Amazon Bans Refurbished Ink and Toner Cartridges

 Posted by CPC_Andrew - August 13, 2010 at 8:58 am

AuctionBytes.com reports that effective September 10, 2010 refurbished ink and toner cartridges will violate Amazon’s Condition Guidelines. For the complete story click here.

Merchant Best Practices with Bing Shopping

 Posted by CPC_Andrew - August 12, 2010 at 12:39 pm

This blog is a continuation of CPC Strategy’s comparison shopping engine (CSE) spotlight on Bing Shopping. July’s CSE spotlight detailed Google Product Search.

Merchant Best Practices with Bing Shopping:

Bing Shopping recently turned free at the end of July, marking the end of Microsoft’s Cashback program. The new-found freedom from click costs has attracted new merchants into Microsoft’s comparison shopping space who are looking to compete for free product exposure. Here’s some tips to make your products stand out from the rest.

Include the most relevant information in your Bing Shopping data feeds.

For best results adhere strictly to the Bing Shopping data feed specs found at the end of the Bing Shopping program merchant integration guide.

1. Include as many attributes about your products as possible (UPC, MPN, Brand, Condition, Description, Image, Shipping & Tax Info).
2. Provide the highest quality information for each product. This includes adding high quality product images and clear product titles.
3. Make sure your data feed is updated regularly to account for any changes to your inventory. This improves your product accuracy and consistency.

When you’re dealing with free engines, the best strategy is provide the most complete data about your products. These tips mimic our Merchant Best Practices with Google Product Search.

Microsoft’s move to a free CSE is attracting numerous new merchants, and in our quarterly comparison shopping rankings we note the high conversion rates our merchants experienced on Bing Cashback. With the addition of numerous new merchants and products, a larger body of Microsoft’s unique users will be able to shop for what they want through Bing Shopping. Hopefully traffic increases and conversion rates hold steady. Your key to tap into this free traffic source is to have detailed product information in your data feed.

Here’s a trick to boost your traffic taken from a great article at PracticalEcommerce.com: For the upcoming holiday season, personalize your product descriptions and titles with holiday-relevant terms such as “Christmas Gift”.

The links below contain information regarding Bing Shopping.

Internet Retailer says bye-bye to Bing Cashback

Bing Shopping FAQ

Bing Shopping Program Merchant Integration Guide

Bing Community blog that reports on Bing Shopping

Amazon Product Ads Rolls Out New Bidding Model

 Posted by CPC_Andrew - August 10, 2010 at 9:42 am

Recently Amazon Product Ads released a new bidding model. This model is much like that of Shopping.com’s that takes into account various price points of specific categories. The following is a message sent out to Amazon Product Ads retailers.

Dear Product Ads seller,

On September 30, 2010, we will be changing to a new, more flexible cost-per-click pricing model that takes into account the price of the advertised product. We believe the new model will better align our minimum bid structure with the price of the product you advertise to make Products Ads an even more efficient marketing channel for you. If you have either stopped advertising lower priced products through Product Ads in the past or have decided not to advertise lower priced products due to cost concerns, we recommend that you consider listing those products under the new pricing model.

Under the new pricing model, each product category will be divided into three price tiers based on the price of the product being advertised. For example, the “Baby Products” category will be divided into three subcategories that consist of (1) baby products priced under $25 (with a minimum bid amount of $.10 CPC), (2) baby products priced between $25 to $50 (with a minimum bid amount $.25 CPC), and (3) baby products priced over $50 (with a minimum bid amount $.50). This will give you the opportunity to list more selection across all price points.

To see what this new pricing model will look like and edit your bids prior to September 30, 2010, go to https://sellercentral.amazon.com/advertiser/biddingUI/?itemID=200137680 (log in required). If you do not change your bids (in the Manage New Bids Section) by September 30, 2010, they will be automatically set to the new minimum bids, so please consider whether the new minimum bid amounts are acceptable to you.

Bids set in the new pricing model will be reflected in your Performance by SKU reports and in your invoices generated after September 30, 2010.

If you have concerns about the new pricing model or changes to your minimum bid amounts, or you believe you have been overcharged, please contact our support team using the Contact Seller Support link located at the bottom of any page in your Seller Central account.

