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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
