21
Sep
2011
Barney Larkin

Sort your Google Shopping feed out...here's how by FusePump!

Google Shopping Product Feeds

We wanted to put together a document that informed people about the changes to the Google shopping channel and what they needed to do in order to maintain a feed after the changes of 22nd September go live. FusePump customers needn't worry because we optimise the feed already!

The changes below, including a summary table, are included in a handy downloadable PDF from here

What you need to know. The Changes to Required Fields

1.            Google Product Category (aka GPC): This attribute ensures that your products appear in the right category (you wouldn’t want that Harry Potter DVD showing up under “Books”) and that we apply the correct set of enforcement rules for a given category.

2.            Apparel/ Variants: Variety is the spice of life, and we’re working to create a richer shopping experience for apparel & accessories that come in multiple colours, patterns, sizes, etc.

  • Apparel variants are only required for feeds targeting the US. For feeds targeting other countries, the attributes are recommended and may be required in the future
  • Variant-level information is required only for products in the “'Apparel & Accessories' category, and all related subcategories
  • You only need to send us data for variant attributes if your product varies by that specific attribute. So, if your shirts are all made of cotton, there’s no need to send the “Material” attribute. However, if your shirts were available in three colors and three sizes, you would send us nine separate line items, varying by color and size
  • There is no penalty for not sending variant level data for other categories
  • If you include variants, you also need to ensure that you send an “item_group_id” to connect those variants and that these group of variants share the same common title. More on this below.

3.            Item_Group_ID: We use this attribute to cluster together all the variants you send us for a given item. Sort of like ‘Super Glue’ for variants.

  • This attribute is required only for variant Apparel products in the US
  • If you have a “Parent SKU” shared by all variants of a product, you can provide that as the value for 'item group id'
  • If you send us an item_group_id attribute, we will automatically look for variant attributes. Conversely, if you did send us Item_group_id, you should ensure you send us at least one variant attribute.

4.            Size: This is an important Variant attribute for “Apparel & Accessories.” Size is only required for feeds targeting the US.

  • Separate your products into different line items in the feed. Each line will have a different “size” attribute, and maybe even vary by other attributes
  • There’s no need to send separate images for separate sizes, unless the appearance of the item changes because of the size

Other Useful Links

Google Merchant Centre Help Page:

http://www.google.com/support/merchants/bin/answer.py?answer=188494&expand=JP

FusePump Top 5 Tips on integration within this channel:

http://www.fusepump.com/fusepumps-5-top-tips-successful-google-shopping-channel-marketing-how-avoid-disaster

Contact barney.larkin@fusepump.com for more information

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