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But first, what is a metafield in Shopify?
Metafields are custom data fields that allow you to fully customize the look and functionality of your Shopify store without code. This can help you change your store’s template and add individual product information like:
- size guides
- ingredients lists
- material composition
- “best-seller”/”selling fast” labels
- related products
This information is in addition to your standard product description at the bottom of the page.
Why add metafields to your Shopify store?
Metafields are proven to improve SEO results and increase conversion rates by providing detailed information high up on each product page. This helps customers make informed purchasing decisions, increases their trust in your store and minimises barriers to checkout.
Beyond customer-facing benefits, metafields also streamline your backend operations. You can use them for internal inventory tracking, creating smart product filters, enhancing site search, and building dynamic content across your store, without having to write any code.
What are the different types of metafields?
You can add metafields to pretty much any aspect of your Shopify store including:
- Products
- Variants
- Collections
- Customers
- Orders
- Companies
- Locations
- Pages
- Blogs
- Markets
But the most commonly used metafields are for products and variants.
Shopify variant metafields are custom data fields for each specific variant (e.g. size, style, colour) of a particular product. Having the flexibility to customize information for each variant can be super helpful as details like material and availability may change depending on the item.
For instance, rather than saying all your blue t-shirts are selling fast, you could specify that size M is selling fast. Or if you’re selling a chocolate bar in multiple flavours, you can specify that the ingredients are different for each variant.
How to add a metafield in Shopify
There are three steps to adding a metafield to your store: First add a metafield definition, then add a metafield value and finally, connect the metafield to your theme.
How to add a metafield definition
Think of this as the template to specify where you want the metafield to appear in your store and what values it can hold. You can select either a standard or custom definition. Standard is easier as it’s universally compatible across all stores.
How to add a metafield value
Through Shopify admin, add specific values (e.g. colour, date, size) to your metafields on the corresponding pages.
How to connect metafields to your theme
To display this information on your store, use the theme editor. Here you can customize where the metafields appear, making sure they’re assigned to the right product.
- Add a section that supports dynamic sources.
- Click the connect dynamic source icon, which looks like three circles stacked on top of each other with a + button.
- Click + to search for and choose the metafield you want to connect.
Find a more detailed guide in Shopify’s help centre.
What are the challenges of managing metafields across stores?
If you’re managing products across multiple stores or sharing product data with other stores, metafields can create significant complexities and inconsistencies in data across sales channels. For instance, if you’re a supplier selling your product to 100+ dropshippers or retailers , and have to make an important metafield update later on, it can be a real headache to chase up all your stockists and ask them to manually make the change on their end.
The inconvenience goes both ways. If you’re a retailer, you don’t want to be wasting precious time manually updating hundreds if not thousands of product details. This becomes even more complicated when there are many variants for each product.
Really, it comes down to human error. One small miscommunication over metafield data (like sizing or material info) could lead to many angry customers. So it pays to automate metafield management when dealing with products across multiple stores.
How to bulk update and sync metafields across multiple Shopify stores
Shopify does have a native function to bulk edit metafields within your own store. But this can get complicated once there are multiple stores involved. That’s where a Shopify app like Syncio comes in to bridge the information gap.
Syncio allows you to keep metafields synced across multiple Shopify stores in real-time. So any changes made on the supplier’s end will reflect on the retailer’s store. It also works for multi-stores, so you can sync your metafield data even if you’re selling across multiple stores and locations. Any changes made to the base store’s metafields will reflect on the connected expansion stores too.
Syncio also bulk clones metafield definitions and values for products and variants across stores, so you can avoid manually updating metafields one by one – which is laborious and time consuming. Simply install Syncio and enable the Metafields Add-on feature. You can do this in three easy steps:
Step one: Enable Metafields in Syncio
- You can do this when you first install Syncio and pick your plan
- Or you can add it later by navigating to your Syncio dashboard and selecting Manage > then “Metafields”. Choose your plan and click “next”.
- Metafields will now appear on the left navigation panel in your Syncio app.
Step two: Sync Metafields
- Click onto “metafields” on the left panel.
- Here you’ll see a list of your connected suppliers.
- Click “view metafields” next to their name to see a full list of available product metafields from their store.
- Once you’ve found the metafile you want to sync, click “sync definition”.
- Once the status appears as “synced”, it will be available on your Shopify store.
Step three: Sit back and allow Syncio to update metafields for you
Now the stores’ metafields are synced, any changes made on one store will automatically update on all connected stores. This means no manual updates, human error or angry customers. Save yourself precious time and customer satisfaction.
Getting started with metafield syncing
We've created a complete setup guide that shows you exactly how to enable and configure the Metafields add-on in Syncio - from turning on the feature to syncing your first metafield. If you have questions or need a hand, reach out to us at support@syncio.co. We're here to help!
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