Option Groups can be used if you wish to present products with multiple options in your store. Therefore, a store item can be associated with one or more option groups, where each Option Group contains two or more options for the user to choose from.
For example, the item “Toast” can have an option group as “Choose your bread” where the options can be “White bread” and “Brown bread”. Additionally, options can add value to the main item and therefore can have an associated price.
An option can also be considered as a store item where an optional price can be configured. Option groups can be used for upselling, promotions, and for ingredients or type selection.
On This Page
- Add Option Groups
- Add Option Groups via Excel
- Types of Option Groups Supported by Gonnaorder
- Add Options to an Option Group
- Edit Option Groups or Options
- Mark Options as Preselected
- Reorder Option Groups
- Reorder Options
- Delete Option Groups or Options
Add Option Groups
Option groups are an excellent way of differentiating your products or adding value to store items. In the case of product differentiation, you can use options to sell the same product differentiated by the sizes and ingredients among other things. And about adding value, you can choose to package your product with additional items that usually go along with the specified item and assign a price to each of the additional items.
To add an Option Group to an item, click on the name of the category to which that item belongs and pick it from the list.
Click Edit on the name of that store item in which you want to Option Group to view and edit its details.
On the item details page, scroll down to the Option Groups section and click Add Option Group. At this point, you should have chosen a name for the option group.
The name of the option group may depend on the store item to which you are adding options, but it should be something people can easily identify and understand.
An option group may also have a description, usually a few words or short phrases. The description is not displayed anywhere on the customer menu but is shown in parenthesis beside the group name on the selection dropdown. Option group descriptions are usually helpful if you have more than one group sharing the same name. For example, if you have two coffee option groups where one is white, and the other one is black (or iced and hot).
Other than the name and description, you also need to choose how customers select the provided options by choosing the appropriate option group type.
Add Option Groups via Excel
You can also add the option to Option groups via excel. To add the options, ensure the Option Groups name is created.To upload options under these, click Update Catalog Options via Excel.
Download the excel sheet that contains template to fill the columns with data.
Once you have filled in your options catalog, the next step will be to upload it to the store for the items to appear in the menu. We have populated the catalog with several categories and products for the example case. To upload the new catalog, you select the file you just edited by clicking on the Choose File button, as shown below.
GonnaOrder will read your catalog file and present the categories and store items the same way they appear in your store. This step allows you to verify that you have the correct information in the catalog. Once the details are correct, click on the Accept and Import Catalog to save your products.
Types of Option Groups Supported by Gonnaorder
Exactly 1 Option Must Be Selected
When you choose this option group type, then the user sees an interface with your options from which it is mandatory to select one option and not more.
At Most One Option Should Be Selected
This means a customer can either choose one or none of the options provided. The difference with the first option group type is that in the first case, the user must select one option while in the second they can opt for none.
Any Number of Options Can Be Selected
When you choose this setting for your option group type, a customer can choose none, one, or more of the options provided therein. This is a good option when you have options that can go together and customers can choose without restrictions. Further, for this option, you can choose to allow customers to add more than one instance of every optional product.
Custom Selection
This option allows you to choose a custom number between 0 and 10 (inclusive) for both the minimum and the maximum number of options a user can choose. Further, a user can choose the Any option for the maximum number to remove the upper bound for the options. When any option is selected to represent the maximum, a customer can choose as many options as there are in that option group.
You can allow a customer to add more than one item of an optional product to their order. Furthermore, when the minimum and maximum number of options a customer can choose are set, GonnaOrder will restrict users to these limits. Therefore, no customer should select more than three options or select none. The limits apply to the total number of items selected regardless of whether a customer chooses multiple selections of one product or picks one of each type.
Even though we have used this option group to explain all the types, you may use a single group with just any type. For instance, it is clear that a customer can choose none, one, or any number of ingredients from the breakfast components. Therefore, the Any number of options is more befitting for this case.
After you select the desired type of option group, then click Save for the changes to take effect in your store.
Add Options to an Option Group
An option group must have options for it to live up to the name. Options are usually products that you want to bundle together for a specific reason or purpose. For instance, options can be items that can add value to the main store product. They can be items you want to offer to customers for free.
To add an option to the option group you previously created, scroll down to Option Groups in the item details page and click Add Option to the right of the option group name.
On the option’s details page, provide a name for the new option. Other than the name, you can add a short description and a price. You can then choose one of three options to save your option:
Save: save the option and go back to the main item.
Save & Continue: save the option and continue editing its details.
Save & Add New: to save the option and add a new one.
The different ways to save an option helps you add as many options/details to your store with a few clicks.
Options Can Have Negative Prices
The price of an option can either be positive or negative. While positive prices increase the value of the order, negative prices decrease the order value. Essentially, negative prices can be used with options that customers can exclude from their orders. For example, you can have an option Without bacon, or Do not include mushrooms with negative prices.
To add a negative price to an option, add the minus sign (–) before the whole number part of the price.
Every option has two important settings:
- Visible: This defines the visibility of the option in the customer menu. Every option will be visible and customers can view and add it to their order by default. When the visibility is disabled, the option will remain available under the parent option group, but will not be displayed to customers on the order page.
