Froogle experience? Options

[ninjacat]

Hi All,

I've been asked to look at Froogle (UK) as a possible source of traffic
for a client who currently does well in Kelkoo, Pricerunner and Dealtime.

From what I know of Froogle, it shows crawled results but the higher ranking
(when using the price filters) results are only achieved by means of an ftp feed.
I must say after using the other comparison sites I find Froogle a joy to use in it's simplicity!

I know Froogle is still in Beta at the minute so I'm assuming Big G (Big F?) is getting ready for
an advertising push to get this kick-started. Has anyone here had experience with Frugal
(setup tales, significant traffic?) or an idea of the true launch date?

Any Froogal info in this regard would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

[Respree]

I've been using Froogle.com for about two years now, since their BETA was introduced in the US. I'd agree with you, that it's very easy to use and FTP.

I would presume that the UK version works in the same manner as the US version. Assuming this is true, the results are presented in two blocks, if you will.

The upper (better ranking) block consists of merchants who have submitted their items for sale through the Froogle feed. Following the feed results are the organic results supplied by Google.

The feed is better controlled than the organic results, hands down. You get to say exactly how the listing appears, similar to displaying product pages on a website (with some limitations), including the title, price and description.

One thing to note (and I've forgetten to do this a couple times) is that you have to remember to submit a feed every 30 days. Understandably, Froogle wants to keep their index 'fresh' by removing discontinued products and avoiding stale pricing and product descriptions.

If you forget to submit, you'll have zero listings. However, it's not the end of the world. Simply submit another feed and in a couple of days, all the listings will be live again.

To be frank, there has not been much discussion as to how the 'fed' items are ranked (if you find out, let me know). It doesn't appear to be the same algo as Google. I've got #1 rankings in Google on certain products, but not so on Froogle (although it's high, it's not #1).

That's great you're an early adopter of the UK version. Not much competition with the feeds. However, that won't last for long - I guarantee it. Everybody and their brother will quickly find out it's the best deal in town. It FREE, for starters. And equally important, and perhaps more so, it will take every single listing you submit and index it. The same can't be said for Google.

[Grumpus]

Part of the ranking algo in Froogle is to make sure that your top few results represent a range of prices. If there are products available, it'll try to show you a high, low, and mid price ranged set of items up there at the top. I haven't figured out a great way to capitalize on this, though, but it is useful to know.

While FTP feeding might help, I've managed to get organic results to rank #1 in the past, so I don't really think that using the FTP is a definit key to getting #1 rankings.

G.

[ninjacat]

Hi Respree,

Thanks for posting. I did reply to your post last night but
it seems it didn't make it here God knows what thread
I replied too Many thanks fo your comments and I'm
glad you're having some sucess with Froogle in the US.

Hi Grumpus,

Surely if you have a product which is the cheapest outright , an optimized feed,
AND the viewer selects the "Price: Low to high" filter, that's gotta do it!? I mean
any other algo applied at this point is messing with the 'honesty' of the results
the viewer is asking for surely? I guess it depends on how specific the
search terms are I guess...need to experiment a little.

Thanks Grumpus....looking forward to trying this and posting
my experiences...

[Grumpus]

Yes - if they apply a "low to high" sort, then lowest price would prevail. The downside here is that you aren't going to get many people using that search if you don't have an item that has a unique name. For example, do a search for "DVD players" and then sort low to high. You'll get a bunch of Amazon stuff because they have stuff on their pages with a category that has "$7.00" in it and Google thinks that that is the price of something.

It's rare that you will find what you are looking for if you sort by low to high (or high to low) so people aren't going to use that sort method very often. And, if you can beat the lowest price showing (which in most cases, it's an error, not a real price) then you aren't going to get the sale anyway because your visitor will feel cheated.

Oh - and "new/recently updated" seems to get precidence in the list, too, by the way.

G.

[Respree]

Surely if you have a product which is the cheapest outright , an optimized feed, AND the viewer selects the \"Price: Low to high\" filter, that's gotta do it!?

Well, yes and no. I think one has to keep an eye on the big picture. Half the battle is driving targeted traffic. However, too many people don't stop to consider the half -- what you do with those visitors once they get to your store (i.e. conversions). Sometimes, cheapest isn't always the best. You may have heard the saying, "Good things aren't cheap and cheap things aren't good" or "If something is too good to be true, it usually is."

In some cases, being the cheapest may also lead to the perception of inferior quality or an assumption of poor service. I guess it all depends on your marketing strategy. Of course, there will always be a niche for discount products, but many of the brick and mortar stores that do this successfully are well known. It's somewhat more difficult for an unknown online store to carry the same perceived trust factor.

One way to test the waters to determine what pricing strategies work best for you is to feed Froogle some loss leaders and track your conversion rates on those clickthroughs. You could drive lots of visitors, which convert to no sales. If this happens, you could have other problems with the store itself (i.e. why don't my products listings convert?). It's also possible that you could just as easily convert very well. If so, attractively price more of the same. A small margin on lots of sales is better than a large one with little sales (think McDonalds).