Best Regards,

The Amazon Product Ads team

This change will help you lower your cost of sale percentage, especially if you sell inexpensive products in traditionally expensive cost-per-click (CPC) categories. Amazon Product Ads, recently named the best converting comparison shopping engine but also the engine with the highest average CPC rates, is taking proactive steps to improve the marketing channel they provide to merchants. If you don’t have your products listed there, do so today.

Comparison Shopping Engine Spotlight: Bing Shopping

 Posted by CPC_Andrew - August 5, 2010 at 1:08 pm

Each month CPC Strategy is releasing a merchant-oriented Comparison Shopping Engine (CSE) Spotlight. Today’s spotlight features the recent release of Bing Shopping, a free CSE like TheFind.com and Google Product Search. We’ll talk about how it operates and why you should list your products there.

If you missed it last month make sure you check out the CSE Spotlight on Google Product Search.

The top three things you need to know about Bing Shopping:

1. Loading products onto Bing Shopping is free. If you’re new to Bing Shopping you can start the application to list your products here.

2. If you were already on Bing Cashback, keep submitting your data feed and you will automatically be brought over to Bing Shopping. Make sure you remove the Bing Cashback tracking pixel and any related Cashback logos from your website.

3. Many of the same best practices with data feed submission for Google Product Search are critical for your success on Bing Shopping, such as submitting clear, descriptive data and mapping all necessary search attributes into the appropriate categories. Click here for a Bing Shopping sample data feed.

How it works:

It’s interesting to compare how Bing’s search results display compares to Google’s. Here’s the search results for watches (click to enlarge):

You can see a product picture box in Bing’s search results that displays products from the watches query, absent in Google’s search results. Also the related searches menu on the left hand side of the Bing search results can help shoppers make a purchasing decision by displaying the most common searches related to a particular search.

Here’s the same search on Google (click to enlarge):

Here’s a picture of the Bing Shopping interface (click to enlarge):

Update the interface completely to ensure the most accurate information reaches your customers.

It will be interesting to see how Bing Shopping converts for our clients. Bing Cashback recently secured second place for the best converting comparison shopping engine category in our quarterly comparison shopping engine rankings. Now shoppers don’t have an incentive to make purchases through the search engine without the Cashback program, which may have an effect on product conversions.

Another topic we’ll be watching closely is if Bing Shopping’s merchant support system increases their responsiveness. Since Bing Shopping is free expect to see an influx of merchants applying to list their products.

Here you can check out how the late Bing Cashback compared to the other comparison shopping engines. Where will Bing Shopping rank in Q3?

Useful links:

Bing Shopping data feed example

Bing Shopping featured in Internet Retailer

Bing Blog detailing the new Bing Shopping

On Thursday 8/12 the Bing Shopping spotlight continues with a merchant best practices blog. Do you have any questions about Bing Shopping? Post a comment here or e-mail contact@cpcstrategy.com and we’ll get back to you.

CPC Strategy Clients can get Pre-Approved on Bing Shopping

 Posted by Rick - July 30, 2010 at 9:03 am

Bing Cashback, Microsoft’s cost per sale comparison shopping engine, is becoming a free CSE starting July 31.

If you’re a CPC Strategy client and you’re already listed on Bing Cashback you will be brought over to the free Bing Shopping program automatically. If you’re a CPC Strategy client that’s new to Bing Shopping you have the unique opportunity to expedite the approval process to the comparison shopping engine by filling out the form below:

www.cpcstrategy.com/bingsignup

If you are NOT a CPC Strategy client and want us to contact Bing on your behalf, please fill out this form below and we will forward your application to Bing.

www.cpcstrategy.com/bingnewclients

With over 80 million unique users Bing Shopping presents a massive audience to your products. This is a shopping engine you don’t want to miss out on.

Shopping.com Experiencing Product Issues

 Posted by Tien - July 28, 2010 at 11:46 am

Shopping.com is currently experiencing issues with products being listed as rejected or mis-categorized in their user interface.

The main issue is that many products that were previously categorized correctly are now being put in their miscellaneous section, thereby not allowing consumers who browse through categories to find certain products, though they should still show up in searches.

The slight benefit here is that products listed in the miscellaneous categories have the lowest CPC’s, at $0.10-$0.30 depending on price, but again minimizes their exposure.

They’ve notified us that their engineering and product teams are working to resolve the issue, though no exact timeline has been given.

