Network Intellect’s Top Tips for Price Comparison Feed Management

Welcome to another edition of Network Intellect’s Top Tips! Today, we’re focusing on Feed Management and have provided a valuable check list of factors which MUST be taken into consideration when managing a Comparison Shopping campaign:

1. Don’t Let Your Account Run Out of Budget!

Your product listings’ popularity scores could be reset if you allow this to happen, as your listings will be pulled from the engines. This will affect the rankings of your products on the search results page. You could also miss out on sales, as some users might find your products listed early in the month and come back towards the end of the month to find your products are no longer listed, thus making their purchase from one of your competitors instead.

2. Ensure ALL Data provided in Feeds matches the Data listed on your Site.

The last thing a shopper on a price comparison site wants is to see your products listed at £20.00 only to click through and see that on your actual site it’s really listed at £40.00. These experiences leave a bad taste in the mouth and users will be reluctant to click on your products on CSE’s in the future. Your products may also be pulled by some CSE’s if they find that the data you have provided in your feeds are not up-to-date, so ensure that feeds are updated regularly.

3. Make the most of Free Price Comparison Sites

Google Product Search (formerly known as Froogle) allows you to list your products for FREE! You literally pay nothing for your conversions, so if you aren’t making use of these sites you are missing out on a great avenue for pure profits.

4. Don’t Overbid!

Keep in mind that shoppers using CSE’s can always sort the results by different factors such as price, so bidding excessively won’t necessarily improve your placement or visibility. You could improve your rankings by other means, such as becoming a ‘trusted store’ and getting a preferred placement, whilst logos, free shipping call-outs and sale price strike-through graphics can all draw the consumers eyes to your products without the extra cost.

5. Include Shipping Rates

Shoppers are becoming more and more savvy. As such, it’s important that you provide the total price for your product (the CSE’s will show product price + p&p so the consumer knows exactly what they are paying) so that shoppers can make a fully informed decision before clicking through to your site. If you are offering free shipping and are NOT providing this information to the consumers, you will certainly be missing out on sales.

6. Include MPN/UPC information

If you have the MPN (Manufacturers Part Number) or UPC (Unique Product Code), ensure they are included in your feed as they will ensure that your products are grouped with other merchants selling the same items.

7. Allow Product Pages to be Crawled by Search Engines.

Some retailers try to block search engine crawlers from their product pages and image files, which can have a negative effect on your Google Product Search traffic. Instead of blocking the crawler, indicate to the crawler the pages you prefer to display in the search results by using the <link rel=”canonical”> tag. Learn more about this tag here.

8. Know your Merchant Rating!

Make an effort to capture feedback from your consumers, particularly if you have a lot of happy customers who would gladly share their positive feedback. Your merchant rating is a strong reflection of how your customers perceive your brand and as such, it’s an important aspect of your overall reputation and brand management process.

9. Use Sale/Discounts, Coupon Codes and Promo’s in your Listings

Some CSE’s will accept promotional offers and coupon codes should you include them in your product data feeds, so that you can provide the shopper with all the information they need. Including such offers will help provide you with an advantage over your competitors.

10. Don’t Manage your CSE Program like a Paid Search Program

Although both are similar in that they run on a PPC/CPC model and both drive traffic to your site via search results, Comparison Shopping and Paid Search are very different. CSE’s provide detailed product information such as descriptions, prices and images before a click has been made. Paid Search is basically limited text ranked by bid and quality score.

Both ventures deliver completely different experiences for the user and will require different levels of budget and stringency of management.

Please visit our site for more information on Price Comparison Site Management.