How to add sections around your category and article pages

Your homepage is built entirely out of sections you choose. Category, brand and article pages work differently: they keep a fixed middle, and you add sections around it.

This applies to stores running the new design.

The Core

The Core is the part of the page that does the selling: the product grid on a category or brand page, and the article body on an article. It is always there and cannot be removed, which protects the thing visitors came for.

The zones

Three areas sit around the Core:

• Above the core: between the page title and the grid or article. Good for an introduction, a buying-guide paragraph, or a set of highlight boxes.
• Below the core: under the grid or article. Good for an FAQ, a newsletter signup, or related content.
• Sidebar: a column beside the product grid on category and brand pages. It stacks underneath the grid on phones.

Article pages do not have a sidebar. The zone above and below the article body is where their sections go.

Why this matters for search traffic

A category page with nothing but a product grid is thin: there is little for Google to read and little reason for a visitor to trust it. A paragraph above the grid explaining what the category covers, and an FAQ below it answering the questions buyers actually ask, turns the same page into something worth ranking.

You do not need this on every category. Put the effort into the handful you want to rank.

Setting it up

Go to Design > Editor. The selector at the top of the left panel lists your pages, and under them a Zones group.

1. Choose the zone you want, for example "Category pages: Below the content".
2. Add sections and edit them exactly as you do on a page. The preview on the right shows a real category page from your store, so you can see where the section lands.
3. Press Publish.

One arrangement covers every page of that type. Editing "Category pages: Below the content" changes what sits under the grid on all of your categories at once, which is the point: you set it up once rather than category by category.

Turning the sidebar on

The sidebar needs two things: the switch, and something in it.

1. In Design > Options > Layout, turn on Category Sidebar.
2. In Design > Editor, choose "Category pages: Sidebar" and add your sections.

With either missing, your pages render exactly as they do now. That is deliberate: an empty column would just push your product grid sideways.

What can go in a zone

Above and below the core are full width, so they take the same section types a page does, except the Hero. A hero opens your homepage with its headline, and a category or article page already has its own.

The sidebar is a column, so it takes only the section types built to run in one: headings, FAQ, newsletter signup, category links, products, pick cards and custom HTML. The editor shows you the shorter list when you have the sidebar selected.

A heading in a zone always shows as a subheading, because the page around it already has its main title.