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heritagelaceandtreasuresboutique



Posts: 126

PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 1:41 pm    Post subject: Google Shopping Reply with quote

Has it been posted anywhere what decision Ecrater is going to make in regards to the Google feed, since Google is making all of the big changes.

Will our items submitted to Google by Ecrater be stopped by Ecrater? It would be know to know what Ecrater's plans are.
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MoonwishesStore
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Posts: 17389

PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 3:37 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

I haven't seen any definitive post yet by ecrater.
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heritagelaceandtreasuresboutique



Posts: 126

PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 4:14 pm    Post subject: Google Shopping Reply with quote

This is a very concerning matter. I have been on other forums of which I sell on the sites and that is a big topic right now. Business is down and way down for many and much is attributed to the Google changes that are already being implemented.

Sure hope that Ecrater comes out with what they plan to do shortly.
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MoonwishesStore
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Posts: 17389

PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 4:27 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Business is down and way down for many and much is attributed to the Google changes that are already being implemented.


Same here. It is a much discussed topic. You do have the option to pay for adwords for your store if you wish, but what ecrater in itself can do for us, I'm just not sure as I doubt they are going to fork over for adwords for all and still leave this a free place to sell. What is important is that each seller figure out as best they can what they should do themselves to get themselves out of this rut. Whenever I wish that google was an entity that I could chew out, I remember that they have never made a promise to any of us to help us make money or sell out goods.
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oakteakstore



Posts: 1050

PostPosted: Wed Aug 08, 2012 8:30 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Paying for adwords has the potential to cost small sellers an absolute fortune. And once you bid on one of the adwords campaigns, you have no control over the final fees, since you are bidding per click and no one knows the quantity of clicks, it is a total unknown, except after the fact. I think Google is expecting people to pay 40 cents per click or more. That could ad up to a huge amount. I think you can pay as little as 1 cent per click, but if someone else bids more per click, you will lose out in visibility. It is a bidding thing.

This is for only the most monied sellers, huge store and companies.
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MoonwishesStore
moderator


Posts: 17389

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 7:41 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I had coupons several times for $100 worth of adwords. You would have thought that they would have manipulated the results somehow so that I would have gotten a FEW sales while using adwords promting me to continue using them. But alas, no. I couldn't find a single sale that I could attribute to adwords. Most likely I was doing something wrong, but I don't have gobs of money to throw around while I try to figure it out. If I thought that paying $100 a month would bring in $1000-1500 a month, I would be willing to pay it. But spending $100 every 10 days (that is all I ended up with both times) for zero profit is a sure fire way to go broke and unsuccessful fast.

The problem for many of us from an article I read the other day is that Google, from the day (if not before) they announced that the change was coming, was already changing things and we all seemed to slide under the radar immediately. We need to figure out some way to stay above the radar and I'm sure not clear on that yet, but working on it.

Too little time, too much to do! Rolling Eyes
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RustyFarmall



Posts: 1300

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 7:57 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

The answer, in my opinion, is to start promoting "BING" every chance we get, and do our best to discourage the use of Google shopping.

For quite some time now, my store items have shown up in Bing shopping with much more relevance than what Google ever did.
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SheilaDeesPostcards
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Posts: 4614

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 9:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

RustyFarmall wrote:
The answer, in my opinion, is to start promoting "BING" every chance we get, and do our best to discourage the use of Google shopping.

For quite some time now, my store items have shown up in Bing shopping with much more relevance than what Google ever did.
I agree with the promotion of Bing. Recently I'm searching more and more on Bing because I'm getting the information I request when the information was not given by Google in the first 2 or 3 pages. (I wasn't looking for products being offered for sale; I was looking for specific information.) Bing Shopping would be more revelant if it offered used items. We need to all email Bing Shopping as buyers to request they change their restriction on used items.

I was told in the past a feed is sent by eCRATER to Bing Shopping, but they only accept new items. As a seller, I looked into sending a feed for a stand-alone website and discovered 4 things.
1) They give a template for a feed and it includes a field for condition.
2) The condition field is not a required field.
3) They state they are only accepting new items for Bing Shopping.
4) It appears either the rules have changed, there are marketplaces sending feeds that omit the condition field, or some marketplaces are paying for feeds to Shopping.com which is fed to Bing Shopping without the condition field.

I would think if Bing Shopping got enough emails from buyers who want to see used items on Bing Shopping, they may reconsider their policy.
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vintagecornerstore



Posts: 151

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 10:51 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

As I mentioned in an earlier thread, I had had a phone call from Google encouraging me to sign up my main website for this program. (I have 1700 items on that site.)

