Optimization Best Practices for Shopzilla
Shopzilla and its sister site, Bizrate, continues to be one of the prime movers among comparison shopping engines. Shopzilla pumps high volumes of traffic through to merchants, and most importantly to merchants, there are many ways to make this traffic profitable.
Key Features
One of the most important features for Shopzilla is their bidding system. As with other CSEs, Shopzilla offers the ability to bid on a product level. This is important because in a competitive environment like Shopzilla where many different retailers are competing, bidding become very important.
Using Shopzilla’s bidding UI, bids can be made on a category or product basis. The bidding UI will give a review of the top bids in given categories which gives some indication of where a merchant’s bids should be placed. With non
matching items, a progressive bidding approach is recommended (as usual). If an item is matching, then options become more limited. The results are heavily weighted toward price. To really move up the list, make sure to install the costumer surveys to help work toward featured store status, which will push listings to the top of the results. Hopefully this has already been done, because it takes a while to get there.
Continuing the bidding talk, keep in mind that a zero bidding strategy can be done with Shopzilla. However, know this is only usable for products which are very unique in comparison with Shopzilla’s selection. If more than a few merchants have a similar product, it’s just as good to review the product from the feed if not performing.
Lastly, keep in mind the dreaded holiday increases. With minimums expected to climb the usual 20% this year for the holiday season, keep an eye on how this effects position items with bids, and also ROI across the board.
Potential Challenges
Ensure category mapping is optimal. Many Shopzilla keyword searches will display potential categories to shop in first, and then a listing of possible product matches from the entire engine. Be sure make keyword searches as a costumer would, and then place products in the most likely category to be searched in. Of course, testing is best in this case by switching category placement for products. However, let’s face it, if a merchant hasn’t done this already throughout the year, it’s not a good idea to start now.
Lastly, keep a sharp eye on traffic surges. During this time of year, and especially on a high traffic engine like Shopzilla, ROI can get out of control in a hurry. Keep a daily eye on performance trending and adjust as needed. Of course reactionary optimization is not the best tactic, but a responsive component is especially necessary in this environment where profitable
products and strategies during the course of the year, can quickly become budget killers.
Next up on the comparison engine optimization task list: NexTag
Yahoo Shopping Optimization (aka Yahoo Product Submit)
Yahoo Shopping is one engine that has made a number of changes this year, most notably instituting category level bidding. Yahoo Shopping is still lagging far behind its status of a few years ago, when it was known as one of the top 3 channels, but Yahoo still packs a punch.
Key CSE Features
Category level bidding…hooray! For a long time merchants were handcuffed by not having many levers to pull in trying to increase traffic. Since search relevancy was based almost entirely on keyword content and past history, it could take a long time for new products and new merchants to gain clicks or sales. Now, Yahoo offers the ability to set bids by category in the Yahoo UI. As good competitive intelligence, Yahoo will also show what the top 5 bids are within each category. This gives a good sense a of how bids should be placed.
Support is also great for Yahoo. Yahoo is one of only a few channels that offer phone support for immediate concerns. Any merchant who has panicked because something is seriously wrong with listings during busy season should be able to appreciate this option.
Potential Hurdles
One potential hurdle is watching out for Yahoo featuring a product on it’s Yahoo Shopping homepage or on other areas of it’s ad network. The product will be featured for a 24 hour period, and the merchant has no advance notice of this. In my experience, a merchant can expect a huge surge of traffic during this time (perhaps 10 times or more than regular amounts). This can create havoc with tight budgets,and usually ROI is not as good. Currently, there is no way to turn this off, or opt out of being featured.
Another possible issue comes with images. Earlier in 2008, I saw several instances where Yahoo retained old images for products. I have not seen this happen recently with Yahoo, but if a merchant sees old images displaying, call into support and ask for a full image refresh. This will fix the issue as Yahoo will flush out all previously saved images and pull directly from current image locations provided in the most recent feed.
Hope this helps, and next post is the ‘monster’ of CSEs: Shopzilla
Optimization Tactics for Shopping.com
Shopping.com should be one of the main priorities for any merchant who uses comparison shopping engines. In reviewing Shopping.com, there are many features that make this engine unique and should be reviewed.
Key Features
Shopping.com offers a cost allocation system where the bid is adjusted based on the quality of the traffic source within the Shopping.com network. In doing so, Shopping.com is providing a great service for their merchants because rates are adjusted by quality. Bidding is only available by category, but if the bid on the item qualifies as one of the top 6 bids, then the product listing is given featured status. If featured status is not available due to higher bids by competing sellers, then Shopping bills the bids at the standard category level rate. This makes Shopping one of the most bid friendly engines in terms of helping their merchants.
