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Breadcrumbs and multiple parent categories on Shopify site - what's the answer?
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Hi Mozzers... I'm working on a Shopify site - it is polyhierarchical with multiple parent categories for each product. Not uncommon with Shopify because of issues with faceted nav on that platform.
The problem is that defining ONE breadcrumb trail back to the homepage, it works against UX, as people will be wanting to go back to the previous search results, primarily, to revisit the parent category specific search (this is an ecommerce site with a huge number of products).
So heaven knows what to do. I could do:
(1) Home / Product to avoid the issue. Not very good for UX though as where is the previous category page (where more than likely a product search was carried out).
(2) Home / Specific Previous Search Page - Parent Category / Product (if that is possible without upsetting SEO performance - I don't think it is - but any advice is welcome)
(3) or I could define one specific path and also include: Return to Previous Page / Search as a separate clickback link outside of but adjacent to the breadcrumb trail (I think Macy's used to do that): https://baymard.com/blog/ecommerce-breadcrumbs
The problem with defining a specific path is it flys in the face of UX in the context of this site! Although of course defining one path seems to be best practice for SEO.
Any help would be gratefully received! Thanks a million, Luke
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