- Preselected: This setting is disabled for all new options and no option will be selected when the order page loads. Therefore, customers will have to independently decide which option to choose. You can enable this setting for any option in an option group to have it selected when the order page loads. This may encourage customers to go with the selected option instead of picking others. This applies to all types of option groups and means that you can also have multiple options preselected depending on the type of option group you have chosen. Find a more detailed explanation under the preselected options section and remember to save the changes when done.
You can add more options to your option group using the same process. The short description and price fields are optional. You can have options without prices especially if you would like to offer your customers free gifts. For the example case, all the options used have a price but no short description.
Edit Option Groups or Options
You may from time to time choose to edit either option groups or the options included therein. Given that option groups are associated with individual items, you will need to know which store item has an associated option group and then decide what you need to change.
To edit options or option groups, scroll down to the Option Groups section in the item details page and click Edit on that option or option group you want to edit.
For the case of an option group, you can change its name, option group type, add/edit options, or add translations. You can change the name of an option, update the option’s short description, update the price, change the visibility of the option, enable stock control or add translations. Essentially, you can update every field you filled when creating an option or option group. See the images from the Add Option Groups and Add Options to Option Group to see all the details you can update.
Mark Options as Preselected
Preselected options can be a good way to suggest to a customer the best option to take with a given item. And by the best, it could be what many people would choose or that which adds significant value to the price of the main product. Having preselected options in option groups may mean fewer clicks for most of the customers and hence a better customer experience.
This section will show you how the customer will see your option groups when there are preselected options.
Exactly One Option Must Be Selected
When you choose this to be your option group type, and as we previously stated, the customer should be reminded that they must select one option. However, with preselected options, the product page will appear with preselected options already marked and thus the error message will not be displayed to the user. See the images below.
Any Number of Options Can Be Selected
Any number of options can be selected type of option group allows the user to select between zero (zero included – meaning none) and the maximum number of options in the option group. The customer may therefore submit the order without choosing any option. This type of option selection can be useful when you want the customer to choose ingredients that should or should not be included in their product. See how preselected options appear on the customer menu as presented in the images below. In the second image, the customer must deselect what they don’t want to be included in their order.
At Most One Option Can Be Selected
This type of option group limits your customer to either select one option or none. If you do not choose a pre-selected option, then the customer may be tempted to submit the order without adding any option. And if these options had associated prices, then you would be losing value as a store. Adding preselected options may encourage the customer to submit the order with the option selected thus increasing the order value.
Custom Selection
Option groups that allow custom selection are a bit different from the rest in that they give you more flexibility in deciding how customers choose the available options. Further, they allow you to create custom rules for option selection.
If you knew some of the options customers ask for when buying a particular item, then you might as well use these options for a custom selection. Say, for instance, that customers have been requesting to get a cheese burger but without tomatoes, without fresh lettuce leaves, or without both for personal reasons. In that case, it would be appropriate to add an option group for these additional requirements to the cheese burger. This is one of the many logical scenarios where custom selection is applicable and we hope you will be imaginative enough with your store. For the example case, we have three custom options and we have set the custom rule to say that a customer can either select none or one of the options available.
Reorder Option Groups
Option groups appear on the customer menu in the same order they appear in your store dashboard. However, this order is not permanent and you can change it at any time.
To rearrange option groups in an item, head over to its detail page and scroll to the option groups section. We will assume that you have at least two option groups in your store. And if that is the case, you will see directional arrows to the right of the name of every option group saved in your store. Using these arrows, you can move an option group either up or down.
Click on the downward pointing arrow on the first option group to move it below the second group.
After the above operation, the customer interface will change and now the Pizza dough type group will appear before the ingredients. As we mentioned before, the order of option groups in your store may influence which options the customers choose. Therefore, it is advisable to switch the order of the option groups from time to time. Also, always ensure your option groups have descriptive names and a reasonable number of options.
Reorder Options
Like with option groups, you can change the order in which your options appear on the customer menu. Changing the order of items allows you to experiment and understand how the order affects customers’ choices. For example, you may want to change the order of options listed under an item if they are more than four.
To change the order of options, go to the specific store items under which they are listed and find the option groups section. Find the respective option group in which the options you would like to rearrange are listed and use the up and down directional arrows to move items higher or lower in the group. The new order will be used when customers view the item on the menu.
Delete Option Groups or Options
There probably will be a time when you no longer need to have an option group or an option for a certain store item. Say, you no longer have the capacity to offer the options or you no longer wish to offer options as gifts. Then, you would have to permanently delete the group or option in question.
To delete options or option groups, find the item with which the option group or option is associated and click to edit. Option groups and options are part of an item’s details page.
For this example case, we will delete one of the options in an option group.
Scroll down to to the Option Groups section and choose the option you want to delete. Click on the Edit icon next to the name of the group or option to load its details page.
On the details page, click Delete and the click Ok to confirm that you actually want to discard the option. Notice that the process described here applies to both options and options groups. However, you will need to delete all options listed under an option group before removing it.