Next, check how products are matching up to existing listings. Shopping is one of an increasing number of channels which are focusing much more heavily on matching up offers from different merchants. If a merchant knows that their products are being sold by other companies, then that merchant should be sure to review Shopping’s listings to ensure the products are matching correctly. Shopping uses primarily UPC and MPN, as well as product title, so also ensure these are correct. If sending apparel items, the flood of listings from Amazon has created a surge of size specific listings. Based on this, I would suggest reviewing how apparel items line up and consider using size based or child specific listings.
Lastly, Shopping would want me to encourage everyone to use their ROI tracker which can help monitor the quality of traffic. So consider instaling the ROI tracker (your welcome, Shopping)
Potential Hurdles
In addition to reviewing product listings for matching, also review how Shopping is categorizing items. In Shopping’s backend, there are 3 sections: ‘Categorized Correctly’, ‘May Need Review’, ‘Rejected’. If items are listed in ‘Categorized Correctly’ or ‘May Need Review’, then always spot check, but don’t worry too much - the items are most likely where they should be. If in the ‘Rejected’ section, that means these items are not displayed. You should contact Shopping on this one or check the categories being assigned within the product feed.
If you do need technical support, plan ahead. You will need to go the help and resources section in the Shopping UI, and then submit a ticket. Unlike Yahoo Shopping and Amazon Product Ads, there is no support phone number or email address offered here which has frustrated quite a few sellers. So, if a merchant has an issue and isn’t spending a large amount each month (no assigned account manager), then put in a ticket and anticipate a wait: 24-48 hours is standard.
For the next post, I will continue focusing on first tier engines: Yahoo Shopping
Optimization for Amazon Product Ads
In heading into the busy season of retailing, I will be narrowing focus back down to specific comparison engine tactics and discussion. The goal of these posts is to identify key features of each engine to be aware of, and how these features should be taken advantage of.
The first CSE on the list is Amazon Product Ads. As has been mentioned before, Product Ads is the CPC equivalent to Amazon’s commission and shopping cart based format. This knowledge is key because the Product Ads network must make some key alterations to fit into the existing Amazon format.
Product Listings
When submitting listings to Amazon Product Ads, UPC is even more important here than some other channels (a UPC focused post is coming in the the near future, but an old post is at The Future of Shopping Comparison and The Problem with UPC).
The reason UPC is monumental here, is that Product Ads only goes by product title and UPC to list products. So Amazon is sorting through the products being submitted, and trying to match them up appropriately. Without an ASIN, as served up by the Seller Central focused system, product ads will look to UPC and product title as a guide. If a merchant is selling without UPC, then product title is used exclusively, and this is not based on an exact match. This means completely different products can be paired together under a product page for another completely different product. For example, if a merchant is selling several different kinds of ‘black polarized sunglasses’, then all of these could be grouped together, and the only way the consumer can see they are different glasses is to click on each link…driving up CPC costs greatly.
The take away, either come with UPC or make sure product titles are significantly different.
Key Features
Amazon Product Ads allows bidding on the category level. Make sure to use this feature to gain additional exposure. Also, keep an eye on which categories receive bids. Product Ads will place items in categories which are not being assigned by a merchant. For example, toy jewelry can easily be placed in the real jewelry category by Amazon based on its own internal algorithms. Make sure to check this and keep bids at zero for categories which don’t match up to inventory.
Lastly, Amazon features great support for their programs. A merchant can submit written tickets, or request a phone call. There are still some canned answers here and there, but overall this is one of the best support systems in the industry for technical and listing issues, so be sure to use it.
Hope this helps some companies in handling Product Ads, and I am looking forward to talking about the next CSE, Shopping.com.
Making Cents in a Nonsensical World
As financial giants and elder statesman of the American economy have come crashing down this week, it’s difficult to pull this all together and project forward with what is coming up in the near future. I may not always be perfect in looking at my crystal ball (see Yahoo and Microsoft Impact), but I am definitely not afraid to try.
Near Term Retailing Impact
The near term impact of all the upheaval this week from the stock market drop, to failing mortgages, to the fall of Lehman Brothers, AIG, and others, will be decreased sales as consumer confidence takes a hit.
Wow…suprise, I know.
