ASP Shopping Cart Help

Category Setup Print Topic

PDshop can be configured to have an unlimited number of categories, and sub categories. From the main menu in PDAdmin, choose from "Show All" or "Add Category".

If you click on "Show All" you will see a category "tree", listing all top level categories alphabetically. Beneath the top level category, will be any subcategories. You can click on either to edit the category.

Category Name:
The category name should be short, one or two words. It can be up to 25 characters in length. You cannot use the following characters: "\" ":" "/"

Parent Category:
The "Parent" category field is used to designate sub categories. If you want to create a sub category simply create a new category. Then, specify a "Parent" category by using the drop-down list. If you are creating a top-level category, leave the "Parent" category field blank. Later, if you decide to change a sub category to a top-level category, select the horizontal line from the drop down list and "Save". This will remove the Parent category.

Short Description:
The short description appears on the "Categories" page, and on the "Item" detail page. The "Categories page is accessible from the main menu in the storefront. It will list all categories, their immediate sub-category, and your short description. You should keep the length to a minimum as it may make for a long "Categories" page.

List Order:
Optionally you can enter a number here. This number will be used when your categories are set to sort by "Specified List Order" (see Setup>General settings page). For example, if you do not want your categories & subcategories to be listed alphabetically, you can specify the list order using numbers; lower numbers appear first, higher numbers appear last.

Detailed Description:
The detailed description is edited using the built-in "HTML" editor. This gives you unlimited formatting controls over text and you can even insert images. This description appears on the "Category" detail page (users will be taken to it whenever they click on a category from within the store).

NOTE: It should be noted that it is not necessary to have items in a category. You can use the category pages to display any text or graphics, with our without items. This gives you the ability to create an unlimited number of pages in your website. (Example: you might want to create pages such as, "about the company", or "calendar of events", etc.)

Category Items
Max Per Page:
This setting allows you to specify how many category items should appear on a given category page.

Page Style:
There are two ways your items can be displayed on the category page, in columns or a standard list. If you choose columns you must specify the maximum columns you want your items displayed in. The number of items and rows depends on your Max Per Page setting.

You can also specify what elements are visible on the category page. Using the different "Show" checkboxes, you can hide or display elements. For example, you can hide the image, price, description, item number, or other elements, to tailor the look of your storefront.

Meta-Tags:
Meta Tags are the Title, Description and Keyword data that is embedded into each category's web page, it is used by search engines to determine your listing (Note you must submit your site to search engines, PDAdmin does not submit sites for listing). You can enter a Title, Keywords, or description for each category to improve search engine racking. If you leave these settings blank, the default store Meta tags you setup under the "Name/Title" will be used.