Blog posts offer many opportunities for online retailers to promote current promotions, connect with their audience and highlight products. Developers can bring value to clients’ stores by adding functionality to articles pages and improving the user experience of blog subscribers.
Since its inception, blogging has been a popular content marketing tool. Hubspot recently found that 55% of marketers consider blog content to be their top priority. A Social Media Examiner survey found that 58% of marketers believe that original written content is more important than visuals or videos.
Developers can increase conversion rates by improving the appearance of article pages while customizing or building themes. It’s possible to make Shopify blog posts more user-friendly and unlock the potential for success by using Liquid.
“Developers can increase conversion rates by improving the appearance and feel of articles pages when creating or customizing themes.”
This article will show you how to personalize blog articles pages. I’ll be demonstrating intuitive ways to display custom author names and improve navigation with the previous and next buttons.
Use the blog or article to create your objects
You’ll probably find yourself using two different but related Liquid objects when customizing Shopify’s post templates. Let’s look at the properties that these objects allow us to access.
The article object is related to individual articles and allows you to output attributes such as article titles and authors. The article has a complete list of attributes.
The blog element refers to elements that are related to specific blogs. This context shows that a blog is the ‘parent’ of its associated articles or ‘children’. A merchant may have several blogs that cover different topics.
One blog could be for News, while another one would be for Case studies. Each blog could have different articles. The blog object has all the attributes that are available.
This tutorial will show you how to use these objects in different ways to maximize the experience for your clients and buyers.
Custom author names displayed with tags
Clients may wish to use a different name for their blog posts, or feature guest bloggers who they wish to credit as the author. Shopify themes defaultly displays a blog post author based upon staff admin accounts. However, it is possible to modify the article template and display any author names you wish.
We would like a custom name to appear in blog articles. Clients don’t need to have access to the theme code. So we can create rules that will generate a specific author name from the tags associated with each blog post. You can offer a seamless experience for your clients by doing this.
Let’s say that our client has Ana Smyth as a guest blogger. She contributes articles to our client’s content-marketing strategy. Ana would require an admin account to select her author name. However, the client would prefer that her name be displayed without requiring her to have an account.
Locate the Liquid object article.author to find the author’s full name. If you are using a sectioned theme, this object will likely be in the article-template.liquid file within the Sections directory. You may also find it in the template file.
It is likely that you will see the following:
article.author When these conditions are met, we’ll use control flow tags to add additional conditions to the article.author. This will output a custom author name. These conditions should be related to the articles tags in our case.
Liquid tags can be used to identify Ana Smyth as our guest blogger. We could also set up control flow tags like this:
If article.tags includes ana%, % Ana Smyth% else %??article.author %% endif Also, you can see that we added an other tag. This allows us to add a follow-up piece of code if the first condition is not met. If the blog post has not been tagged with “ana”, this allows you to output from admin the author assigned.
After this has been added, you can view the article. Her name will be listed as the author.
You can create blog tags for guest authors that have different if requirements. This process can be used for generic brand names or pseudonyms that clients wish to display without the need to create an account.
Liquid can be used to add next and previous article buttons
Buyers may be interested in reading more articles from your client. Increasing the ease of accessing similar articles will increase the usability and accessibility to their online store. Setting up optional previous and next articles buttons provides users with an additional level of navigation and allows them to browse more blog articles.
The blog Liquid object already has attributes that can return URLs for older and newer articles. These object attributes can be linked to buttons on an article page. Section settings can also be used to make it possible to display the buttons.
First, create the buttons. Next, add the link to the next and previous blog articles. In this case, I’ve added the container with the buttons and linked Liquid objects to my article-template.liquid section file, just above where the social sharing buttons are located.
You can see here that we have two link elements that are pointing to our Liquid objects, blog.previous_article and blog.next_article. These link elements return URLs for older articles and newer ones. These link elements are btn. This class can be set up in your theme’s styling or you can add your own.