So 2008 has shaped up as a really tough year (at least I was right on this one, see Wake Up, 01/2008). However, I would expect this trend to continue into Q4. There will be a holiday season as usual, but it will not be as robust as predicted a year ago, and most likely there will be many more low ticket items sold. The silver lining is I would expect the December 26th sales to be a big draw as people look for items that surprise…no one could afford to give to them.
As a retailer, I would focus on froogle friendly products and put together promotions based on consumers not being as free wheeling as perhaps they were a few years ago. In other words, luxury items will be a tough sell. Dito for home improvement goods since fully 5-10% of mortgage payers are struggling keeping up. I would recommend the following:
Free Shipping: Tried and true, and I would lower the qualifying price point as low as possible
Buy ‘X’ and get ‘Y’ free: Push multiple item purchases, bundle when possible. I have a feeling many will be looking to buy an assortment of goods at a discount to hit their gift giving list at once.
Time Sensitive Promos: Pick out some special days, slash prices, and see what you can clear out. This is best if you have a high traffic item or section you can put a promotion on, however a good email list and campaign can work just as effectively. If you can keep a rolling line of promotions so consumers check back throughout the holiday shopping season, even better.
Long Term Impact
Undoubtedly, the economic landscape will be changing quite a bit. If I were really on the ball, I would be looking into starting a financial or investment service, because the pickings really slimmed down for investment banking this week.
For retailers, I would take a scaled approach for 2009. I still believe strongly that the valley will be reached sometime in 2008, and the economy will turn beginning in 2009. I would anticipate much smaller gains next year than in years past for ecommerce. However…and this is the big however…. ecommerce will gain more quickly on traditional forms of retailing like physical stores and print advertising.
The continued increase in communal marketing and usage online will be accelerated by people becoming more local, essentially limited in terms of driving and transportation. More bargain hunters have emerged, and will continue to emerge.
As a retailer, and I am biased here, I would continue to invest in optimized strategies through CSE and SEM usage. However, also look into social networks. As many will tell you, this will be the next big wave as business learns how to take advantage of MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc. I expect company centric groups and communities to spring up around products which are more custom tailored to smaller audiences (insert ‘grass roots’ paradigm here).
Ultimately, there will be change, innovation, and a bunch of new stuff. Youtube type videos will continue to grow, and retailers should expect to be more informative and transparent than ever to gain new clients. It will be fun…
On a side note, I think I will be going back to writing posts during the day. These 1AM musings seem to be a little too philosophical and not as granular/detailed in nature…as I remember that was the point of this blog in the first place…. 
CSE Holiday Rates
So in looking forward to Q4, the first thought that comes to mind circulates around holiday rate increases.
As usual for the 2008 holiday season, expect comparison shopping engines to temporarily raise CPC rates to make sure merchants share the wealth. Expect this to happen starting November 1st and lasting until December 31st. The key to the process is adjusting.
First, make sure you are ready to adjust any product or category level bids. Remember if you are bidding just a few pennies above minimums, and then minimums go up 20% in cost, then your bids will no longer be valid. Instead, you will be scrapping the bottom of product relevancy like merchants who never saw a bidding interface.
After adjusting bids, then make sure to monitor performance. Long before rate increases go into effect, traffic will begin to rise steadily. I suggest carefully monitoring items on a product by product basis to make sure costs are not scaling too far ahead of traffic and sales.
Next, relax. That’s right, relax! Too many merchants get too caught up in the ramp up to busy season, that they loose focus and act like they have had way too many coffees. The problem with that approach, besides alienating fellow co-workers and partners, is that you will miss the details. That’s right - you will be so wrapped up in revving your engine, you will not have the coherency to examine patterns in the right state of mind, so you can see the new opportunities as they emerge.
Lastly, plan for Q1 2009. Remember this is an economy going through pain (see Lehman Brothers). Make sure you are accurately anticipating what the results will be at the end of 2008. If you had inflated figures compared to recent trends, then don’t be afraid to take that into account and set expectations now. Ecommerce is still growing, but not at a 25% clip anymore.
In planning for Q1, also remember to turn bids back to normal minimums in January. Many merchants don’t revert their bids back, and end up paying inflated seasonal costs because their CPC rates are still set at Q4 levels (no, most CSEs will not revert this back for you).
With that said, enjoy the next 2 weeks of relative sanity, ponder what Microsoft is going to do with the Ciao.com purchase (now that Jellyfish aka Cashback is getting it’s act together), and please do tell me what has happened to Google Product in the last few weeks. Geez…
The Reach of CSE Affiliate Networks
One thing to understand when using comparison engines is the way the engines use their own affiliate networks.
