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So far I am only feeding my products to froogle which is taking me about 20 mins each time to do. I am looking into shopzilla, Amazon and Nextag to feed my products maybe other shopping comparison sites in the future.
Is there any thing out there like an application or service to make feeds easier that's not too expensive?
It's scary just to think how much time I need to spend to upload those feeds frequently to different sites.
Thanks
Hi,
There are few generic data feed softwares that can output to several price comparison engines but they are either costly or they charge per SKU/product/record and it gets way expensive.
If you already have scripts that extract data from your database then I would say go 1 step further and create a DTS package on SQL Server that will run on a scheduler (monthly/daily) and generate the data feed and you can still automate it to log into their FTP and drop the file, which saves you time and all other hassles...
This is the simplest and easiset and affordable solution I can think of or I provide to my clients.
Thank you for the suggestion, but I am not very advance on the technical aspect. The SQL thing sounded difficult to me. All I have is a spread sheet with all my products. I don't mind to spend a little money if there is a simple to use software to do what I need.
thanks
When your products is listed on your site, do you use a mysql database or something so that you can connect to it to grab your product information and images and then output the information on the site. If so, and it is a mysql database that is used, you can easily get someone to make you a script that will grab the relevant information from your database and create a nice formated database that you can easily upload the the datafeed sites.
Most sites use databases so that they can keep their sites organized and things. But if your site is just html, then I really don't know what you can do.
Hi,
Sungyangchen , if you have spreadsheet then we can workaround it and still be able to generate a data feed for froogle or other sites, but unless we don't see a sample of what you have it is tough for anybody to make assumptions or provide solution, let me know if you need help drop me an email or private message ...
There are many different ways to submit and methods as well. One quick piece of advice also. List all products on Froogle but once you begin formatting your feeds for other comparison sites try to work a filter that will begin taking items out that you are not getting a high return on. Many retailers submit products that burn through click money or don't provide the right amount on return. For example, do not post a $2.00 item at $.25 per click. Using the right management system you should be able to get your profits moving up quickly. Hope this helps.
Is this a common issue with online merchants? I occasionally take on unfunded projects if there's some momentum, a need, and marketing potential. If any reader is interested in providing info/insight, please PM me.
thank you all.
I took a look at merchantadvantage.com from kevin's reply. looks pretty interesting. sounds like it's exactly what i need. i am going to give it a shot since it's got a 30 free trial.
thanks again to everyone. i will keep you updated the the result.
ps. i get my products from export of my shopping cart either in spreadsheet or xml.
Here are Froogle's export/import requirements: https://www.google.com/froogle/merch...tructions.html
You may be able to find similar helpful information from other shopping comparison sites.
If you are using Excel, you can build macros to generate a worksheet for each of the formats you need. Be careful on your UPC codes column though, Excel seems to like to default to numbers for long strings that contain no letters and then may round the number or drop the leading zeros.
thanks Kevin, i am impressed, merchantadvantage 's app have saved me great deal of time, and the tech support staff are very helpful. i recommand merchantadvantage to merchants who are feeding data to multiple shopping sites like meself at www.discountmotoparts.com
From a business owner perspective, data feed has become a neccessity, but very troublesome and time consuming, I recommend out sourcing this service and to concentrate on your core business instead. Just go to google and type in "data feed service" there are many there.
I would like to also mention there are some site that does not require any custom data feed, meaning they accept any feed, such as our company PriceComparison.com (http://www.PriceComparison.com).
Andrew
after using MerchantAdvantage application. and I realize that I can manage datafeed myself. they told me the next update will have ROI tracking. I can't wait...
Managing the data feeds is so important because quite honestly, you can't trust the shopping portals to place your products correctly. They can mismap some of your products, and false advertise a product at a price, driving unwarranted clicks to your site for the wrong item, and you would never know.
Not even the larger ones?
Especially the larger ones... shopzilla and shopping.com are known to either miscategorize or categorize as "unknown".