However, we would like to allow clients to decide if these buttons should be displayed. You can create section settings that allow your clients to toggle between the previous and the next buttons in the theme editor.
The schema tag of the section file can be used to define the settings for these buttons on the theme editor. This article on Shopify’s Web Design and Development Blog provides a detailed explanation of how to create section settings.
We’d like to add a checkbox to the theme editor to toggle between the previous and subsequent buttons. However, we would prefer to have them display as the default.
We can now wrap the previous and next buttons containers in control flow tags, which reference the ID that we have created above.
This shows that the section setting ID corresponds to the schema setting ID. This setting can be toggled on in the theme editor. The code within control flow tags, which are the previous and next buttons, will execute when this setting is turned on.
Blog articles can be creative
You can make your custom theme projects more valuable by making your blog article page more feature-rich with intuitive settings, navigation, and other useful features. It is possible to modify existing dynamic sections to make them more appropriate for blog posts.
Your clients need flexibility when designing blog posts. If you are able to add functionality to article pages that is empowering to your clients, this will help you set them up for success.
Blogging is one the most cost-effective ways to drive traffic to your store and increase sales.
Crickets. It took a good hour to delete every sentence.
This is a common sentiment. Writing may not be what brought you to the business-owning world in the first place.
We want to make it easier for you to publish high-impact posts, since all that you have heard about the benefits of blogging for your business are true.
We put together a set of templates to help you create four great posts for your ecommerce store blog. This post will walk you through the process step by step.
First, some preparation work
To make your blog posts more effective, you will need to be familiar with your audience and your goals.
Know your audience
First up, your audience. Before you can write one word or plan a post, you need to be able answer basic questions about your ideal customer and what they want.
- Who is buying your product? This includes income, age, location and many other factors.
- Why do they buy it?
- What are they interested in?
- What are their beliefs?
These questions can be difficult to answer, or your answers are unclear. Before you collect sweet, sweet blog traffic, you need to clarify those details.
Imagine how much easier it will be to write epic articles for a 34 year-old female executive who purchases locally-made products for her dog. She is passionate about supporting small businesses and believes that small-batch products are better for her dog than products made by “people who like dogs”.
Once you have your audience in mind, it’s time to set goals for your blog.
Know your goals
Although posting once per week is a goal it is not something to be excited about.
You can make your blog posts more interesting by setting goals that are directly related to your business, such as increasing your email list and driving additional sales.
Online marketing allows you to track the performance of your blog posts in all the detail you need. Get started by ensuring Google Analytics is enabled for your store. If you don’t already have one, you will need one.
Next, it’s time for business-focused goals. For example, 1% of your blog traffic should convert into a sale. Think about how motivated you will be to promote these posts if you know that the traffic will lead to more money in you bank account.
You can set business-focused goals like converting 1% of your blog traffic to sales.
It’s also a reminder that you must make your blog and posts sellable if you want to convert your readers into buyers.
This could mean linking to products, using a banner to promote a sale or a popup with a coupon. No matter what your goal, it is clear that aiming beyond “write a post” can help you be more strategic.
It’s now time to start working on the four powerhouse posts.
1. Template for gift guide post
Gift guides are the perfect way to remind your audience that hey, insert-gifting-occasion-here is coming up soon, and your wares would make a great gift.
These posts can double-duty as a sharing wish list that your audience can pass on, or they can be searched via search engines by gift-hunters in desperate need of ideas for gifts for vegans or vegetarians.
Maybe they are looking for a guitar-playing, football-loving person who enjoys eating vegan food after yoga. It’s possible that they are looking for something unique, but you never know.
Oprah is still waiting to make a list of favorite things for vegan, guitar-playing and football-loving yogis. A gift guide blog post can help you fill that void.
Your products will be included along with other great ideas that you believe your target audience will love. You can include related brands or books. However, your goal is to create a helpful and lovable gift list that your target audience will love. This is how it should be done.
This post requires you to:
- A list of 8-12 products that would make great gifts for your target audience (including your products).