If you’re a CPC Strategy client we’re working to ensure all of your products are being processed and categorized correctly. If you’re a merchant experiencing these problems with your account click on the Help tab at the top right hand corner of your account and then go to the Contact Us tab at the top right hand corner of that page.

We recommend submitting a ticket through the Online Support Form for the fastest results.

Bing Cashback to Comeback as Free Bing Shopping

 Posted by Tien - July 20, 2010 at 9:59 am

After announcing the end of its Bing Cashback platform in June, Microsoft has announced the resurrection of their comparison shopping engine via a free Bing Shopping program, similar to Google’s Shopping/Product Search.

It was an expected move from Microsoft, which generated a bit of buzz around the internet, particularly among customers out looking for a deal.

It also was accompanied by headaches with merchants not being able to get on due to delays among Microsoft’s Bing program, as they were constantly being backloaded with requests to be on there.

For merchants currently on Bing Cashback, Microsoft says there’s not much further action needed to participate in the new Free Bing program:

Q. How do I get started?
A. It is easy to onboard your products into the Bing Shopping program. If you are an existing Bing cashback Shopping advertiser, all you need to do is keep sending us your Bing cashback Shopping data feed after July 30, 2010 and it will automatically go into the new Bing Shopping program for free, subject to the new Bing Shopping program Terms of Use.

Q. Will my existing Bing cashback Shopping data feeds automatically transition to the free Bing Shopping data feed on July 31, 2010?
A. Yes, if you continue to send your data feed to us on July 31, 2010 and thereafter.

So there we have it–nothing further needs to be done at this point for merchants currently on there.

It’ll be quite interesting to see what ever loss of traffic a merchant may experience from consumers not receiving any cashback–to the profit gains a merchant will receive, for the same reason.

However, Microsoft does leave the door open for a CPC program being in their future:

Q. What is the cost to send my product catalog through the Bing Shopping program?
A. At this time we are offering you the opportunity to send your product catalog to Bing Shopping for free. In the future, if we charge for use of the Bing Shopping program or change the requirements to use that are free of charge, we will provide notice pursuant to the Bing Shopping program Terms of Use

Complete information on the new Bing Shopping program can be found here.

Q2 Comparison Shopping Engine Rankings Released

 Posted by Nii Ahene - at 7:57 am

We’ve just released our comparison shopping engine rankings for the second quarter of 2010. Full coverage here-

http://blog.cpcstrategy.com/the-top-ten-comparison-shopping-engines-compared-q2-2010/

Pricegrabber Merchants Can Save up to 26% on FedEx

 Posted by Tien - July 15, 2010 at 4:04 pm

In one of the more unique locations for a banner to be located, merchants logging into their Pricegrabber accounts are now greeted by a special offer from Fedex:

Clicking through to the link takes one to Fedex’s site, where a merchant is presented a chart comparing standard shipping rates vs savings rates, ranging from 20-26% depending on the service.

It’s a very natural pairing of course, combining retailers with a shipping company, but do merchants really want to be pitched within their logins, as un-intrusive as the ad may be?

One must wonder then, is Pricegrabber is charging a CPA or CPC model for this kind of brand promoting?

Become Getting Ready for Halloween, in July

 Posted by Tien - July 14, 2010 at 9:25 am

Every kid’s favorite holiday is off to an early start this year, as Become.com is announcing their launching of a Halloween microsite that’ll allow merchants to specifically advertise and promote their Halloween related listings.

From Mother’s Day to Black Friday, Become has generally been in the forefront when it comes to special promotions in the CSE space.

The actual Halloween microsite will launch on September 7th and will be a portal for consumers to find all things Halloween related. To get set up a merchant can submit a limited feed with 50 containing pertinent information such as titles, descriptions, and URLs:

Here’s an example for individual product deals:

Product title: $10 off Grim Reaper Costume
Description: This costume comes complete with your personal scythe (adjustable handle length and engraved pattern of your choosing), now available at $10 discount with Promocode SPOOK10 while supplies last. The cloak is made from soft velvet and features…
URL: www.yourstoreURL/grimreaper00111
Store Description: Your Store has been in business since 2005…

And for specific category deals:

Deal Description: 10% off Harry Potter Costumes with Discount Code HP2010
URL: www.yourstoreURL/costumes/harrypotter

Remember, it’s never too early to start planning for Halloween, whether you’re a merchant, or a trick-or-treater.