ShopSite Forums

Hello,

Is there a way to use thumbnail buttons in ordering options instead of a dropdown menu? Our customers have trouble with the dropdown, especially on mobile.

I'm also wondering what the difference is between ordering options and subproducts, and when one should be used in place of the other.

Thanks!

It is possible to create custom code to display images or colors as buttons rather than using pull down menus, but it isn't straightforward. You could hire one of our ShopSite certified designers to set that up. Here is an example of a site that is using a similar customized feature (they don't have it setup on all products)...click a size, then you will see the color options available for that size.
https://www.nursinghomeapparel.com/shop/product5262.html

Ordering Options and Subproducts can be used in the same way, or they can be used differently. As you have seen, ordering options only come in pull down menus within ShopSite. With subproducts, you can customize the template to display them however you want. Some built in ShopSite templates display subproducts as a pull down menu, but many display them with radio buttons, checkboxes, or in a table format. You could also more easily setup the image-as-a-button option with subproducts. However, with subproducts, there would only be one level of options (such as just color options). You wouldn't be able to easily or neatly setup color and size options. Two big benefits with ordering options are (1) reviews...if a product has subproducts, the reviews customers would write would be for the subproducts, not the parent product. (2) with ordering options you can setup cascading menus so that the options change based on the previous option selected. For example, if a customer selects "blue" you can have the next pull down menu only show the sizes where blue is available, instead of displaying all possible sizes, some of which blue might not be available or may be out of stock.