Managing products in your eCommerce store can be a daunting task, especially when you’re taking on a new line, or you need to make changes to multiple products. Editing them one by one in the backend of the store can be time-consuming, but using a file to build add, or edit items can be a huge timesaver!
Uploading products in bulk for BigCommerce involves preparing a properly formatted CSV (Comma Separated Values) file, containing all the necessary product information such as titles, descriptions, prices, SKU numbers, etc.
Adding New Products in Bulk to Your BigCommerce Store
The easiest way to add a bunch of new products at once to your BigCommerce store is to use a file upload. Your Store Wizards offers a free product import tool that simplifies the process and is somewhat easier to use than the import tool in your store’s backend.
To add new products using our free tool, you will first need to create an account at Your Store Tools by clicking here. Yes, our BigCommerce tools are free for store owners to use!
Once you set up a Your Store Tools account, select the Import Products tool:
You should have your CSV file ready to upload with all your relevant product information. When creating your CSV file, there are only four required fields (column headings):
- Product Id (which since you’re uploading new products, should be left blank)
- Product Name
- Category (you can enter the category ids for each product, or you can leave this blank, but either way it must be an included header. If adding products to multiple categories, separate each number by a comma.)
- Type (enter Physical or Digital depending on the product type you’re adding)
Examples of other fields you can have in your CSV file include description, price, SKU, UPC, shipping weight, meta description, brand name, and more. When using our tool, don’t worry about column heading names, as once you select your file to import, our tool will help you map the columns to the appropriate field in BigCommerce:
Once your fields are mapped, you can choose to be notified via email when your import is complete, or just monitor its progress from your dashboard!
Now that you have imported your new items into your BigCommerce store, you can review them and add any additional information, make changes, add images, etc. by simply going to Products > View.
For more detailed instructions on how to use our free product import tool for BigCommerce, click here.
Editing Existing Products in Bulk to Your BigCommerce Store
There are times when you will want to edit a bunch of existing products in bulk such as when a manufacturer changes packaging size, UPC numbers have changed, or when prices need to be updated. This can also be accomplished via a file upload.
Since these items already exist in your store, the simplest way to begin is to use our Product Export tool to download your store’s products. Simply click on Export Products and then select the criteria for the products you want to download:
Unlike the BigCommerce built-in product export that exports all products in your store, our product export allows you to filter which products you want to export based on criteria such as brand, category, SKU, availability, and more. This makes managing them offline much easier!
Once that criteria is set, in the next step you can choose exactly what product data you want to export. This is also something you can’t do with the built-in BigCommerce export! This allows you to choose only the data you’re updating, so if you’re just updating pricing and UPC codes, you can select those as the columns to export.
Just like when creating new products with an upload, keep in mind that the following data is required every time you import into BigCommerce:
- Product Id (which since you’re uploading new products, should be left blank)
- Product Name
- Category (you can enter the category ids for each product, or you can leave this blank, but either way it must be an included header. If adding products to multiple categories, separate each number by a comma.)
So make sure you choose those four fields, in addition to any others, with your export.
For more detailed instructions on how to use our free product export tool for BigCommerce, click here.
Once you export your products and make the edits, save your CSV file and then head over to our Import Product tool and select your import file:
Map all the columns in your file with the appropriate fields in BigCommerce, then continue through the steps until your file has successfully been uploaded and your products updated.
Utilizing files to generate new products or update existing ones within your BigCommerce store streamlines these tasks, significantly reducing the time it would take to perform each action individually through the store’s backend.
If you like our product import tool, you’ll love the other tools we have available for free as part of the Your Store Tools suite. Be sure to check out all that we offer and be sure to let other store owners know about these free tools for BigCommerce!
Watch Our Video to See How to Upload New Items to BigCommerce
Scott Sanfilippo began his eCommerce journey in 1994 by co-founding one of the Internet’s first online retailers, TheFerretStore.com, which was acquired by PetCo in 2006. In 2001, he co-founded the eCommerce design and marketing firm Solid Cactus, which was acquired by web.com in 2009. Today, Scott is the General Manager of Your Store Wizards and lives in Delray Beach, FL. Scott can be contacted at scott@yourstorewizards.com.