Setting Up the Default Rules in Visual Category Merchandising

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Introduction of Default Rules

Default Rules are a set of category-specific promotion rules that remain active all the time. The only exception to this is the duration when there is a campaign with a set of rules for the same category. In this case, the campaign rules are applied.

Here, a rule is an instruction to boost (or deboost)  a set of products matching specific attribute key-value pairs (e.g. brand, color, size, etc.) and/or a set of pinned products to appear at the top of a category page.

Adding Default Boosting Rules

• Under Visual Merchandising → Default Rules & Facets, click on the Manage Rules & Facets button to start a new window for creating boosting rules.
• You will see a Category selection popup. This has been introduced to lock the categories that you wish to merchandise. Select the categories that you want to merchandise and click on Proceed. (Read more about Category Locking feature here)
• Choose a Category from the category drop down to start creating rules for it. Once you have selected a category, you should see the products of that category on the right.
  

• From the left side panel, within Default Boosting Rules, click on the + button to add a new rule.

• Here, you can specify one or more product attribute conditions to choose a set of products to promote or demote. The interface also allows you to create individual groups (the Add Group button) of such conditions and then specify AND or OR conditions between these individual groups.
• Once these conditions on product attributes are specified, use the slider to assign a boosting score or enter a score manually.
• To Boost, use a score (an integer value) between 1 and 999 where 999 is the highest boosting score (i.e. maximum promotion).
• To Deboost, use a score (an integer value) between -1 and -999, where -999 is the maximum deboosting score (i.e. maximum demotion).
• When a product satisfies all the conditions, the score specified here, along with a self-learning score is used for promoting/demoting a product on the category page. 

Copying Rule to Other Categories

• Once a boosting rule is created, you can copy the rule to other categories by clicking on the Copy Rule icon
• You can copy the same rule to All Categories or to Specific Categories that you had locked while selecting categories to merchandise (Learn more about locking categories).

Pinning Hero Products

• If you like to show a few selected products at the top of a category page (i.e. first products in the product listing), the VM tool allows you to "pin them to the top". Simply hover your mouse on a respective product and click on the "pin" icon. This will move the “pinned” products at the top of the page.
  
• It is important to note that the pinned products take the first few spots on the respective category page. The other products (i.e. not pinned) are then organized as per the other applicable boosting scores and/or their self-learning score as computed by the Klevu search engine.
• You can also bulk pin products by selecting them using the product selector and using the PIN SELECTED option under ACTIONS.  
  
• To unpin a product, simply hover over the already pinned product and click on the pin icon to unpin the product.

• Additionally, you can pin more products and manage the ones already pinned from the “Manage Pinning” section. 

Managing Pinned Products

• Manage your pinned products by clicking on the Manage Pinning menu from the left side panel to pin more or manage existing pinned products.
  
• In the Manage Pinning section, you can see two tabs.
  • Pin products- From here, you can pin products either by viewing all products or by searching for specific products.
    
    • From this tab, you can:
      • Pin more products by selecting them
      • Search & pin products
      • Unpin already pinned products
  • Order Products- From here, you can view and manage already pinned products.
    
    • From this tab, you can:
      • Drag & drop existing pinned products in the desired order
      • Reorder products using the number re-ordering input
      • Unpin products individually or by selecting multiple pinned products
      • Find Out-of-Stock or deleted products (at the end of the list)
      • Perform the following actions by clicking on three dots
        • Unpin All Pinned products
        • Unpin All Search results
        • Unpin Selected products
        • Unpin Out of Stock
        • Unpin Disabled/Deleted products
        • Move products to the Top or Bottom by selecting multiple products

• Once you have made the changes, you can preview those changes by selecting the APPLY button.

• If you want to pin multiple products in single click, you can use the Bulk Pinning option (see below).

Bulk Pinning

• From Manage Pinning section, choose Bulk Pinning menu to pin multiple products at once. This will open an editor.
• You can pin products in bulk by selecting SKU(s) or Klevu Product ID(s) in the editor screen.
• Ensure that each SKU or Product ID is entered on a new line.
• Clicking on Pin Products will validate all the entered SKUs/ Product IDs and pin (append) them after any existing pinned products. Note that the pinning order will follow the order as they have been entered.
• You will also be able to see how many products were successfully pinned, and any other product that were either skipped or not found with a downloadable report.

Excluding Products

• To exclude a product from the category page, from the preview product grid, hover over a card and click on the Exclude icon. The product will disappear from the current product listing.

• You can also exclude multiple products using the product selector and choosing EXCLUDE SELECTED from the ACTIONS menu.

• To include such a product back into the product listing, visit the Manage Exclusions section in left side panel to include it back.

Managing Excluded Products

• Click on the Manage Exclusions section from the left side panel to exclude more or manage existing excluded products.
  

• In the Manage Exclusion section, you can see two tabs.

  • Exclude Products - From this tab, you can:

    • Exclude more products by selecting them

    • Search & Exclude Products

    • Include already excluded products

  • Include Products - From this tab, you can:

    • Include products individually or select multiple excluded products to include.

      • By clicking on the three dots, you can perform the following actions:

        • Include All Excluded products

        • Include All Search results

        • Include Selected Products

        • Remove Out of Stock products

        • Remove Disabled/Deleted products

• After making all the necessary changes, preview them by selecting the APPLY button.

• You can exclude products in bulk using the Bulk Exclude functionality by entering SKU(s) or Klevu Product ID(s) similar to Bulk Pinning.

Publishing Boosting Rules

• Once you have created boosting rules and pinned the needed products, you can click on the Save & Publish button to see the changes in effect on the category pages on your store.

• Please note that it may take up to 20 mins to reflect the changes on your store front.

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→ Also see, Setting Up the Scheduled Campaigns in Visual Category Merchandising