Why Are My Out-Of-Stock Products Not Visible?

Keeping your out-of-stock product pages visible allows you to capture demand with a back-in-stock alerts app. But what happens if your customers can’t see them? In this article, we’ll explain why your out-of-stock product pages may be hidden and how you can fix the problem. 

What Happen if Out-Of-Stock Pages Are Not Visible? 

Your out-of-stock product pages should always stay visible. This avoids a negative impact on your SEO and also lets you capture demand and maximize sales by using a restock alerts app. 

If your out-of-stock product pages aren’t visible, shoppers can’t see items they might love. You also can’t collect valuable data and learn about their interests and buying intent. 

Using the Swym Back in Stock Alerts app helps you make the most of sold-out products while keeping your pages visible. Doing so leverages interest in out-of-stock products while driving conversions. 

How to Find Out If Out-Of-Stock Pages Are Hidden

You’ll need to view the front end of your e-commerce store to determine if out-of-stock product pages are hidden from the customer’s perspective. If you already know which products are out of stock, try browsing through your catalog to see if the pages are visible. 

If not, navigate to your e-commerce dashboard. There, you’ll be able to see inventory levels for each of your products to identify which ones are out of stock. From there, repeat the previous steps to see if the product pages are visible. 

Reasons Pages Are Hidden (and How to Fix Them)

Your out-of-stock product pages can be hidden for several reasons, including settings in your e-commerce platform or settings in a third-party app or plugin. Certain automations can also hide out-of-stock pages.  

In this section, we’ll show you why your product pages aren’t visible and how to fix the issue. 

Pages Hidden By Your E-Commerce Platform

Shopify

Shopify can natively hide out-of-stock products in two ways.  The first is to hide the product from your collections. To fix this, visit the Collections page in the Shopify admin and ensure the “Inventory stock” condition is not set to 0. This should make your product pages visible.

Your Shopify store comes with a default collection that shows all of your products. However, if you have an automated collection, it can override the Catalog page, causing out-of-stock items to be hidden based on your conditions. 

View this Shopify help document for step-by-step instructions on why Shopify is hiding out-of-stock product pages and how to make them visible again. 

BigCommerce

Stopping BigCommerce from hiding out-of-stock product pages is simple. Go into Advanced Settings then Inventory in the BigCommerce dashboard. Then ensure the value for “When a product is out of stock” is not set to “Hide product completely.” Your product pages should now be visible. 

WooCommerce

You can hide out-of-stock product pages in WooCommerce using the default platform or with a plugin. To ensure your pages are visible, navigate to WooCommerce > Settings > Products. Then find the “Out of stock visibility” checkbox. To make your page visible, ensure the “Hide out of stock items from the catalog” box is not checked. 

For step-by-step details on changing visibility settings using a plugin, visit this WooCommerce help document. 

Pages Hidden By a Third-Party App

Are you using any third-party apps or plug-ins to hide out-of-stock pages? If so, make sure you disable the app on the pages you want to show. Refer to the FAQs or help guide of your unique app for step-by-step instructions.

If your app doesn’t have the capability to unhide only specific pages, then we suggest you do not use the app. Instead, you can reap the benefits of keeping out of stock pages viewable and easily disable or enable the Notify Me button on product pages you plan to restock.

Pages Hidden By Automation

Automation tools like Shopify Flow and Zapier can also hide out-of-stock product pages. For instance, in Shopify Flow, you can create a workflow automation to hide products based on their inventory level using the “Hide product” action. If you want to make your products visible again, you’ll need to edit these automations or remove them from your store. 

If you need help with hidden out-of-stock product pages, our support team is ready to assist you. Just reach out to us via email at support@swymcorp.com.