- A picture of each item
- Each item’s price
- Brief description of each item and why it is a great gift idea for your audience
- Each item has a link
After you have all the content, your post will be about 80% complete (score).
A variety of products and prices should be included to get the best results. Reach out to other small businesses if you have any suggestions for products to include in your guide. It could be a great way of working with other business owners.
2. Roundup post template
Consider your ideal customer. What is it that they are most excited about? Are you having trouble finding the right person to help?
If you are selling vegan-themed clothing like Wholesome Culture and it is close to a major holiday your customers might be getting ready for potlucks and other events that involve a lot of animal products. A list of 10 great vegan recipes that you can use for holiday events would be very useful and on-brand.
Each roundup post will be unique depending on who you are and what resources you have available, but all of them follow the same structure.
This post requires you to:
- A brief introduction to the list: Who it is for and why it was put together
- A list of all resources that you include (posts and products, etc.).
- Each resource has a link
- Each resource has an image
- Each resource is briefly described
- If applicable, the price per resource
Once you have the basic structure of a roundup posted down, it can be one of the most versatile posts on the internet. Your first roundup post might be a compilation of resources on a particular topic or other great posts from the internet. But this framework is versatile enough to work for many more.
Roundup post structure can be used to compile your best blog posts, favorite products, and your most-sold products. This flexible framework is great for when you are having trouble coming up with blog posts or if you have to quickly create one.
Once you have an idea and a list of things to include, the writing part will be easier.
3. Template for a How-to Guide Post
You can go beyond a simple roundup and give your audience something more with a how to blog post.
A roundup post with recipes is great, but a how to post with one of your original recipes (and delicious) would be even better. This post is not only for brands that talk about food.
Your audience is searching for information and you can help them with everything from styling the perfect fall look to organizing their home or finding the right glasses for their unique face shape.
100% Pure Cosmetics offers this example. They realized that their audience could transition from summer to autumn makeup, so they created a guide that helps them transition each major type of makeup .
Think about the things your audience cares about and how they relate to your brand. What can you offer them that could make your brand a great fit? And that they trust you with the knowledge and skills to use?
Let’s move on to the next part.
This post requires you to:
- A brief introduction: Tell the reader why this skill is important and how it will benefit them.
- Each step of the process is listed.
- A guide or overview of each step.
- Images as required (you may not need an image in order to clearly communicate each step).
4. Interview post template
Interviewing other people is one way to ensure your post is shared beyond your audience. Interviewing other people will ensure that your post is shared with others.
It’s also a fun way to get experts to speak about their passions.
Before you start, think about the strategy for your interviews. This includes who and what you are going to ask.
Do you want to show your audience behind-the scenes? Do you want to teach or educate? It is important to understand your audience in order to determine what they need, like, or want.
Jennifer USA is a great example of streetwear clothing for women. On their blog, they feature a series of interviews with inspirational women. These include everyone from a Fulbright grant recipient to to a freelance writer and Danielle Fishel –the actress who played Topanga in Boy Meets World.
Create a New Blog Template on Shopify
It is important to learn how to edit Shopify blog posts and create a blog template. Today, we will show you how to create a blog template using just a few simple steps.
Step 1: First, go to Online Shop and then choose Themes
You first need to log in to Shopify. Next, navigate to Online Store. You will find Online Store and Themes.
Step 2: Click Act then Edit
Next, you’ll see a list themes of themes that are available in your online shop. Select the theme you wish to edit. Next, click on Actions. Then choose Edit Code.
Step 3: Click Create a new template
You can edit interface by clicking the folder Template and then click Add new template under that folder.
Step 4: Choose an article option, and then choose the name of your template
After clicking on Create a new template a dialog will open asking you to choose the article option from the drop-down menu and the name for your template.
Step 5: Click to create a template
Click Create a template to continue
Step 6: Make any necessary changes to the template
You can now customize the template using the online code editor.
Step 7: Click Save
When you are done editing code, click Save.
