Add Products to Categories by Importing

Now that you have created your product categories, you would probably like to know how to add products. But first, let's cover the why. Adding products to Categories will help organize the products on your website and make them easier for customers to find.

While you can add products to categories manually, importing products can be much faster and easier to do when working with a large number of products.

As a reminder as to how category structure works, refer to the screenshot below:

• Parent Categories - any product category that has another category assigned as a child in the category structure. A category can be both a parent and a child to another category. A parent category may contain products but does not have to contain products.
• Child Categories - any product category that is connected to a parent category. They may also include Child Categories and products.

Note: when the site search indexer runs, a parent category will automatically display all products from their child categories. Even if the parent category is empty, it will still appear to have products.

In order to import your products, you will first need to export the products that are in your portal. This will give you the list of products that you need to categorize in order to import.

Export Settings for Product Categorizing

• Navigate to the Products section of the PIM Portal
• Select the "Category Assignment" tab
• Click the "Show / Hide Columns" icon

• Select the fields you would like to export; depending on you workflow, some helpful columns could be:
  • Code – helpful if the code is used for reference or searching, and is required for importing as it is the identifying factor for matching information.
  • Name – can be helpful when categorizing the product.
  • Created – helpful if you would like to sort by created date to find newly added products
  • Active – synced from your ERP and helpful to confirm if a product is currently active on the commerce website.
  • Display – a Kodaris setting, and helpful to confirm if a product is displayed on the commerce website. Both Display and Active columns need to be set to "yes" in order for a product to be displayed on the commerce website.
  • Primary Category Code – this field should only be used for new products and the "do_not_display" category if they are being used as part of the PIM Workflow.
  • Category Columns – if your product belongs in more than one category, you can assign products to additional categories using the available category columns. Select as many category columns as you will need for your products.
  • PIM Status – if you are using the Kodaris PIM system to track the status of products, it can be helpful to have this column selected – especially if you would like to filter on complete products that are ready to be categorized.
  • PIM Category – if you are using the Kodaris PIM system, it can be helpful to have this column selected – especially if you would like to filter on various "buckets" of products (i.e. exterior products, roofing, lumber, etc.).
  • PIM Category Status – if you are using the Kodaris PIM system to track the status of categories, it can be helpful to have this column selected – especially if you would like to filter on products that are ready for categories to be updated, QA'd, or complete.

• Go to "File"
• Select "Export"

• Rename the file if needed, then click "Save" to export the file

Note: if you are exporting a large amount of data, it may take a small amount of time to complete the export. The file with download and save to your computer.

Add Product Categories to Exported Spreadsheet

The next step is to enter the category code for each product into the Categories columns. These category codes need to match the existing codes that you already have set up in the Portal.

Find Product Categories with Search

• To quickly find the category codes you need, navigate to "Categories" in the PIM Portal
• Stay on the "Search" tab

• Find for the product category in a few different ways:
  • Use the Search bar to search all fields
  • Filter a specific column by a search term
  • Sort a specific column alphabetically using the up or down arrows

Find Product Categories with Category Tree

You can also find a category code by using the Category Tree.

• Navigate to "Category Tree" in the PIM section of the Portal
• Scroll to find the name of the category you are looking for, then double click the name

• Highlight the Code, then either right-click or use your computer's quick keys to copy in order to paste into your spreadsheet

Updating the Product Categories

Now that you have your category codes, it is time to go through the exported sheet of products and update the products with the correct category code.

The best way to fill in the category code is by copying and pasting the exact category code from the PIM Portal as this will help reduce errors. If the category codes do not match what you have in the PIM Portal, the import will skip those products, the system will send an error, and the product will not be added to the desired category.

Enter the category code in the Category 1 column. If the product needs to appear in more than one category, use the additional category columns.

Once you have completed your updates, save the file as a .CSV file.

Note: every product should have at least one category code – or it should be in a primary category such as newProducts or do_not_display.

Example Spreadsheet for Product Import

Here you can see an example of the updated spreadsheet with product categories that is ready to be imported.

Note: The columns of name, pimCategoryStatus, pimStatus, and pimAttribute status columns are all considered product data, and not category assignment data. These columns will not update with a category assignment import, and will need to be imported by using the data tab import. The only columns that will update with the category assignment import are the category columns.

Importing Product Category Assignments

• Navigate to "Products" from the PIM section in the Portal
• Select the "Category Assignment" tab

• Select "File", then "Import"
• Choose the "Default Category Assignment Mapping" option
• Select the .CSV file you would like to import

The import function is quick - once you upload the selected file, the data in the file is created or updated. Please be sure that you select the correct file to import, and have your file prepared correctly.

Once you have imported your products with their assigned categories, updates or additions can be made at any time in the Portal.

Remember - the only data that will be updated with this import are the category columns.

Category Assignment Tips

You may have noticed that we recommended exporting the "Active" column. In order for products to be active on the commerce website, the products need to be marked as active in your ERP. This also applies to the Kodaris "Display" column – all products need to be set to "Yes" in the display column in order to be visible on the website.

If you do not want certain products to be seen on the website, we recommend updating the Primary Category Code column with "do_not_display". Any product you do not want to update for commerce use can be placed there. If you wish to use this category as mentioned, it will need to be created before importing your product sheet.

Note: if using the Primary Category Code, this column can only be cleared out or updated during import by using the "Data" tab; otherwise it has to be manually updated in the product grid, or by updating product details. Continue to the bottom of this help page for more information.

Importing PIM Category Status and Primary Category Code

If you are using the PIM Workflow and would like to update the PIM Category Status and Primary Category Code by import, this can be done with the same spreadsheet as above, but this would be a separate import and will need to be completed by using the import option Data tab.

Using the same Product spreadsheet you will be importing, you will only need the code, pimCategoryStatus column and the primaryCategoryCode column to reflect the data that you would like. If you have assigned products to a category in the spreadsheet, you will no longer need the product assigned to the primary category, and it can be left blank for the import.

• Export the spreadsheet as a .CSV file

• Navigate to “Products” from the PIM section in the Portal
• Select the “Data” tab

• Choose "File" > "Import" > "Default Product Mapping Update Only"
• Once you have selected the import type, you will be prompted to select the file that you would like to import – choose the file that has only the code, pimCategoryStatus, and primaryCategoryCode information, and once the file is imported, this product data will be updated.

Notes on Primary Category Code

As noted earlier, the Primary Category Code column should only be used for new products and the "do_not_display" category if they are being used as part of the PIM Workflow.

As you add categories to products, this column should be updated as well. You can either do this as part of the import process as noted above, or manually update on the Data, Category Assignment or Attribute Assignment tabs.