astoresearchbox

aStore Search Box

Including an aStore Search Box needn't be a pain. Here we show you how it is possible, though hopefully amazon will make this a more flexible feature in future.

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The simplest way of including a search box is by having your astore embedded within an existing page and including a search box either above it or to one side. This has the advantage that you can place one for each amazon region you are an associate in. The stand alone search box looks like this

Including a Search box within an aStore

Amazon do not make this at all easy. Many aStore owners create an astore just to display a certain number of handpicked products, they then wonder why their aStore does not have a search box. The reasoning for this I suppose is that by hand picking items your menu should therefore allow people to select the product they want without searching. Which is fine for small sellections, but useless for those who want a much bigger aStore.

The way around this is to create more categories on your aStore and do not populate these categories, just use the category header for, let's say books, select the 'all sub-categories' button, and leave the fields blank.

This will produce a search box like this -

Note that I have only added Books, you can add all of amazon's categories to our menu and they will also appear in the search drop-down box. Though it may be better to keep this list as short as possible - An aStore aimed at motor-racing enthusiasts wouldn't benefit from a 'Baby Goods' section!

First Draft, I may or may not be adding more to this page depending on feedback recieved! Meanwhile feel free to check my other Amazon aStore Tutorials.