All product options not importing into WP listing

Hey @medcline,
Thanks for giving the plugin a try! It’s correct that the plugin is designed to bring over product data on the SKU level, but the plugin also supports an option type that isn’t used to build out SKUs (called modifiers). Modifiers are any choices that are attached to a product that don’t affect the way the physical product is stocked in the warehouse. So for example, Size would be an option associated with a SKU (or variant), but something like Primary Reason for Purchase would be considered a modifier.

It looks like the Primary Reason for Purchase and How you heard about Medcline choices are being recognized as variant options (the kind used to build out SKUs) rather than modifier options, the way they should be.

If you don’t have SKUs built for the size options already, could we have you try creating them in your BigCommerce store? This would be worth a try to refresh the data in our system get the Reason for Purchase and How you Heard about us options converted to modifiers.

Karen,

Thank you so much for the detailed and helpful reply! We are so excited about this plugin and hope to get it live as soon as we work out these issues.

Question: is there an easy way to change some of the options in my option sets from variants to modifiers? I found this article:

https://developer.bigcommerce.com/api-docs/catalog/products/modifier-options

I’m hoping there is a more simple way to do this than through API modification on the products listing. We are do not have internal capabilities to do this (hence why we’re anxious to start building out the front end of our site in WP)

Thanks again!

Glad to help! The developer documentation you’ve linked is the correct article–remaking the options as modifiers through the API would definitely work although I understand that may not be an option for you.

We may be able to convert the options through the UI though. It’s possible that remaking the product would cause it to save the choices as modifiers. Could we have you try recreating the options/option set/product to see if it comes through intact on WordPress?

Karen,

I made a new product with new options/sets. Didn’t seem to change anything.

https://medclinemd.com/products/wp-plugin-test-product/?variant_id=87

For some reason, it looks likes checkboxes (and I think freeform text boxes) get pulled in regardless of whether they are variants or modifiers.

I guess the next option is to try to find a developer to convert the options through the API? I don’t see a way to do it in the API.

Thanks again for the guidance.

Hi there,

Apologies for the late response. Checkboxes and text fields are commonly modifiers (meaning they aren’t used to build out SKUs), so it looks like both are being created correctly as modifiers through the control panel. Dropdowns on the other hand can be a modifier type, but are more often associated with variant options (used to build out SKUs)–I think that’s why your dropdown choices aren’t coming over. The system thinks they should be variant options because of the display type, and variant options need to be associated with SKUs to import to WP.

We have a couple of options:

• Soon, we’ll be rolling out a new BigCommerce UI for creating products that will make it much easier to control whether product choices are variants or modifiers. If you’re able to wait for this update, this should resolve the issue. I don’t have an exact ETA for when the new UI will be available across all stores, but it should be soon.
• For now, a developer could use the v3 API to create the product with the correct configuration of variants and modifiers. Links to documentation here:
  https://developer.bigcommerce.com/api-reference/catalog/catalog-api/products/createproduct
  https://developer.bigcommerce.com/api-reference/catalog/catalog-api/product-modifiers/createmodifier
  https://developer.bigcommerce.com/api-reference/catalog/catalog-api/product-variants/createvariant

Karen,

Thanks again for the reply. Our developer was able to figure out how to add the modifiers through the API. I am excited for the new UI for building products. Will we be notified of that change when it goes live, or do we just need to check it every so often?

On a different note, how can we access the WP “product details page”? We would like to change the aspect ratio of the photos in the gallery as well as the order that the items show up on mobile. For example, we would like the gallery to display before the product description, pricing, options, etc. on mobile like it is on our current BC product details page template. I realize this is a different topic. Shall I start a different thread? Thanks

Glad you were able to adjust the modifiers through the API! I’m not sure if there will be a dashboard announcement when the change is live in your store, but if you’re in the control panel frequently, you’ll definitely see it ??

For adjusting the WP product template, this customization guide is a good place to start:
https://developer.bigcommerce.com/bigcommerce-for-wordpress/extending-the-plugin/customization-guide

If you have any questions beyond that, let’s start a new thread. Thanks!

Karen,

So it turns out that we haven’t fully resolved the SKU-less options issue. Our developer send this message:

“I spoke with bigcommerce support as the dropdowns are not being displayed on the wordpress product page. Apparently dropdowns and rectangles (even as product modifiers) will not be imported into wordpress unless SKU’s are added.”

So it looks like we are back to the drawing board on this. Any other ideas?

Hey there @medcline,

From my testing, it appears you can’t create modifiers with dropdowns and have those options sync to WP.

I’ve escalated this issue to our product support engineering team. I’ll be sure to get back with you with our findings as soon as I have more information!

• This reply was modified 5 years, 10 months ago by Mikaela.

Thank you, mike. I hope they can move quickly on this. It’s the one things that I keeping us from going live.

Hey there @medcline.

After testing on our end, it appears that there is an issue with multiple choice modifiers syncing to WordPress. We’ve created an engineering ticket so our team can do some more digging. In the meantime, is it feasible for your team to create variants and use dummy SKUs to get these choices over into WordPress? It’s not a perfect solution, but that may be what you need to do in the interim.

• This reply was modified 5 years, 9 months ago by Mikaela.

@mikaelabc,
Unfortunately, we have multiple sizes of our product and 2-3 multiple choice questions that we need to ask that don’t affect SKU. We contemplated making dummy SKUs previously, however, the number grows exponentially with each size and question we ask and thus is not feasable.

I understand. One way to reduce the manual labor around this is making the fields required and using the Auto SKU generator as a possible workaround. Another path forward could be using the Text Field modifier and allowing your merchants to fill it in. Those should come over to WordPress. If there’s any movement on the engineering ticket I will be sure to follow up here in this thread.