comparison shopping engines 101 - getting your products found

ComparisonShopping Engines 101

Getting Your Products Found

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IMA Las Vegas | August 13, 2012

Ryan Douglas - Product Manager, SingleFeed

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Personal Bio

• Over 7 years hands on ecommerce experience• At SingleFeed – Customer Development and Full

Service Account Management• Working directly with hundreds of retailers

• PlumberSurplus.com – Online Marketing for Internet Retailer Hot 100 Retailer.• From 10 orders a day in a garage to 500+ orders a

day with 3 locations• Product Manager of SingleFeed – help integrate our

tools for Vendio users• Remember - I used to be in your shoes as a retailer

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About SingleFeed

• Leading data feed management tool for small and medium sized retailers

• Founded in 2006 True Ventures, Acquired in 2011 by Vendio

• Trusted Partner – To Google and many of the leading shopping engines

• Core Customer - Retailers doing $250K to $20M• Pricing – Flat Rate Service plans from $99/mo

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Overview

• What are the Comparison Engines?• Why Should I use Shopping Engines?• How to Get Started• Recap• Q&A

What are Comparison Shopping Engines

Comparison Shopping Engine? Shopping Comparison Engine? Price Comparison Engine? What's the difference?

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What are Comparison Shopping Engines?

• Traditional shopping engine lists one picture, one title, one description and all of the merchants that sell that particular product

• Product listings help consumers quickly and easily make apples-to-apples comparisons to make smart buying decision

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Where to begin?• CSE – Comparison Shopping Engine

• There are 25+ Major CSE’s• General to Niche

• Google Product Search, Pricegrabber, Nextag, Shopping.com, Shopzilla, etc

• Pricing – Cost per click (CPC)• Flat CPC rates, determined by each engine• Variable CPC rates “bidding” at a category

or product level• Budgets managed per engine• Does this work with your budget and cash

flow?

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List of Comparison Shopping Engines

And many more!

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Google Shopping

www.singlefeed.com (800) 705 8852

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Google Shopping

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Google Shopping

www.singlefeed.com (800) 705 8852

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Google Shopping

www.singlefeed.com (800) 705 8852

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Nextag

www.singlefeed.com (800) 705 8852

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Nextag

www.singlefeed.com (800) 705 8852

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Shopzilla

Why Use Comparison Shopping Engines?

What’s in it for me?

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Why use CSE’s

• Each CSE spends $$$ on marketing and SEO to drive traffic, adding to your “reach”

• They have more experience and deeper pockets than you do. Let them help you.

• Unique visitors per month (comscore April 2012)

• Google Shopping >20M• Shopzilla >18M• Nextag >17M• Pricegrabber >7M

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Why use CSE’s

• What do you sell?• Shopping Engines support Widgets to

whatchamacallit’s but no services• Each engine has different policies on allowable products –

ie no tobacco or alcohol, digital downloads, etc

• Part of a complete online marketing presence• CSEs contribute 5-20% of total sales/traffic

• A way to increase traffic and sales on your site• Controlled and profitable approach• Own the customer, not like eBay/Amazon• Relies on your own site conversion experience

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Who uses CSE’s

• The Shoppers• Top CSE’s account for over 200 Million unique visits

per month• Price isn’t the only driver in their searches

• Seller reputation, product rating, shipping cost are all factors

• Typically already know what they are looking for

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Who uses CSE’s

• The Merchants• Already listing on other channels – Amazon/Ebay• Actively using online marketing such as SEM

(AdWords), SEO, and email.• Selling well established brands of products – no

obscure generic/house brand items• Price competitive to a degree – won’t work well if

you’re selling at the highest price• Have bandwidth/people to handle Marketing duties

Getting StartedThe checklist to begin listing on the

shopping engines

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You Need the Basics First

Requirements

• Access to product data/catalog• Ability to frequently updates feeds• Shopping Engine Accounts• Credit Card for CPC engines• Tax and Shipping Information• 5-10 hours for initial setup/launch (not

including feed generation)

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Step By Step

Step 1 - Create Shopping Engine Accounts

• Typically takes 20-30 minutes to register/setup• Need basic store information – tax, shipping

rates/rules, store logo, Support phone #, etc• Pay initial deposit (if required) via Credit card• CPC fees are set by product category rate cards

• Fees from $0.15-$1.00+ (avg $0.35)

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Example – Become.com

www.singlefeed.com (800) 705 8852

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Step By Step

Step 2 - Create Data Feeds

• Enter the “Feed Matrix”• Most CSEs use 10-15 fields or more

• Product Title, Description, UPC, Color…• Every CSE has different requirements - download feed spec’s

from each one and follow instructions• Common and unique data fields between each CSE• File formats – csv, txt, xml, etc

• Use Excel to open/create/read files.

• Get a Developer to help create a feed generation script• Re-useable solution for your website

• Data Feed Management Services• Streamline/automate the process.• SingleFeed helps in this area

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Step By Step

Step 3 – Upload/submit Feed Files

• Automate this process if you can via scripts and FTP delivery.

• Will require Developers• Deliver feed files regularly – as often as your

product data changes.• Upload via web for small files, FTP for larger

files• Once per day is our recommendation

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Step By Step

Step 4 – Review & Correct Errors

• May take several tries to get the feed file “just right”

• Strive for >90% approval and move on• Error messages from CSEs are not

always clear• Warnings vs Errors vs

Recommendations

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Step By Step

Step 5 – Setup Tracking and Reporting

• Don’t want to be “flying blind” on performance• Use Google Analytics at a minimum

• Utm parameters: utm_medium and utm_source will get you started

• Most CSEs have their own tracking as well, we recommend you install too

• Helps w/ ranking and bid amounts and conversions to have this installed

• Monitor performance regularly – look at least 1x a week

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Key Takeaways

• Submit Feeds frequently• Don’t submit the same feed to all the CSEs• Set a budget – daily/monthly to avoid overspend• Remember to check results – “Don’t set it and

forget it”• Start with 1 or 2 CSEs then expand – avoid

shotgun approach

www.singlefeed.com (800) 705 8852

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Question and Answer

Contact InfoRyan Douglas

ryan@singlefeed.com800-705-8852 ext 201www.SingleFeed.com

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