> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://www.twicecommerce.com/docs/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# How to build a collection and merchandise it

> Group listings into a collection — manual versus smart, how tag matching works, ordering, and where the collection surfaces for customers.

<Card title="Open in TWICE Admin" icon="external-link" href="https://admin.twicecommerce.com/catalog/collections" horizontal>
  catalog/collections
</Card>

A collection groups listings so customers can browse them together — *Ski hire*, *Under €50*, *New this season*. It is a merchandising device, not a category: a listing can be in several collections at once, and being in one changes nothing about the listing itself.

The choice worth making deliberately is at the start. A collection is either **manual** — you pick the listings — or **smart**, where listings join by carrying the right tags. Manual gives control; smart gives a collection that maintains itself. Changing your mind later means rebuilding it.

## Prerequisites

<Warning>
  **Required permission:** collection create and manage rights. All four system roles hold them.
</Warning>

<Info>
  **Before you build a smart collection, look at your tags.** A smart collection is only as good as the tagging behind it, and if listings are tagged inconsistently the collection will be quietly wrong rather than obviously empty. Manual is the better choice until tagging is a habit.
</Info>

## The Walkthrough

<Steps>
  <Step title="Create it and pick the type">
    From **Catalog > Collections**, select **Create Collection** and give it a title and description on the **General** tab.

    Then pick the type, which is the decision that shapes everything after it:

    | Type       | How listings get in                       | Good for                                                                               |
    | ---------- | ----------------------------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
    | **Manual** | You choose them, one by one               | A curated set — a campaign, a shop window, anything where the selection is a judgement |
    | **Smart**  | Listings join automatically by their tags | A set with a rule behind it — a category, a price band, a season                       |
  </Step>

  <Step title="For a manual collection, add the listings">
    On the **Listings** tab, add the listings you want and order them. Order is merchandising: the first few are what most customers ever see.

    A manual collection stays exactly as you left it. New listings do not join on their own, which is the point and also the maintenance — a campaign collection built in March is still March's collection in September unless someone updates it.
  </Step>

  <Step title="For a smart collection, set the tag rules">
    Under **Smart Collection Rules**, select or create the tags that define membership, and set whether a listing has to carry **all** of them or **any** of them.

    * **Any** — a listing with at least one of the tags joins. Wider, and the usual choice.
    * **All** — a listing must carry every tag. Narrower, and useful for intersections like *winter* plus *rental*.

    Membership is then automatic: tag a new listing and it appears; remove the tag and it leaves. Nobody maintains the collection, they maintain the tags.

    <Note>Smart collections match on **tags only**. They cannot match on price, category, attribute, or availability. If you want *under €50*, that is a manual collection or a tag someone applies deliberately.</Note>
  </Step>

  <Step title="Fill in the Marketing tab">
    The **Marketing** tab carries how the collection presents itself — its page title, description, and URL. A collection is a landing page as much as a group, and it is one of the few catalog pages a customer might reach from a search engine.

    Read more: [Collection Marketing tab](/docs/catalog/collections/marketing)
  </Step>

  <Step title="Put it somewhere customers will see it">
    A collection that exists is not a collection anyone finds. Surfacing it is storefront work — featuring it on the home page, or adding it to the navigation — not something the collection does for itself.
  </Step>
</Steps>

## How do I know it worked?

* **The collection lists the listings you expect** — for a smart collection, check the membership rather than assuming the tags did what you meant.
* **The order is deliberate** on a manual collection, not the order you happened to add them in.
* **It opens on the storefront** and is reachable from somewhere a customer would look.
* **A newly tagged listing appears in a smart collection** without anyone touching the collection.

## Troubleshooting / Common Pitfalls

<AccordionGroup>
  <Accordion title="A smart collection is missing listings I expected">
    **Almost always tagging, not the rule.** The listing does not carry the tag, carries a near-miss variant of it, or the rule is set to **all** when you meant **any** — an *all* rule needs every tag present, and one missing tag excludes the listing silently.

    **What to do:** check the rule's match mode first, then the tags on a listing that should be in and is not. Tag drift — *winter*, *Winter*, *winter-2026* — is what usually causes this, and it is worth fixing at the tag level rather than adding more tags to the rule.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="A smart collection contains listings that should not be there">
    **Cause:** the tag is broader than the collection. A tag applied for one purpose pulls listings into any collection built on it.

    **What to do:** either narrow the rule by adding a tag with **all**, or use a more specific tag. If you find yourself wanting to exclude one listing, you want a manual collection — smart collections have no exceptions list.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="I want to reorder a smart collection">
    **You cannot pick the order the way you can in a manual collection.** Membership is derived, so the ordering control a manual collection gives you is not there.

    **What to do:** if order is the point — a shop window, a campaign — build it manually. Use smart collections where membership matters and sequence does not.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="Can a listing be in more than one collection?">
    **Yes, and it usually should be.** Collections are not a taxonomy and do not compete. The same listing can sit in *Skis*, *Under €50*, and *New this season* at once.

    That is worth saying because people arrive expecting one-listing-one-category and then build far fewer collections than they should.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="The collection is empty on the storefront but full in the admin">
    **Cause:** membership is not visibility. The listings in it still have to be Public, on the Online store sales channel, and available at the location the customer is browsing.

    **What to do:** open one of the missing listings and check its publishing. A collection cannot make an unpublished listing visible.
  </Accordion>

  <Accordion title="I need to change a collection from manual to smart">
    **Treat it as building a new one.** The two work differently enough that switching is not a setting you flip and walk away from.

    **What to do:** get the tagging right first, build the smart collection alongside the manual one, compare the membership, and retire the manual one once it matches.
  </Accordion>
</AccordionGroup>

## Next Steps

<CardGroup cols={2}>
  <Card title="Collections" icon="layer-group" href="/docs/concepts/catalog/collections">
    What a collection is in the data model.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Collection Listings tab" icon="list" href="/docs/catalog/collections/listings">
    The tab reference for membership.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Collection Marketing tab" icon="bullhorn" href="/docs/catalog/collections/marketing">
    How the collection presents itself.
  </Card>

  <Card title="Create and publish a listing" icon="plus" href="/docs/guides/catalog/create-and-publish-a-listing">
    Publishing the listings a collection groups.
  </Card>
</CardGroup>