I've had two followup calls from them, and on the last one (just today) said that I wasn't interested in the program. I said that I would probably look into putting things on etsy, since it is a destination site. She sounded genuinely quite disappointed, and I wonder if a lot of sellers are giving her that answer.

The truth is, if Google shopping only features the "big box" and like stores, I question how many people will use them. Google may be coming to the same conclusion. At least I hope so. (Heavens knows, they have rolled out quite a few unsuccessful programs that they have since ditched.)
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oakteakstore



Posts: 1050

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 12:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

It's interesting that I am still getting sales, however now my sales are being processed mainly by PayPal. Prior to this, Google Checkout (Wallet) was the preferred method. Maybe Google is suffering from this move with their Checkout sales.
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jigsaw-puzzle-palooza



Posts: 822

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 3:29 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

oakteakstore wrote:
It's interesting that I am still getting sales, however now my sales are being processed mainly by PayPal. Prior to this, Google Checkout (Wallet) was the preferred method. Maybe Google is suffering from this move with their Checkout sales.


My sales in July were pitiful and for whatever reason are back close to my average in August but nearly EVERY one of my sales has been paid with PayPal also.
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MoonwishesStore
moderator


Posts: 17389

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 3:31 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Quote:
Prior to this, Google Checkout (Wallet) was the preferred method.


Don't know why, but I have been getting at least half my sales paid through GCO even though that amount had dropped alot in the last few months. It is just August now that it picked back up.

I do hope that Google finds that they had a bad idea for what they are doing. The big box stores don't need the shopping site as who doesn't know about Amazon and ebay, etc. Customers would go straight there and both sites have their own search engines. The reason Google's search was so good was it lead people to the obscure items, now I'm not sure what they are leading people to as when I do a search for a non-sale item, it takes some work to find what you are looking for and it has only gotten worse.
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FoxAndFish



Posts: 1585

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 6:26 pm    Post subject: Re: Google Shopping Reply with quote

heritagelaceandtreasuresboutique wrote:
Business is down and way down for many and much is attributed to the Google changes that are already being implemented.

eCrater sellers are still showing in Google Product Search...and for my part, my items are showing up better than they have since the disastrous Google MayDay algorithm change and loss of eCrater indexing in 2010. For the first time in more than 2 yrs, some of my products are the first item on the first page, ranking appropriately ahead of the non-relevant nonsense that the search results had been returning.

But sales have tanked, on other venues than just eCrater. And since it can't be attributed to Google Shopping changes, which, according to Google, don't take full effect until October, what does that tell us?

It tells me, at least, the same thing it did 2 yrs ago: it's not that eCrater sellers weren't working hard enough, not promoting enough, not blogging enough, not sprinkling enough backlinks across the net, not studying SEO enough, and all the other things that sellers at the time got blamed for. It's Google doing things they're not announcing publicly while trying to distract users with the things they want to or have to announce publicly.

As we were discussing in another thread entitled "Looks like Google organic is being influenced by paid ads" at http://community.ecrater.com/viewtopic.php?t=31388 ... that could very well be part of what's happening.
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FoxAndFish



Posts: 1585

PostPosted: Thu Aug 09, 2012 6:45 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

vintagecornerstore wrote:
if Google shopping only features the "big box" and like stores, I question how many people will use them. Google may be coming to the same conclusion. At least I hope so.

I'm not as optimistic.

Google doesn't really care or need to care how many people use their search engine. That is now irrelevant. The only thing that matters in a pay-to-play system is who pays. Not who uses. Google can be certain that large entities such as eBay and Amazon will pay, b/c the perceived benefit of showing in a Google search engine outweighs the fees, which are not even a drop in the bucket for internet ad budgets of $173 million (eBay) and $199 million (Amazon).

Google can guarantee a certain number of eyeballs based on its standing as the leading search engine. Even if usage drops somewhat, no other search engine comes close to capturing the market...so companies with big budgets pay to advertise with the leader, b/c they are the least-risk game. And even if this move decimates search eventually, Google will get enough income out of it to make it worthwhile for a few yrs or however long it lasts...until they have to do something else to squeeze out return for their investors.
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lastade-designs
moderator


Posts: 2903

PostPosted: Fri Aug 10, 2012 3:34 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

In this article, http://www.ecommercebytes.com/cab/abn/y12/m08/i10/s05, I found this quote:
Google's #1 stated intention with this change (and even the title of their blog post announcing it), is building a better shopping experience for consumers.

I tried out a few titles from my listings, some are there, some are not.

But- they are on the first page of the search. If someone is searching for an item like mine, I don't believe they will click on shopping if they can find it on search, so maybe small sellers that sell in specific niches will be ok. I don't know about the people that sell stuff you can buy at big box stores. I don't think they will fare as well.
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