This article walks through the process of updating many locations using the Bulk Editor.
When to use the Bulk Editor
The Bulk Editor is an interface that allows users to update multiple locations with the exact same information.
An example of this would be if a user needed to update fifty locations with the same hours of operation.
A user would not use the Bulk Editor if they wanted to update all fifty locations with a different set of hours of operation for each location.
How to use the Bulk Editor
From the Location List page, the user will select the Bulk Editor in the Bulk Update dropdown.
Once selected, the user will enter the Bulk Editor flow. Here, there are four main steps:
- Select the locations that will be updated
- Enter the information that should be updated on each location
- Review the changes before publishing
- Publish the changes
Selecting the Locations to Update
The user will first select the locations to be updated.
This is the standard location selection modal where users can filter by accounts and labels. They can also search for specific locations.
Once the user selects each of the locations that need to be updated, they should click NEXT on the bottom of the page to move onto the next step in the process.
Entering the Information to Update
In this step, the user will see the standard tabs they would see on a location profile: Basic Data, Rich Data, and Photos & Videos.
On each tab, the user will see most of the same fields they would see on the same tab on the location profile page.
Some Fields Are Not Present
There are a handful of fields that are not present on the Basic Data tab. These fields are those that should be unique for each location - such as address and phone number.
While some clients may have the same phone number across many locations, this is a rare circumstance and not recommended for publishing to directories. These fields were purposely left off to avoid the scenario where a user accidentally update many locations with the same contact information.
What Information will be Updated?
The only information that will be updated on a location is the information entered into the fields of the Bulk Editor. Any field that is left blank will not be updated on the selected locations.
Update Existing or Add to Existing
Some fields take multiple values - examples include: Keywords, Payment Options, and Album Photos.
Once information is added to one of these fields, the user will have the option to Update the Existing information on the selected locations or Add to the Existing information on these locations.
Update Existing
When this option is selected, any existing information in this field on the selected locations will be removed and replaced with the information entered in the Bulk Editor. Users should use this when they want to standardize the information across all selected locations
Add to Existing
When this option is selected, the values entered in the Bulk Editor will be added to any existing information in the selected locations. This option should be used if the user has a few values they want to add to the existing information, whether it is standard or unique across the selected locations.
Field Limits
Some fields have a limit on the number of values that can be added to the field.
Examples include: Categories can only have 10 values and Keywords can only have 20 values.
When selecting Add to Existing, it is possible some or all selected locations are nearing the maximum number of values that can be accepted. In this case, the system will add the Bulk Editor values, in the order they were entered, until the maximum limit is reached.
For example, a location has 8 categories. The user selects to add 7 categories to the existing categories for each location. The system will add the first 2 categories entered in the Bulk Editor to reach the 10 value maximum for the field and ignore the other 5 values for this location.
Since each location may have a different number of values already added, the system will max each location at 10, using the values the user added. So some locations may get 2 of the Bulk Editor values, some 3 values, and others all 7 values.
Once the user has added the values to be updated, they should click NEXT to move on to the next stage of the process.
Confirmation Page
On this page, the user will have a chance to review the changes that will be applied.
They will see a list of the fields to be updated, the action that will be taken on the field, and the values that will be added to the locations.
For fields that have the Update Existing and Add to Existing option, the user will have the opportunity on this page to change the action taken on the field.
The user can also review the list of locations that will be updated. This will be the same list of locations they selected in step one.
If the user sees any changes that need to be made, they can click the BACK button on the bottom of the page to go back through the steps of the process to reach the page where changes need to be made.
Publish
Once the user is assured all updates are accurate should click SAVE.
The user will then get a confirmation modal. Once they confirm, the changes will be made to all the selected locations.
At this point, all locations with AUTO-SYNC turned on will publish changes to the directories.
Any location with AUTO-SYNC off will need to go through the standard manual sync process.