When sending a product to the CSE, the product doesn’t only go to display on that engine, but it is distributed to a number of other outlets to pull in traffic. Some sites are reasonably obvious like PriceGrabber using PrecioMania (the spanish version). Others are not so obvious. Even well know sites are fed, sometimes by many sources.
As a quick example of a well known site, CNet takes products from several sources including Shopping.com and PriceGrabber. This can be a great place to advertise products, but also be aware with a large site such as this, that product information needs to be clean and accurate. Potential data inaccuracy or even excessive marketing tactics, can lead to confused consumers.
Lesser known sites can come from a variety of sources. The good news is that many times the engine can work for a merchant to augment traffic patterns by limiting poor affiliates and opening up well performing ones. One of the best examples is Shopping.com’s variable rate CPC system. In this system, Shopping places a value score on their affiliates and then bills accordingly, so many times the billed CPC cost can be lower than advertised minimums.
Cross pollination also happens. This is when a CSE will actually feed to another CSE who is lacking products. This actually occurs more often than most merchants think. The problems with this system is that only select products are sent based on the end destination’s product fill, so there is not as much product control. Also, CPC rates may be less by going through the end destination directly, so a comparison needs to be made.
Ultimately the main take away is that merchants should ask each engine they use about their affiliate networks and how these may be controlled to untilmately improve the ROI on traffic delivered.
Looking Across Ecommerce Borders
So, I am not on vacation, but apparently I am in full reference mode over the past week or so. Today, I ran into Michael Amar’s article, Why Europe is the biggest opportunity in the next couple of years for the American e-tailers.
Expanding business overseas is a favorite topic here at CD, and Michael’s Shop.org article breaks this down pretty well. Good to glance over in thinking about life after Q4.
Online Shopping Taking Steps Forward Despite Economy
Chip Arndt over at eTaildTail wrote a good follow up piece a few days ago that is worth mentioning:
Online Shopping is Recession Proof…Well Almost!
Arndt talks about the contrast between the rising trends in online shopping and declining trends in overall retail. It is thoroughly amazing as retailers are going as far as including online sales in quarterly reports because the marketplace is becoming so large. Advertising expenditures for online advertising is pushing to surpass newspaper advertising thanks to ROI (and saving several forests in the process).
While technology doesn’t provide all the answers, it’s great to watch the impact to helping with the economy, ecology, or just plain efficiency of the world.
Google Insights - Another Great Free Program
For anyone wondering whether Google was great at roiling out free research tools, then take another look.
Google’s new keyword search tool gives a great view into regional and time based patterns related to search. Using several features (that I am still exploring), you can drill down to see how search popularity has changed by region, worldwide. For those enterprising ecommerce cowboys who are looking to integration worldwide online sales, this should help. For those local business looking to tap into the newly profitable local markets based on rising gas and shipping costs, then you need to take a look too. I encourage anyone who wants to relate trends over time and region to take a look here:
(Click for a larger view)
Rise of World Culture
I’ve noticed some interesting trends lately and once again, this is not a new observation that I can claim responsibility for. However, it’s good to pause (best on a daily basis if you can afford the time) and look at your surroundings.
For a long time now American culture has been pushing it’s tentacles into the rest of the world. Whether its Coke, McDonalds, or Levi’s jeans, American culture has been infiltrating other countries for over 30 years now. I remember specifically traveling to Italy back in 1992 and seeing a House of Pain album displayed prominently in a record store (remember the mesmerizing beat and hook for ‘Jump Around‘? - if not, do yourself a favor and click on the link).
New Movement in Mass Culture
The major difference to me now is that the styles and trends are becoming much more pervasive. Previously untouched markets are now merging with what had been a Euro-American dominated cultural movement. A few weeks ago, I noticed a write up on how the Shaolin Temple is now selling online. What!?!?!
The kung fu diseminating, Wu-Tang inspiring, Shaolin Temple has now worked itself so much into popular culture that they have created an online store. In looking through their hosting site, I came across a number of goods being sold in China that look unmistakably…well…very American. Even trendy enough to not quite make it to Walmart/Target yet. See for yourself:
Looking over all this, it seems apparent we are seeing what is the key ingredient for a true world culture. That is a shared identity.
Before when people looked differently, talked differently, had different histories, it was too easy to draw lines of separation and ultimately exclusion. However, similarities are becoming more dominant and inclusion will become the norm. Why write about this in an ecommerce blog? Simple - with new consumers coming with similar tastes as current consumers, the world is getting much smaller and new opportunities now exist. Keeping an eye on these changes should ultimately make a light bulb go off in each of our heads about what will be possible in the coming years.
