The Google Merchant Center has made some changes yet again. Some of these additions will be required, while others will only help your data’s quality.

You can find their press release about it here: http://googlemerchantblog.blogspot.com/2011/07/important-changes-to-google-product.html

Summary:
These changes will take place on 9/22/11.

• A New Google Product Category – This is a new attribute field they’ve added in addition (separate from) to the google product type attribute.
• An Image for every product – One image is now required for every item, and Google can now accept up to 10 additional images per item.
• Availability is now required – Google will now accept your item even if its out of stock.
• Apparel Category – There are some changes to the apparel / clothes category where google is now asking that you include attributes like Size, Color, Gender, and Age Group for any item that comes in variations. IE Shoes that come in multiple colors.
• Google will be checking feeds for accuracy and have noted they will be taking action against accounts that violate their standards. The basic part I took from this is that the price advertised on the CSE needs to be the price on the page.
• Feedperfect is currently being updated to accept these changes.

If you have any questions about this, or anything related to CSEs please feel free to email me. feedperfectblog@gmail.com

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 12th, 2011 at 11:46 am and is filed under Blogroll, FeedPerfect News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.