Metafield or New Product Template? How to Choose in Shopify

Once you start using product metafields, this is where people get a little confused. When do you use a metafield, and when do you actually need a separate product template?

The easy rule

• The design stays the same, but the information changes from product to product? Use a metafield.
• The design of the page needs to change for a group of products? Use a separate product template.

When a metafield is the right choice

Let’s use Ipswich Cake Room again. For cake products, we use a metafield to show ingredient information. Every product has different ingredients, and some products have none at all. A cake topper doesn’t need an ingredients section. Neither does a spatula.

So instead of building a separate page design for every type of product, we use one product template. The Ingredients section only shows when a product has ingredient information in its metafield.

Same design. Different data. That’s exactly what metafields are for.

When you need a separate product template

Ipswich Cake Room has an ongoing offer on Colour Mill Food Colour Oil 20ml bottles: buy five, get a sixth free.

That offer only applies to those products. It would be confusing to put a promotional banner on every product page in the store.

So we duplicate the standard product template, add a banner to the new template explaining the offer, and assign that template only to the products in the promotion.

Now the banner shows where it’s relevant and nowhere else. Customers can clearly see which products are part of the offer. They don’t have to guess or hunt for the fine print, and they aren’t shown promotions that have nothing to do with the product in front of them.

This isn’t about making your store more complicated. It’s the opposite: keeping the store clear for the customer, and manageable for you behind the scenes.

Two questions to ask first

Before you create a new product template, ask yourself:

• Do I need to change the design of this product page? Create a separate product template.
• Or do I just need to show different information on it? Start with a metafield.

Your action for this week

Look through your product range and find one group of products that needs to be displayed differently from the rest. Decide whether the difference is in the information or in the design, and you’ll know which option to use.

Want a hand?

Still unsure? Tell me what you’re trying to achieve and I’ll point you in the right direction. If you’d like to learn the whole build properly, step by step, that’s what From Stuck to Selling is for.