Yahoo Shopping Bidding - August 13th
Get ready, set, go!!!
Bidding officially launches on August 13th for category level bidding on Yahoo Shopping. As a merchant, it’s a good idea to schedule some time on this day to browse through categories and adjust your (as of the 13th) minimum bids.
I expect as the day and week progress, whatever changes made will loose some traction as other merchants begin to raise bids in their respective categories. Watch out consumer electronics!
So, it’s best to be conservative at first and raise bids at least a few pennies above minimum. Get your products out of the big bin of merchants who are either too lazy, too busy, or too ignorant to take advantage of this new system. Come back in a few days and see how the products are displaying. At that point, start making new adjustments, and with all engines, make sure to check back in a couple of months when dreaded holiday rates begin to kick in. (Officially no word on whether Yahoo will institute holiday increases on bids, but it’s a pretty safe bet).
PriceGrabber Deal of The Day
OK, so this is not exactly breaking news, but it’s definitely worth checking on if you use PriceGrabber to list items.
A couple of weeks ago, PriceGrabber announced they will be launching a Deal of Day of the promotion. The idea is not new, which is highlighting one deal per day (similar to Woot.com).
What is unique, is that PriceGrabber is not charging CPC rates, but is only offering this on a CPA or commission basis. The terms are quite good as well. A retailer need only supply an item for less than the normal advertised price. PriceGrabber posts that item prominently on their site for a single day. When someone purchases the item, the processing goes through PriceGrabber’s Storefront system.
The bottom line: Merchant only gets charged 6.75% commission, plus a small transaction fee of less than $2. The product and merchant are prominently highlighted which also aids in branding. No insertion or set up fees, just tell PriceGrabber what day you want and what product you are advertising.
For those planning on Q4, you’re a little late. Pretty much all of October, November, and December are already taken. However, if you have a seasonal peak outside of those months, this is a great opportunity to highlight products.
Focusing on Price In A Tough Season
Thought there was an interesting article put together by Brian Smith at ComparisonEngines.com. The post highlights the marketing position of the comparison shopping engines and the struggle with price.
Traditionally the comparison engines have struggled with positioning themselves as not strictly a price crawling engine. If comparison shopping were all about price alone, this would instantly exclude 70% of the merchants using engines. To keep these merchants on board, engines need other mechanisms in place to pull in clicks and sales outside of price alone. This creates more competition and when done properly, can increase value for the consumers.
However, in this price conscious time, Smith argues that comparison engines need to play to their strength, which is delivering targeted results so a quick and ultimately price driven query can be delivered.
CSE’s would be wise to find creative ways to drive price conscious sales without necessarily marginalizing merchants. One creative approach is PriceGrabber’s Deal of the Day approach. Focusing on ways to deliver better value to consumers is a win-win formula, especially in today’s marketplace.
eBay and Buy.com = Diamond PowerSeller
A major story has been percolating this week about a situation that has been affecting eBay sellers and looks to reshape the future of the marketplace. For any merchant who has long tried to find a way to get on eBay in a cost efficient way, that day is soon coming. For small businesses who have made a living seller discounted goods, you may want to look over your shoulder.For a detailed view, I suggest the New York Times article here : http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/14/technology/14ebay.html?_r=1&oref=sloginSummary on eBay - Buy.com Agreement
The main point is that Buy.com has secretely (until now) flooded eBay with approximately 5 million listings. For these listings, eBay has charged no listing fees.
The listing fees have been the traditional barrier (in addtion to an auction style format) that has kept many large retailers off eBay. With fixed priced listings becoming the norm, the next stage was getting a retailer with a large inventory on without nasty listing fees, charged on a per item basis. Apparently, this wall has been breached with the Buy.com deal.
Without going into more detail, this means eBay is quickly and aggressively moving to get fixed priced listings as their main revenue source (already happening) and eBay will be targeting more traditional online businesses for expansion.
Actionable: Medium to Large Businesses Not Using eBay
If you are one of these businesses, this means you should be paying attention over the next few months. Expect an announcement by eBay to begin recruiting businesses on negotiated agreements like the one with Buy.com, where items can be sold at an unspecified commission rate, and no listing feeds. This will essentially open up eBay as a marketplace. Like all other marketplaces, goods will react differently here. Mainly this would be an excellent place for overstock items and liquidations.
