I just wanted to report a problem with Google Base/Merchant Center that has been occurring all day.

If you are receiving e-mails like this after submitting your feed, don’t freak out and blame yourself. This is a Google side error, your not to blame….. …..this time

Dear Google Merchant Center user,

On March 2, 2010 11:32:44 AM PST you uploaded to Google Merchant Center via FTP a file named “FILENAME.TXT”, but you don’t have a data feed registered with this name. Please verify that you provided the correct file name, including correct capitalization.

This is a computer-generated email. Please do not reply.

You can change your notification settings at http://www.google.com/merchants/basicsettings

Here is a link to the:

Google Base Help Forums where people are reporting the issue:

I will update everyone once the error has been fixed by Google.

CSE.Manager@gmail.com

Have you ever wondered why your competitors are ranking higher than you on Google Product Search?

Well as we all know that on Google Product Search content is King. Your titles should have key-words and key phrases (terms and phrases that a shopper would use to search for the product.) Your descriptions follow the same rule but unlike the title, you have much more room to add these key phrases.

So elaborate, be creative!

If you feel confident that your title and description are very SEO friendly but your still being out ranked, the Google Base Competitor Analysis tool created by (Tom the Developer) can help to tell you why.

This tool allows you to search for products or keywords on Google Product Search and be presented with much more information that is not generally displayed on the normal Google Product Search listings. You will be shown the pertinent fields (and data within said fields) that your competitors are including!

Here is an example of what you can see using this tool:

Here we can see the Weight, Condition, Product_type, Manufacturer’s part Number (MPN), Universal Product Code (UPC), ID, Model_Number, Brand attributes that a competitors listing includes. You can the cross reference this data to see what you can do to improve you listing. You can also use this tool to potential help populate data that you may be missing from your data-feed.



Lets say you get your products from a drop shipper but the data-feed they gave you does not include an UPC number. Using this tool you can look up the product and get its UPC number from someone who has that data input. Obviously you’ll want to make sure that the products are identical so that you aren’t incorrect or erroneous data.

Lets say that you are not being included in a Google Product Search group listings.

You would want to know why right?

Well you can use this tool to look up your competitors in this group and find out what data that they all share in common but you lack. Generally an incorrect or missing UPC or Model Number is the culprit.

The Google Base Competitor Analysis Tool is something that I use often to help improve my clients content and data feeds. The best part about this tool is that it is free. That’s right, FREE!



You can access the Google Base Competitor Analysis Tool here



CSE.Manager@gmail.com

Google has added another weapon to their internet marketing arsenal, Google Product Listing Ads. These ads will appear in the “Sponsored Links” section of the search results on their website (the same place your normal AdWords Ads currently appear).

“Product Listing Ads is part of our effort to simplify the advertising process for merchants with large product inventories. Some of the key features of Product Listing Ads include:

* Pay only for results: Product Listing Ads are charged on a cost-per-action (CPA) basis, which means that you only pay when a user clicks on your ad and completes a purchase on your site. Because Product Listing Ads is charged on a CPA basis, it offers a risk-free way for you to reach a larger audience on Google.com.
* List your entire inventory: Product Listing Ads requires no keywords or additional ad text. Whenever a user enters a search query relevant to an item in your Google Merchant Center account, Google will automatically show the most relevant products along with the associated image, price and product name. Product Listing Ads makes it easy for you to promote your entire product inventory on Google.com.”

Source: Inside AdWords: Announcing Product Listing Ads

Here is a screen shot showing the difference between a Product Listing Ad and some AdWords Ads:

You can read the article detailing the release here: Inside AdWords: Announcing Product Listing Ads

CSE.Manager@gmail.com