Categories are the primary way to organize your products in Tuplo. Once you establish them, you can assign categories to product groups, making it easier for customers to find what they want on your website with just a few clicks.
Categories as they appear on your website.
Categories provide a broad description of your products. Examples include clothing, camping supplies, and car parts. They are structured hierarchically, allowing for unlimited nesting to offer maximum flexibility. However, it's best to keep the structure simple.
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**SEO Considerations**
Use categories to structure your website and optimize its indexing by search engines like Google and Bing. Once established, minimize changes unless necessary to reduce the need to re-index your website.
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### Create New
To **add** a category:
* **Choose** **More Options > New Group**
* **Enter** a title.
* **Press** Return.
Once created, you can add categories by following these steps.
1. **Select** the desired category.
2. **Choose** **More Options > New Category**.
3. **Enter** a title.
4. **Press** Return.
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### Delete
To **delete** a category:
1. **Select** the category.
2. **Click** the Remove button.
3. **Click** OK.
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**Quick Tips!**
Deleting a category requires unassigning it from all product groups as a safety precaution.
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### Manage
To rearrange categories:
* **Click and drag** them within the window.
To **change** the name of a category:
1. **Select** the desired category and do one of the following:
1. **Press** Return.
2. **Click** the category.
2. **Enter** the desired name.
3. **Press** Return.
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### Save Changes
Unsaved changes in the Asset Window.
Any changes you make are unsaved when working in the Assets Window until you click the Save button.
If you're unsure about your changes and wish to discard them, clicking the Revert button will return the window to the previous save state.
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**Quick Tips!**
To protect your data, Tuplo Studio will prevent you from changing tabs or assigning assets if there are any unsaved changes, as indicated by the red icon.
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## Keywords
**Keywords** are unique descriptions that further detail categories and product groups. As additional terms available to assign to categories, they make products associated with them more visible in searches on your website.
By default, products in Tuplo Studio are automatically indexed and searchable on your website so customers can easily find them. These indexes include the product brand, title, category, color, and size. To illustrate, consider a running shoe product with the following characteristics:
* **Brand**: Alta Athletics
* **Title**: Swift Runner
* **Category**: Footwear / Athletic Shoes / Running Shoes
* **Colors**: Red, Blue, White
* **Sizes**: 8, 9, 10, 11, 12
The index for these shoes includes all provided words, ensuring the Alta Swift Runner appears in search results for 'running shoes' on your website. However, if the user searches for "jogging sneaker" instead, the Alta Swift Runner will not appear in the results.
Keywords help by adding the words "jogging' and "sneaker" to the Running Shoes category. Now, Alta Swift Runner and any other product groups assigned to this category will show in searches for "jogging sneaker."
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### Inherited Keywords
Since categories support folder nesting, you can take it one step further when optimizing keywords. By assigning a keyword to a category containing multiple categories, that keyword applies to all of them as an **Inherited Keyword**.
So, you could apply the keyword "sneaker" to the Athletic Shoes category, which would assign the keyword to every category inside.
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### Assign to a Category
To **assign** keywords:
1. **Select** a category.
2. **Select** the Keywords tab.
3. **Click** on the text input.
4. **Type** the keyword.
5. **Press** Return.
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### Remove a Keyword
Keywords assigned directly to a category can be deleted from within them, while you'll need to delete inherited keywords from the parent folders**.**
To **delete** a keyword:
1. **Select** a category.
2. **Click** the desired keyword.
3. **Press** Delete.
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**Quick Tips!**
You can also navigate the text entry using the Arrow keys and remove keywords using the Delete key.
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## Attributes
Categories include the ability to assign attributes and further define associated product groups.
Since you need to create the attributes before you can assign them, check the following section on [attributes](https://docs.tuplo.com/using-tuplo-studio/assets/attributes) for steps to create and assign them to categories.
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## Tax Status
You can apply tax information to a category and any nested categories within. There are several options depending on what services you have integrated with your Tuplo account.
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**Quick Tips!**
Please refer to the [Tuplo Account Management Guide](https://app.gitbook.com/s/V0nc9z5ERStcxnY8SDZS/your-tuplo-dashboard/preferences/sales-tax) for more information on available tax services.
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{% tab title="Tuplo Basic" %}
The Taxable column showing which categories are marked as taxable.
When using Tuplo Basic, categories receive a mark to designate them as taxable. Taxable status is a checkmark that can be activated when editing the category.
To do this:
1. **Open** the categories asset window.
2. **Click** the columns icon.
3. **Activate** the Tax Codes checkbox.
4. Either:
1. **Right-click** a category and choose Switch Taxability.
2. **Select** a category and use the keyboard shortcut **Option + Command + T**.
5. **Click** save to apply changes.
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**Quick Tips!**
When using Tuplo Basic, all categories will default to taxable.
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{% tab title="Avalara Tax Services" %}
The Tax Code column displaying assigned tax codes.
When using Avalara, your options are much more granular, and you can assign tax codes to specify the category's tax status.
To identify the tax code you'd like to apply, use the keyboard shortcut **Option + Command + 6** to open the tax code window.
Then, to **apply tax codes** to a category:
1. **Open** the Categories Assets window.
2. **Click** the columns icon.
3. **Activate** the Tax Code checkbox.
4. **Select** a category.
5. **Click** the now visible tax code field.
6. **Copy** and paste the appropriate tax code.
7. **Click** save to apply.
{% hint style="info" %}
**Quick Tips!**
For more information on Avalara tax integrations, check out the [Tuplo Account Management Guide](https://app.gitbook.com/s/V0nc9z5ERStcxnY8SDZS/integrations/avalara).
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{% endtab %}
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## Video Tutorial
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Learn how categories help you streamline product management in your records and website while enabling customers to search for similar products.
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Optimize your product management and improve search functionality with advanced categorization techniques.
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