Categories not Collections

[AntiqueImagery]

I am fairly new to zazzle but not new to ecommerce or UI design. First off I see that it can take 24 hrs for products to list. I can live with that even if I prefer instant gratification. Second, Collections are a pain. The UI has too many restrictions, too slow to load and too confusing. So I now am in favor of Categories. I prefer that visitors see everything I offer and if they don't want to scroll, they can see my categories which are specific to the genre of the product. If I have too many items up, I can always create a second store but would rather not. So I deleted Collections from my nav bar. One less confusing choice for the customer to figure out.

Simplicity in navigation is always better.

Cheers

[Barbara]

I've had loads of sales where a customer obviously came to one of my products via Zazzle's marketplace search and then proceeded to buy the item and then another product with the same design because they saw it in the attached collection. You may miss out be not having collections.

Different designers have different ways of sorting out categories vs. collections. My own method is to use categories mostly in the realm of When, Where, and for Whom the products are suitable. Not always. There are some outliers. Collections are usually design-centric so that a customer can see where else the design is that first attracted them. But this is my way. Other people have different ways, and much of it depends on how wide or narrow the focus.

(This reminds me that I have some collections in bad need of sorting out and sprucing up.)

Colorwash's Home

[AntiqueImagery]

Thanks! I'll go ahead and figure out what makes Collections tick. My problems with it may be the Chrome MacOS browser update. For my blog, Categories work better but I can see how for Zazzle and exterior SEO the Collection is preferable.

[DancingPelican · Accepted solution]

The majority of customers find our products either in a marketplace search on Zazzle or an internet search where our titles, tags and descriptions have worked well. They do not often come to our storefront to see all the categories we have setup in our stores. If you want customers to find matching/coordinating items you have created, using collections is best for that. Categories are a great way to keep your store organized, both for yourself to see what you have designed, and for customers who happen to visit your store to assist them in finding things there.

[AntiqueImagery]

Thanks! Seems Collections is my next task. While Categories works best for my business blog, Collections certainly is the SEO best option. Now to figure out what I need to do with both. 

[AntiqueImagery]

Collections it is.  But... how do I delete collections I created for future use but have not yet loaded products? Or do I somehow hide them from the masses? I'm busy opening a new Redbubble shop (closed my old one) and fiddling with my TeePublic shop. Step by step instructions appreciated. Hint.

[DancingPelican]

To delete a collection, go to the collections tab in the backend of your store. Open a collection you wish to delete. In the lower left corner  of the opened collection, you will see a trash can symbol. Click on that to delete your collection.

[AntiqueImagery]

and the tech people at Zazzle have worked out the collection problems. Today I was able to delete unused collections. I wonder if Zazzle uses amazon web services? AWS has had a very bad June so far. Locally our hospital lost access for two hours. Thanks again for the advice. 

[DancingPelican]

You're very welcome! Good luck!

[chefcateringbiz]

I played around with collections for a while, but even with whittled-down categories I run out of room for, say, baking from-the-kitchen-of stickers. And I have a million categories in my 2 best stores already, if I did collections categories it would be 4 million, what's the point?

[Barbara]

@chefcateringbiz: It's likely you repeated your categories in your collections or possibly vice versa. After looking at it some years back, I switched the majority of categories to being product-oriented and collections to design-oriented. Result? Just 13 categories (though I could use a few more) and 219 collections (which are still growing). What I figure is that categories are for us since, according to Zazzle, customers aren't known to seek out stores where they'd see our categories. Collections, on the other hand, are likely to be seen by most customers once they land on one of our product pages. We can gain sales through them, though we can also lose sales because of there being "other products" above our collection.

Ultimately, I vote for collections being the better asset. For me, anyway.

