Shows products that match rules you write, relative to the product the visitor is looking at. It is the most configurable source and the only one that uses every filter set.
Entry points
Entry point | Behaviour |
Current Product | The full behaviour described below: recommendations are built ahead of time for each product in your catalogue. |
Current Collection | Falls back to showing the products of the collection the visitor is browsing. None of the filter sets apply, and no generation is needed. To choose the collections yourself rather than follow the visitor, use Collection Products. |
How Current Product works
Unlike every other source, Similar does its work in advance rather than at the moment the campaign is shown. There are three stages.
1. Which products get a list — primary filters (static)
Cooee walks your catalogue and, for each product that matches your primary conditions, builds a recommendation list. Products that do not match get no list, so the campaign shows nothing on their page.
Only active and out-of-stock products are considered; archived and draft products are skipped.
Leave primary empty and every product gets a list.
2. What goes in each list — secondary filters (static)
For each of those products, Cooee searches the catalogue for up to 20 matches using your secondary static conditions. This is where "similar" is actually defined — same category, same vendor, within a price band, sharing a metafield, and so on.
Conditions here can refer back to the product the list is being built for. "Category matches the current product" and "Price is within ±20% of the current product" are the two most common. The filter conditions reference lists them all.
The product itself is never in its own list.
3. Narrowing at show time — secondary filters (dynamic)
When the campaign actually renders, the pre-built list is filtered once more against live state. This is the only stage that can react to something that changes between generation and display — stock, most obviously.
Dynamic conditions are limited to tags, metafields and variant availability.
Match every condition strictly
This toggle changes stage 2. Left off, if the full set of secondary conditions does not find 20 products, Cooee relaxes them one at a time — dropping the last condition, then the one before it — and searches again, until the list is full or there are no conditions left. You get a full list, with the later matches being looser.
Turned on, Cooee takes whatever the full set finds and stops. You get exact matches, possibly very few of them.
Because the last condition is dropped first, order your conditions from most to least important.
Generating
A Similar source on Current Product shows nothing until its recommendations have been generated. Generation is run by Cooee, so ask your Cooee contact after you create or change one.
You need to regenerate after changing primary filters, secondary static filters, or the strict toggle. Changing dynamic filters takes effect immediately — they run at display time and need no regeneration.
Generation is a snapshot. Products added after the last run have no list until the next one.
Filters
Set | Available | Decides |
Primary — static | Yes (Current Product only) | Which products get a recommendation list at all. |
Secondary — static | Yes (Current Product only) | What goes into each list, up to 20 products. |
Secondary — dynamic | Yes (Current Product only) | What survives at the moment the campaign is shown. |
Good to know
Similar is the only type that uses primary filters. Everywhere else the form shows secondary only.
A newly created Similar source on Current Product legitimately shows nothing. That is generation pending, not a fault.
If you want the selection to vary by visitor rather than by product, use Personalised Recommendation.