(00:02)
Kal:
“Hello! Are you looking for help on how to enter products into your BigCommerce store? I’ll show you three different ways to do it in this video. Before we get started, my name is Kal. I’m a developer, store owner, and I run the Ecommerce Growth Facebook community for people like you and me.
I post new e-commerce videos on YouTube every week, so if you find this one useful, please subscribe and hit the bell icon for more!”
(00:34)
Kal:
“Alright, let’s jump over to my screen, and I’m going to show you three different ways to do this.”
Method 1: Manual Entry
(00:45)
Kal:
“First, the manual way. Log in to your BigCommerce store at login.bigcommerce.com. If you don’t have a store, use the link below to set up a trial. Once logged in, go to Products and click Add. This will take you to a product entry screen.”
(01:05)
Kal:
“This is the screen where you’ll enter the product details. The fields with a little red star are mandatory, like the product name. You don’t have to fill in everything right away. For example, I’m going to skip SKU, leave it as ‘Physical,’ unless it’s a digital download.”
(01:37)
Kal:
“Put in the price, category, and weight—these are all required. You don’t need a description or image right away, but I recommend adding them later.”
(02:36)
Kal:
“For images, I recommend using Canva for editing. It’s free, and the paid version has some extra nice features. Create a 1000×1000 or 2000×2000 image for better quality. Once you have it, drag it into BigCommerce, and it’ll upload.”
(03:12)
Kal:
“Now that we’ve met the minimum requirements, click Save. You’ll see a confirmation that the product was saved, and you can click on a link to view it on the storefront. Right now, it’ll just have a title, price, and image.”
(03:42)
Kal:
“That’s the basic entry, but you’ll want to add more details. You can come back later to fill in additional information like brand, multiple categories, descriptions, and additional images.”
Working with Images
(04:18)
Kal:
“You can upload multiple images for a product. Drag and drop the images, and you can reorder them. The order you choose here is the order they’ll appear on the product page.”
(04:49)
Kal:
“You can also set a thumbnail image, which will show up on category pages, while keeping a different image as the main one on the product page. This is useful when you want a uniform look for category pages, but show a lifestyle image when people visit the product page.”
Variants & Customizations
(08:11)
Kal:
“Let’s talk about variants. Variants are things like different sizes or colors for a product. To add variants, click Add Variant. Let’s say you have three sizes: Small, Medium, and Large. You can add these as rectangle choices. Each variant will get its own SKU and price.”
(09:23)
Kal:
“You can also track inventory for each variant. For example, you might have 50 units of Small and Medium, but only 40 units of Large. You can manage this at a variant level, and BigCommerce will automatically update your stock when orders come in.”
(10:32)
Kal:
“There are several types of variant options: radio buttons, dropdowns, swatches, and rectangle lists. Swatches allow you to use colors or patterns, which you can upload as images.”
(11:02)
Kal:
“Customizations are similar to variants, but they don’t create a new SKU for each option. You’re not tracking inventory; you’re just modifying the base product. For example, you could add a checkbox for an upgrade, or a text field for a gift message.”
(12:09)
Kal:
“There’s even a ‘Pick List’ option, where you can offer to add another product to the cart with the main item. For example, with a Coke, you can offer a Snickers bar.”
Additional Settings
(14:33)
Kal:
“You can add search keywords to help people find your product if they misspell something. You can also control the sort order to decide how products show up on the front end, but this only affects the featured sort.”
(15:46)
Kal:
“Use custom fields for things like product specifications. For example, you could add ‘USB Type: C’ as a custom field, and this would show up on the product page.”
(16:58)
Kal:
“You can also add related products. By default, BigCommerce will suggest related products, but you can manually specify them if you want.”
(17:30)
Kal:
“Dimensions and weight are important if you’re using real-time shipping calculators like USPS or UPS. You need to fill these in for every product. If you use site-wide shipping rules, don’t specify product-specific shipping costs unless necessary.”
(18:01)
Kal:
“Gift wrapping options are also available. If you ship internationally, fill in the customs information. Finally, don’t forget about SEO fields—this is where you can optimize your product title, URL, and meta description.”
Method 2: Duplicating a Product
(19:36)
Kal:
“Now for the second method: duplicating an existing product. Let’s say you have several similar products. Instead of creating each one from scratch, go to Products > View Products, find the product you want to copy, and click Duplicate.”
(19:50)
Kal:
“Once duplicated, change the product title, update the description and images, and you’re done. This is especially helpful when entering similar items like t-shirts with different designs.”
Method 3: Bulk Editing with CSV
(20:02)
Kal:
“The third method is a bit more advanced, but it’s a big time-saver if you have lots of products to add. First, manually enter one product, then go to Export and choose Bulk Edit. Export your products as a CSV file.”
(21:30)
Kal:
“Open the CSV in Google Sheets or Excel. You’ll see all the product details. Use this as a template to add new products by copying and pasting values like price, categories, and descriptions.”
(24:12)
Kal:
“When you’re done, download the CSV and go back to BigCommerce. This time, go to Import and upload the CSV. The products with existing IDs will be updated, and the new products will be added.”
(28:55)
Kal:
“Once imported, if you didn’t include images in the CSV, you’ll need to manually add them afterward by editing each product and uploading the images.”
Conclusion
(29:20)
Kal:
“So, those are three ways to add products in BigCommerce: manual entry, duplicating a product, and bulk editing via CSV. If you found this helpful, please hit the like button. Join our community of store owners at join.ecommercegrowth.com, and if you’re looking for a dev team, reach out to us at Epic Design Labs. Thanks for watching!”