Colorwash's Home

[AntiqueImagery]

I'm with you on this now. Categories for products, which follows the Z system. Collections for genre. In Z search, category terms yield massive results while collection terms are more specific to a point. Adding simple boolean phrasing helps: "thin+blue+line" "coffee+mug " https://www.zazzle.com/s/%22thin+blue+line%22+%22coffee+mug%22

Note that the visible search phrase won't show the boolean modifiers. Rather it looks like this after the search is returned: "thin blue line" "coffee mug"

[Barbara]

We're best off being clever with our titles and tags. In other words, if we think a customer will search on "thin blue line," then we ought to use it as a phrase in our tags. The person will often add mug or pillow or whatever to their search.

Colorwash's Home

[AntiqueImagery]

True. Unfortunately Z search looks at both phrases and distinct words. That's when the simple boolean modifiers help.

[Barbara]

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@AntiqueImagery wrote:

True. Unfortunately Z search looks at both phrases and distinct words. That's when the simple boolean modifiers help.

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They might help us, but not the customers, most of whom don't use such modifiers. Some here have asked for them, but I don't think Zazzle is likely to go back to the "old ways." Others have asked, me included, for old-fashioned drop-downs that begin with broad categories with fly-outs that dig down increasingly to finer and finer categories. I love that some retailers are still doing this because it makes it so much easier to find precisely what's wanted. However, it doesn't make for a pretty home page. Sigh.

Colorwash's Home

[AntiqueImagery]

my comments are for sellers. Buyers are on their own, unfortunately. Until and unless Z staff get with the program and add advanced search

[Barbara]

Considering how search works can help the designers shape the words they use and even the images they create, but after that, as in all businesses, the focus has to be on the customer without whom a business will fail. Watching Zazzle over the years, you can see this is also their focus. They know their demographic, and I'm not in it, so some of the things they do are a mystery to me, search being one of them.

Colorwash's Home

[AntiqueImagery]

your last sentence is why I began to delve into the backend working of Zazzle search. i can't help it. It's my librarian genetics. 

[PetalsPalette]

I've learned so much from you here. Such valuable insights. Thank you!

I am still trying to figure out this Category vs Collection thing. I think it used to be that we could create sub-collections under a specific Collection? Now this option is gone? Or maybe I missed something? I would love to have that option. 

Petals Palette | Brand Avenue

[Barbara]

I don't remember there ever being sub-collections inside collections. Has your memory maybe been cross-pollinated by Pinterest where they had (have?) sub-sections for boards?

Colorwash's Home

[PetalsPalette]

Could be a confusion caused by Zazzle's Category then. I really dislike Pinterest's UI. They make it really hard to create the sub sections. So many clicks to achieve the feat. But it'll be great if Zazzle has sub-collection.

[Barbara]

I like Pinterest, but after trying subs within a board, I quickly started mistrusting them because I doubted anything at a lower level within a board would get eyes-on as quickly as I'd like. I'd suspect the same situation if it were to be established in collections.

Colorwash's Home

[PetalsPalette]

That's a good point. That's a real possibility we get less traffic for subs. 

[igiftcenter]

Also note: if I remember correctly that for every category you create and if you are somehow counting on customers visiting your store to peruse your categories.... for every category you create you should make sure you create an associated icon otherwise your category will not be displayed for customers to see

[Barbara]

@igiftcenter: By "icon," are you referring to the images we create for each category? Just checking only because I always think of an icon as tiny spot images and I don't want to miss something else that might be vital.

Colorwash's Home

[igiftcenter]

Yes sorry, category thumbnail images may be a better word for it.  So yes images we create that represent a category

[PetalsPalette]

Thanks for sharing. That's a valuable tip! I'll have to make sure to have it for my category.

[Mural_Maker]

I have a question regarding categories, I'm trying to find out how to get a mug to show up in my category instead of the actual image. My category for mugs just show the image that is on the mug, not the actual mug itself so it looks very unprofessional. I tried to download a mockup and reupload it but you can't do that apparently, won't let you re upload it to zazzle, I'm sure I'm missing something simple yet can't find out what, any help is appreciated.