The short answer is test, test and re-test to see if you can come up with a pricing and marketing strategy best maximizes traffic, conversion and profits that best suits your business model.

[ninjacat]

Thanks Grumpus

I definitely need to spend some more time on this.
Looking further at your "dvd players" search I'm
getting all kinds of related results that are not
dvd players as you say. These are results from feeds, since
I can sort them low to high but every dvd accessory
is then shown due to their low price and there's no
mention of 'dvd player' in the title shown which is bad
because that's what I searched for....I realise I'm just
repeating what you already said Grumpus but please
forgive me for thinking out loud

Ok, going to look into the feed requirements now. Surely
there's some initial matching of categories at the time
of processing the feed but if there is, it appears to be
rather fuzzy....back to the drawing board...

Cheers Grumpus.

[ninjacat]

Thanks Respree...you're right of course about
cheapest not always being the best. My client
competes across the UK and beats every other
retailer on his core lines most of the time.

I was hoping Froogle would add a lot more
importance to the feed categories as you
would expect from Kelkoo etc....the way things
are right now, the high/ low sequencing doesn't
work as you would expect as a punter searching
for say 'panasonic dvd players'

> http://froogle.google.co.uk/froogle?scorin...nic+dvd+players

Going to start at the documentation again ....

[Respree]

I'm not that familiar with Kelkoo, but you're forced to work within the parameters of Froogle feed (or whatever program you're feeding) and just make the best of it. It's just inevitable that some will be better than others.

In Froogle's case, I would focus on 'targeted' traffic. It probably depends on what type of business you run, but "Panasonic DVD players," for example, would likely yield far too many results for the likes of most searchers. Its more likely that they have a specific model number in mind, such as "Panasonic DVD Players S27S." To be included in a more specific search, the logical thing to do would be to feed a 'title' in the format of the search phrase above (specifics) and also include that somewhere in the 'product description'.

[whitemark]

Adding to what Garrick said - if you find people visiting your site and yet leaving without purchasing anything, do also check the keywords used before jumping to the conclusion that there's something wrong with the site. General keywords (like "DVD players") are often indications that the person is still in 'research mode' trying to reach a decision. Really start worrying if the keywords are very specific (often indicating that the person is in the 'buying mode'), and yet no purchase is made from you. Naturally, its not a hard and fast rule, just one more thing to worry about. :)

[bwelford]

I thought about starting a new topic but this seems an appropriate one to revive.

I try to keep a big-picture view of the Internet and I must admit Google Orkut and Google's Froogle aren't even on my radar screen. In the case of Froogle, I realize that may be an oversight. I've read some of the Froogle Help, but it doesn't answer the questions I would really like answers to. Please can those who use Froogle help me on some of this:

1. If you are a merchant using Froogle, does Froogle drive much traffic to your website?
2. Does that traffic convert to sales more, less or about the same as average visitors to your website?
3. My understanding is that the Froogle database is part of the Google Base approach. This is quite independent of the regular Google Search database. Is that correct?
4. Are there any benefits at all to organic SEO with Google for your website pages by having your products in the Froogle database?
5. Are there any other questions on Froogle that I should have asked to give me a full understanding of the current position?

Thanks for any inputs on this.

[Respree]

All good questions, Barry.

I've been using Froogle since it's (beta) inception and must say, have been pleased with it in every way. I'll share my observations.

First of all it's free, so you can't beat the price.

Secondly, if you've ever experienced geting products getting index by Google, the Froogle feed is the answer to having all your products indexed (at Froogle).

If you are a merchant using Froogle, does Froogle drive much traffic to your website?

In 2005, Froogle referrals accounted for more than 25 percent of my net sales. Customer acquisition cost = zero.

Does that traffic convert to sales more, less or about the same as average visitors to your website?

My particular traffic log analyzer somehow cannot tell the traffic that Froogle has sent to me, so I can't answer that question with any certainty. If I were to guess, I would say better (since the search is very specific to products, whereas I get people visiting all the time who are not looking for products, per se), however, to what degree, I don't know.

My understanding is that the Froogle database is part of the Google Base approach. This is quite independent of the regular Google Search database. Is that correct?

I'd say that the Froogle and Google databases operate independently of one another. I was hoping this would 'not' be the case. I've experienced some problems with my product pages getting indexed in Google, however, with the Froogle feed, it indexed everything I fed it (in Froogle). Seems so logical they would 'share notes', so to speak (ie. hey, I know of a URL that you don't know about).

Are there any benefits at all to organic SEO with Google for your website pages by having your products in the Froogle database?

None that I can see. Could be wrong, though.

Are there any other questions on Froogle that I should have asked to give me a full understanding of the current position?

The question of the day is, "How do you improve your rankings in Froogle?" It seemingly has nothing to do with onpage optimization or anything in the feed. Again, I'm most likely wrong, but there seems no apparent logic to how they're displaying the SERPs.

This post has been edited by Respree: Mar 10 2006, 01:22 PM

[bwelford]

Thanks, Respree. I think your very complete answers confirm my 'gut feel' about this.

Do others feel the same way, or (even more usefully sometimes) would anyone have a different point-of-view?