LoveYourFeed.com

Shopping.com has been having trouble with their FTP account generation system for almost 2 weeks. When grabbing the FTP account information you sometimes get a useless screen (no FTP Username or Password):

Their engineering team is investigating the problem.

Update: Fixed

Got a couple emails from merchants having trouble setting up a new account with Shopzilla. Seems that there’s a temporary problem which makes it appear that there’s only one payment option available…pay by check.

I’ll let you know when the normal option – pay by credit card – is back up.

A friendly tip from our friends at Become…

Some of our most savvy merchants go on all the engines every morning and check their top 20 words. It is amazing how good they are at spotting changes and reasons for it. They know exactly which index Google is running. They can tell when we change our algorithms. Smart people. So here is my tip.

Know your top queries (keywords).

You should know what your top 20-100 keywords are on Google, MSN, Yahoo. These will typically relate to queries on Comparison Shopping sites. Type these queries into your favorite Shopping Engines and see how you rank. Take snapshots of the screen for later reference. Over time you can start to understand how your rankings can be affected by bidding, optimizing titles and descriptions, changes to the engine algorithm, and changes by your competition. Don’t like the results? Improve your titles and descriptions to give the engines a better idea of what your products are and what queries they relate to. Your second option is to start bidding! You can change your bids by 1 cent, then type in the queries again to see the changes. Continue this until you get your desired placement with cost of sale.

Maybe it’s time for WebPosition to work this into its package.

Disclaimer: All optimization strategies are suggestions and do not guarantee success. These are data feed optimization tactics I have used or others have suggested which I think everyone should at least think about, if not test.

Google Base seems to be having some trouble keeping up with merchant (and other) uploads this holiday season. Merchants are used to feed (bulk upload) processing taking about 30mins, but for most accounts processing time now seems to be more like 2-3 days. While frustrating, things like this happen. And Google Base is in Beta. Unfortunately, though, this delay in processing causes other problems. Back in October, Google removed its upload limit, allowing feeds to be uploaded more than once per hour. Well, processing latency plus no upload limit causes more headaches for uploaders who can’t update their products. And because Google Base doesn’t have a robust customer service staff, I have a feeling a lot of merchants are not too happy right now as they can’t figure out what they’re doing wrong (nothing).

Ok, I missed a day. I’m sorry.

Here’s a quick tip. Make sure that the products in your feed are available. Face it, during the holiday rush, you might suddenly be out of stock of a lot of items. Remove those items from your feed immediately so you’re not getting charged for clicks that will not convert. In SingleFeed, you can do this by just putting an ‘N’ in the include field – maybe those products will come back in stock in a couple weeks. If you’re not using SingleFeed, just delete that row from your spreadsheet and re-submit the feed to the proper engines.

Two reasons not to remove the products from your feed: 1) you can send the shopper to your nearest bricks and mortar store (you know, that quaint real world thing) and 2) you have an amazing upsell/alternative sell process (this product is not available, but here are 3 other products just like it which you might be interested in).

Disclaimer: All optimization strategies are suggestions and do not guarantee success (although I wouldn’t be writing these tips if I didn’t think they mattered). These are data feed optimization tactics I have used for clients on SingleFeed or others have suggested which I think everyone should at least think about, if not test (test = learning = good).

Ok, this blog is supposed to be about data feed optimization, but we should all be thinking about store optimization, too. The Yahoo! Store blog, written by Paul Boisvert, has been running a 12 posts of Christmas (hmmm…I think it should have been the 9 days of ChistmaHannaKwanza) series with great tips for all etailers. You don’t need a Yahoo! Store to take advantage of his advice. I added the Yahoo! Store blog to my list of links, but make sure to check out these holiday treats:

Tip Three – Tell a Friend

Tip Six – Cross-Sell

Tip Two – Customize Your Header for the Holidays

Tips like these aren’t going to make or break your next two weeks, but I view store optimization as part of the larger war against your competition. The more work you do on your site to increase conversion rate, drive down CPA, increase average order size, etc., the better position you’ll be in to fight off your competitors on the pay per click (PPC) engines or in an affiliate program or with an email marketing campaign.

What other resources do you read for Store Optimization tactics?  Let me know so I can spread the word.

I asked all the shopping comparison engines to submit the ONE data feed optimization tip they’d give merchants right now for the holiday shopping season and then explain why it matters. Here’s what Dennis Hoekstra of Yahoo! Product Submit had to say…

The holiday shopping season is already in full swing, but it’s never too late to better optimize your listings on Yahoo! Shopping. You probably already know how critical it is to provide informative and relevant names and descriptions, product attribute data, and universal identifiers such as UPC. However, to take advantage of Yahoo! Shopping’s newest functionality and reach more motivated buyers, we also recommend including sale-price and MSRP data in your Product Submit feed.

