B2B Commerce

Add Product Templates for B2B Commerce

  1. Hover over a folder and click the Add Product Template icon. 
  2. Enter a Template Name and select whether you wish to Require Product Image for any products assigned this template.
  3. In the left panel, use the search to narrow the property groups results, then select the property group(s) you'd like to add to this template to the list of properties already in the template. Add as many property groups as you would like to this template.
  4. In the main panel, use the filter for property input to find property groups containing a specific property and to filter for that property.
  5. Click Expand All to see all properties contained in your selected property groups.
  6. Click Select All within a property group to select all properties within that group.
  7. Hover over a property and click the Delete icon if it is not appropriate for the template.
  8. Set whether any of the properties you have selected should be Required or Recommended. Required means you must fill these in for PIM to consider a product complete, as you cannot publish incomplete products to your website. Recommended means a field is highly encouraged for governance best practices.
  9. If you select a property that supports template-specific values, click Edit Values to optionally search for and then select or enter values that are valid for this template.
  10. Drag and drop the property groups within the template. This helps order the information they way you want your users to see it when editing products in this template. 
  11. Click Save.

Edit Product Templates for B2B Commerce

  1. Hover over the template in the template list and click the Edit icon. If you already have the template selected, you can edit it by clicking the Edit icon beside the template name.
  2. In the main panel, use the filter for property input to find property groups containing a specific property and to filter for that property.
  3. Click Expand All to see all properties contained in your selected property groups.
  4. Click Select All within a property group to select or deselect all properties within that group.
  5. Edit any previously-defined fields or hover over a property and click the Delete icon if it is not appropriate for the template.
  6. Set whether any of the properties you have selected should be Required or Recommended. Required means you must fill these in for PIM to consider a product complete, as you cannot publish incomplete products to your website. Recommended means a field is highly encouraged for governance best practices.
  7. Drag and drop the property groups within the template. This helps order the information they way you want your users to see it when editing products in this template. 
  8. Click Save.

Delete Product Templates for B2B Commerce

  1. Expand the product template tree to find the template you would like to delete.
  2. Hover your cursor over the template name and click the Delete icon.
  3. You will see a warning message, informing you that deleting a template will affect any products using this template. You will need to assign a new template to those products before they can be published to your B2B Commerce site.
  4. If you are comfortable with these conditions, click Confirm Changes.

Organize Product Templates for Commerce Cloud

Add Product Templates for Commerce Cloud

  1. Hover over a folder and click the Add Product Template icon. 
  2. Select a Product Class, and then click Continue. The product class determines the available property groups and property values for the template.
  3. Enter a Template Name and select whether you wish to Require Product Image for any products assigned this template.
  4. In the main panel, use the filter for property input to find property groups containing a specific property and to filter for that property.
  5. Click Expand All to see all properties contained in the available property groups.
  6. Click Select All within a property group to select all properties within that group.
  7. Hover over a property group and click the Delete icon if it is not appropriate for the template.
  8. Set whether any of the properties you have selected should be Required or Recommended. Required means you must fill these in for PIM to consider a product complete, as you cannot publish incomplete products to your website. Recommended means a field is highly encouraged for governance best practices.
  9. If you select a property that supports template-specific values, click Edit Values to optionally search for and then select or enter values that are valid for this template.
  10. Drag and drop the property groups within the template. This helps order the information they way you want your users to see it when editing products in this template. 
  11. Click Save.

Edit Product Templates for Commerce Cloud

  1. Hover over the template in the template list and click the Edit icon. If you already have the template selected, you can edit it by clicking the Edit icon beside the template name.
  2. In the main panel, use the filter for property input to find property groups containing a specific property and to filter for that property.
  3. Click Expand All to see all properties contained in your selected property groups.
  4. Click Select All within a property group to select or deselect all properties within that group.
  5. Edit any previously-defined fields or hover over a property and click the Delete icon if it is not appropriate for the template.
  6. Set whether any of the properties you have selected should be Required or Recommended. Required means you must fill these in for PIM to consider a product complete, as you cannot publish incomplete products to your website. Recommended means a field is highly encouraged for governance best practices.
  7. Drag and drop the property groups within the template. This helps order the information they way you want your users to see it when editing products in this template. 
  8. Click Save.

Delete Product Templates for Commerce Cloud

  1. Expand the product template tree to find the template you would like to delete.
  2. Hover your cursor over the template name and click the Delete icon that appears.
  3. You will see a warning message, informing you that deleting a template will affect any products using this template. You will need to assign a new template to those products before they can be published to your Commerce Cloud site.
  4. If you are comfortable with these conditions, click Confirm Changes.

Import Product Templates

You can import product templates in bulk. Use the provided import template to add new product templates or update details for existing product templates.

  1. Click the Import Product Templates icon in the top right.
  2. If you have not already formatted your categories according to the template format, click Download Template.
  3. Once you have a formatted template file, click Choose File.
  4. Locate your category file and click Open.
  5. Click Continue. If you receive any validation errors, please resolve them before attempting to import again. You can download the provided file to view error messages that are specific to each row.
  6. View your import progress at the top of the Product Templates list page or click Cancel to stop it. A log of the import displays on the Imports page.