Red Ink Diary

Anyone can upload their product to Google. Doing it correctly and getting it found is the trick, followed by getting it seen before your competition’s items. So, as a small or micro-seller what can you do to improve your ranking?

First, the obvious

• Title - use key phrases, this is organic search. “Suggested maximum length of 70 characters”. For example the angel Christmas ornament shown below was listed for a long time as “Repro Victorian Die Cut Embossed Christmas Angel Ornament” all of which are good accurate describing words, but many do not rank high on searched words. I am hoping that using “Christmas Ornament Swedish Angel Tree Candle” will do better.
• Price - lower ranks higher among comparables
• Description - 150 characters and spaces will be your ‘hook’, what appears in the Google Shopping search. Use the key words and phrases you couldn’t get into your title, do not repeat within the first 100 characters and spaces. Bullets seem to gain brownie points. As an example here are the first 150 characters and spaces in my ad. “Large angel or Saint Lucia carrying a lighted candle and a Christmas tree This is a beautiful old fashioned paper ornament reproduced from an antique” note that I have eliminated commas and periods to be able to get in the word “antique”. Rules for Google Checkout Buy Now buttons are a little different, you put your 100 character description into the button maker so what you write next to the picture has very little weight.

No duplication: this is a new Google rule. You may list the same product on many venues, your website etc. but Google will reject the listing, even with different price, description, title etc. The policy is very clear.

“We do not permit duplicate products in the same account or between multiple accounts. If products are available on multiple sites under the same ownership, one site must be chosen to exclusively submit those products. For example, if you own two websites that sell the same product, you may not submit that product for both sites, regardless of pricing or promotional differences.”

Attributes!

Attributes are simply data written in a form Google can access and translate.

Here is where it gets tricky. Google has very strict rules and they are (oddly) not very good at making them easy to find. Here is a complete list of all attributes defined by Google Product Search in the new Merchant Center.

Some attributes are required, leave them out and your product is out. If you are selling on a Marketplace venue that submits feeds to Google they should, if they know what they are doing, submit the information you have included in your listing.

• condition - choose from new, used or refurbished
• description - Google says “Text, up to a maximum length of 10,000 characters. Ideally greater than 15 characters and 3 words. Do not include promotional or boilerplate text, such as “Free shipping!” or “Click here now!”
• id - A unique alphanumeric identifier for the item i.e your SKU If you sell on Bonanzle the site allocates an identifier if you do not.
• link - The URL of the web page associated with the item. This should not forward to another URL; it must point directly to the target page.
• price - fixed price only, use this format  4.95 or 20.00, free items do not appear in Google Product Search.
• title - Google does not like all CAPS, non relevant symbols like exclamation points, asterisks, more information is found in Editorial Guidelines

The not so secret search boosters

1. Offer Google Checkout; this should not come as a surprise. The argument that you only offer PayPal because it is required on eBay will cost you ranking on your website items.
2. Use the optional payment_accepted and payment_notes attributes in your website feed. On Bonanzle, which does xml feeds, add this at the bottom of your listing. [[ payment_accepted:Visa payment_accepted:Cash payment_accepted:Mastercard payment_notes:Google Checkout]] Be sure to leave no space on either side between the colon and the attribute but do leave a space between multiple attributes, which (on Bonanzle) must all be enclosed in the one set of brackets.
3. Reviews - Think of Google Checkout Reviews as Google Feedback. As Bonanzle sellers we all need to get into the habit of completing Google Checkout reviews on our eligible purchases on the site. They carry an incredible amount of ranking weight. The more sellers with positive reviews we have on Bonanzle the better we will all do.

To enable reviews on purchases check off the review box when you make a payment. Google will email you a review form after you have had time to receive the purchased item. To make reviews on past Google Checkout purchases and learn more about the Google seller review process click here.

Y’all come back!

Christmas Ornament Swedish Angel with Tree and Candle $5.00
Large angel or Saint Lucia carrying a lighted candle and a Christmas tree This is a beautiful old fashioned paper ornament reproduced from an antique. A complex die cut (with interior cuts, not just around the outside) she is printed on both sides, embossed, and has a gold hanging cord.

Shipping to anywhere in the USA is included in the price.

Size approximately 5-3/4′ tall and 4″ across

Big news for Australian sellers!

Google Australia recently applied to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) and was granted a financial services license to provide deposit and payments services to local merchants and shoppers.

Australian buyers have been able to pay overseas merchants through Google Checkout for some time.

We’re not saying

As usual Google Australia is non-committal as to when they will be ready to roll out the service. Spokesman Rob Shilkin confirmed that the company was working on options to roll out an internet payments platform in Australia. “It’s a matter of doing the due diligence and the homework so that if we’re in a position to launch we can do it,” he said. “But no decision has been taken.”

Other news from Google down under

Google announced a new dashboard in the Local Business Center in Australia and New Zealand to help business owners understand how people are searching for their online business listings. The dashboard will show which search queries led users to the business and how many times users clicked through to the business’ website.

Google spokesman William Easton said

“This Christmas consumers are researching their purchases online more than ever before – whether it’s Christmas presents, travel plans, local restaurants or home furnishings. There’s a significant opportunity for Australian businesses both small and large to tap into search marketing to further drive Christmas sales. There’s still time in ‘09 to be found online.”

“The most important thing is that retailers need to be conscious about ensuring they show all the information they would in a normal store. They need to have information about what products they sell, the places they sell them and their availability.”

Easton told retailers the more information a business has available on a website, “the more informed the customer is…and therefore the more likely they are to buy”.
To help new customers Google is offering vouchers for a $100 AdWords search marketing campaign.

Y’all come back!

Effective May 5th 2009 Google Checkout will increase fees with a new tiered fee structure, where the rates will vary depending on the dollar amount of your monthly sales processed through Checkout.

The free transaction processing promotion with the purchase of Google AdWords will also end as of May 5th, this is no real surprise as AdWords have not proved cost effective for smaller merchants with limited promotion budgets.

For small sellers this brings the cost of Google Checkout up to parity with PayPal.

Although I am not happy with what is effectively a 33% increase in processing fees, the back end and administrative convenience factors of Google Checkout are what will ensure my continued preference of Checkout over PayPal.

As a buyer I like the one click checkout and being able to use my credit card without being forced through a series of five screens each defaulting to PayPal’s preferred payment option, not mine.

As a seller I like having funds automatically deposited to my bank in 48 hours, not having to request a withdrawal and then wait 4 - 5 days, which PayPal will blame on my bank.

Most of all I like the simple fact that Google Checkout does not belong to eBay.

Y’all come back!

Today I had the great honor of being a guest on Marlene Gavens radio show, Tips From the Top with the Savvy Seller.

We discussed building trust and credibility as eCommerce merchants and seller motivation. I found the experience simultaneously terrifying, it is recorded live, and useful.

The simple act of writing a memorandum of what I know to be best practice showed me areas in which I need to take my own advice, and quit cutting corners.

You can listen by clicking the green button, FYI the program runs about 45 minutes:

Thank you Marlene for inviting me!

Y’all come back!