Actionable: Small Businesses Already on eBay
Start getting creative, because your business is about to change. The flood of more traditional retailers with large inventories could be pushing you out the door. Expect your business to decline as eBay changes it’s growth strategy. You will want to explore new marketplaces like perhaps Amazon, Facebook selling platforms, or elsewhere.
This change from eBay signals that the talk about fixed priced listings has begin full swing, and the result has been including merchants who couldn’t compete before. Having the cheapest price will still get you a long way, but as a smaller business, your marketing needs to take a big step up or your merchandising needs to be just plain outstanding.
Expect to hear more on this as the coming months unfold.
Analytics Webinar - July 17th
Confused about web analytics?
OK, or maybe you know the basics but realize there is probably more to learn. If that’s the case, I recommend checking out the following webinar on Thursday July 17th, at 12Noon EST/9AM PDT:
http://www.elasticpath.com
Besides the many other reasons I can think of why it would be a good webinar to take in, is that it will involve Avinash Kaushik who is an industry leader in web analytics, author of the book “Web Analytics: An Hour A Day” (highly recommended), and author of the blog, Occam’s Razor.
The webinar is hosted by the folks at ElasticPath and promises to be a good investment of time (whether on the east coast lunch or the west coast second cup of coffee). Enjoy -
CSE - Comparison Shopping Engine Optimization
Every few months or so, I think it’s good to put out a general list of things to do when optimizing for shopping comparison engines. A sort of refresher when concepts usually stay the same, but it’s good to mention as a reminder. After all, sometimes the basics get lost when thinking about all the tiniest details.
Categorization
Probably the simplest and most straight forward thing to do. When building out a product feed or just keeping a feed up to date, be sure to properly categorize all items. This means matching products to the comparison engine’s taxonomy or category structure, and ideally done in a careful and methodical manner. Many people simply look for a good fit, but this is only half the story. Many engines automatically revert to a specific category when typing in specific keyword searches. Test for the right category assignments by quickly typing in primary keyword searches as consumers would do. This is hugely important, as many keywords will take you to not-so-obvious categories. Make notes of where the keyword searches lead, and map appropriately.This seems tedious, especially with a large catalog, but is vital to CSE success.
Bidding
Here is the trickiest of the items. Bidding is not an exact science, and will change constantly. Competition will drive up the price during a busy season, and the price will also change depending on category assignments of the items being sent. Always pay close attention to the bidding intelligence in the comparison engine’s control panel, which can sometimes provide great guidance on what other retailers are doing (see Shopping, Shopzilla, Pronto, Become). Also, be careful with category and product level bidding. Many times these overlap (if the engine offers product level bidding), so constantly test different bidding strategies to stay on top of current trends. As a best practice, always bid at least a penny above minimums. This will keep products out the bottom of the bucket where everyone starts off.
Product Title, Product Title, and Product Title
Be very careful of the product title being used. Most heavily weighted in terms of keyword content is the product title. Make sure to include search friendly keywords allowing consumers to find your product. Stay away from any promotional terminology (free shipping, sale), and be detailed. In general, include the Brand at the front, include a descriptive phrase in the middle, and end the product title with the type of product being sold. Example: ‘Acme Bugs Bunny Rabbit Season Yellow Dynamite’
Product Selection
If you are actually sending 100% of your products, hopefully you are only using Google Product Search, or you have amazing merchandising assistance. As with most situations, the 80-20 Power Rule applies here, where a merchant will see 80% of their sales from 20% of their products. Work on actively filtering out products to only display the best. These will change by season and competition, so just like with anything else here, test away. Sending the whole product catalog or even three quarters is usually a recipe for poor ROI.
Hope this helps and if anyone has additional tips, plesae feel free to share!
Yahoo and Microsoft Impact
I’ve stayed clear of reporting on the Yahoo and Microsoft merger until now, because I wasn’t convinced it would happen. Recent events have changed my mind so this becomes a big issue, and should for any online marketer.
I see the two giants coming together because of a recent war of words between Carl Icahn and Yahoo. Icahn, a large share holder in Yahoo has begun pushing for the ousting of Yahoo’s board of directors and Microsoft has essentially backed the effort saying they won’t further negotiate with the current Yahoo powers that be and can kiss their $33 per share offer good-bye. Because of Yahoo not being very transparent or well understood in the handling of the company, I see the current management loosing the PR battle, being ousted in a shareholders’ meeting, and Yahoo moving toward an awkward merger with Microsoft. (Guess I am going all-in on this one)
What this means to advertising
First and most telling, a slow combination will take place where Microsoft’s ad network will merge with Yahoo’s. While bei