More users than ever are looking for deals on Yahoo! Shopping. The demand has been so great that we launched a new Bargains Center full of information about sales, discounts, coupons, free-shipping offers, rebates and more. Popular bargains and sales categories are featured at the top of the Bargains Center home page with links to product listing pages narrowed by sale price and MSRP. This “special deals” narrowing option is also available from every search result page. Make sure that your reduced-price products are included in these narrowing options by completing the sale-price and MSRP fields in your feed, in addition to the price field.

To keep up on the latest changes on Yahoo! Shopping, remember to visit the Yahoo! Shopping Blog . If your products are not in Yahoo! Shopping today, sign up for Product Submit to get included.

I asked all the shopping comparison engines to submit the ONE data feed optimization tip they’d give merchants right now for the holiday shopping season and then explain why it matters. Here’s what Tracy Lou of NexTag had to say…

Happy Holidays!

A shopping comparison engine’s catalog of products can seem like a mysterious black hole, so here are a couple tips to help you get the best traffic possible for the holiday season:
1. Do not put a variety of products in a Gift category instead of their more precise product categories.

For example, let’s say you are a jewelry merchant and you decide to put a selection of popular products in the Gifts category for the holidays. Now all of a sudden the buyers cannot search for your products by jewelry type, gemstone type, carat size, etc… because the Gifts category does not support such filters.

2. Add keywords that describe your product in your descriptions.

Go to the categories your products are listed in and look at what filters are available for each category. These are the keywords you will want in your description. Again, with the jewelry example, you will want to mention the gemstones, carat sizes, etc… in your description. This will help get your product listed in the matching category-specific filters. If we don’t know that the pendant is mostly rubies, we won’t list it under the ruby filter.

Disclaimer: All optimization strategies are suggestions and do not guarantee success. These are data feed optimization tactics I have used or others have suggested which I think everyone should at least think about, if not test.

I asked shopping comparison engines to submit the ONE data feed optimization tip they’d give merchants right now for the holiday shopping season and then explain why it matters. Here’s what Trent Scoffield of Shopping.com had to say…

For most retailers the next 14 days are the most important days of the year. Given that, my guidance is that systematic or even surgical datafeed optimizations are generally not recommended as it may introduce superfluous risk. However, there are three key areas to spotlight as relevant and timely datafeed activities that can ensure that the 14 days are wildly successful.

1. Feed Freshness. Datafeeds should be updated as often as products and/or product prices change. It’s never more important than the holidays to monitor that your datafeed systems are delivering fresh feeds to all distribution sources.

2. Marketing Messages. The most impactful marketing message during December is a short message stating the retailers last shipping day. “Last shipping day is Dec 21”. This transparency allows the consumer to make an informed buying decision and creates a sense of urgency to purchase. Ideally these messages were “roadmapped” earlier in the year for programmatic inclusion during the holidays. If not, use caution when applying.

3. Out of Stock. Inventory levels can vary significantly during the holidays. Most retailers automatically remove out of stock items from the datafeed to avoid paying for leads that can’t convert to sale. This makes the most sense if the products can’t be backordered. However, some retailers are smartly monetizing the visits from “out of stock” item traffic and in that case leave the items in the feed.

Disclaimer: All optimization strategies are suggestions and do not guarantee success. These are data feed optimization tactics I have used or others have suggested which I think everyone should at least think about, if not test.

I asked shopping comparison engines to submit the ONE data feed optimization tip they’d give merchants right now for the holiday shopping season and then explain why it matters. Here’s what Jonathan Margolis of PriceGrabber had to say…

The best tip for merchants this holiday season is to add as much information as possible to their data feeds. First, make sure to have clear and concise product titles using popular keywords. For example, if you’re selling a Wreath, make sure your product title contains the words “Christmas Wreath.” This will insure that your product will show up when someone searches for “Christmas.”

Second, make sure to add Manufacturer Part Numbers/UPC’s/ISBN’s to your feed. If you’re wondering why competitors show up on the same page and you are left out, it’s probably because of an absent or incorrect SKU number.

Third, make sure sales tax and shipping costs are calculated into the total price (It’s best to include a separate shipping field in the feed). Conversion rates suffer when customers show up at your website and find the shipping cost is more than they’d hoped for.

Fourth, make sure your availability column is updated. If a product is out of stock, either take it out of your feed or let the shopper know before clicking through. If all of this information is included in the feed and your landing page has an above the fold, prominent “add to cart” link, you should see an increase in conversion.

Finally, CSE’s offer a dependable sales channel, so if you don’t have a feed, create one. Some shopping sites may offer a crawling option, but crawling can’t reliably provide the shopper with the type of detail that’s in a feed you have created yourself.

Disclaimer: All optimization strategies are suggestions and do not guarantee success. These are data feed optimization tactics I have used or others have suggested which I think everyone should at least think about, if not test.