Find out how to automate your shopping list area & button to create more product catalogs in less time.
Table of contents:
How to add shopping areas and buttons
Adding a shopping list to your product catalogs was the first step in showcasing your items efficiently and offering a smooth shopping experience for your customers.
Go a step further with this automation, which allows you to do more work in less time. Forget about manually introducing every detail for each product. You can now upload all the product information as the first step, map out the product details once, and apply them to every shopping option with a simple drag and drop.
How to set up the CSV for your shopping area and button
Through these shopping areas and buttons, you can display more information about your products, while also allowing your customers to select the desired item by adding it to the built-in list.
You can add all the information in a Google Spreadsheet, Microsoft Excel, Pages or in a similar program, and create your CSV file.
Before moving on to uploading it in Flipsnack, you need to make sure the file includes all the information you want to display in the catalog. Present the product title, description, (discount) price, as well as up to three images.
Warning: To add images, you can upload the files to a web server, FTP, or hosting service that allows images to be stored and retrieved, and then copy the direct URL of that image and paste it in the image column.
Make sure to add the following column headers to your Google Spreadsheet:
-
Title
-
Description
-
Product ID
-
Price
-
Discount Price
-
Product Images
If you don’t want to display the discounted price or other types of information in your shopping options, you can simply omit them from the CSV file.
However, you can check out more information about CSV files at our help center or contact our support team.
How to import your Shopping list automation CSV
On the main dashboard, go to Automation on the left-hand side of your screen and click on Add new data set. From here on, connect your data to Flipsnack either by uploading a CSV file from your computer or by using Google Sheets.
At this point after import, click on the button next to the trash, in the right corner to identify the four types of information from the spreadsheet. This step is required in order to have all the fields appear when editing your flipbook using the CSV. Using the dropdown, you can select the corresponding data for each type, like in the example below.
Then, return to My flipbooks and edit the product catalog with the automated shopping areas and buttons.
How to add shopping areas and buttons to automate the process
Step 1
Add a shopping area or a shopping button to your catalog, like you normally would, from the Interact section. Check out in-depth details about this part of your shopping list process.
Step 2
Map out your product details once and then simply drag and drop each item over the shopping area to create the interactive catalog.
Click on the area you just added.
In the top right corner, there’s a button for connecting your feed. A pop-up window will appear with multiple product details.
Select the details you want to connect with the information from the CSV.
Warning: Only after you select the option for the first picture, will you unlock the second one automatically.
Step 3
Go back to the Automation section to drag and drop a product over a specific shopping option. The corresponding details will be automatically applied to that field. Make sure to check the preview of the catalog to see the product details you added.
Tip: you can use the search bar for products when you have a big amount of products in your CSV. Simply search using the product title or description between quotation marks. For example "cutting boards".
Step 4
To duplicate an automated shopping area, use the CTRL+D command, and it will automatically generate an extra field. To move that shopping area onto a different page, simply copy and paste it wherever you want.
Here is what the preview would look like for each automated shopping option, with the mention that the automation process is the same for each of them:
If you still have any other questions, feel free to contact us via live chat.