Data Feed

Creating the data feed

What are the minimum requirements for a data feed?

The feed must contain at least the mandatory fields we demand to make a connection to our platform. If one of these fields is missing or it isn’t filled correctly, then your feed won’t be connected.

What are these mandatory fields?

*productEAN is not mandatory, because it’s not always available in certain categories. However, it’s the productEAN that makes the automatic connection with other suppliers possible, which leads to a relevant comparison for the consumers. Manual connection per product is not possible, so we recommend that you add productEAN to the data feed.

Pay attention to these things:

• Add as many EAN codes as possible. This is really important with all the electronic devices.
• It’s highly recommended that all the products have unique names ja they have a specific category.
• We recommend that you add a trackable link as the deep links, so you are able to monitor the results more specific. We only deliver the basic data (clicks and cost) in our PartnerNet. We do not measure amount of orders or traffic.
• Every product needs to be unique. Do you sell different variations (sie. size, color) of the same product? You should always list these as separate rows and add the specifying detail as it’s own column.

If you are currently using Google Shopping or other comparison sites, please ask us if we could use that feed.

Optimizing the data feed

What are features and how do I add these to my feed?

The most common features are size, color, material and gender. These four features are mostly used for fashion categories and are less relevant for categories like for example home trainers, sofas or beds.

Each category has its own important features and a consumer should always have the possibility to filter on certain features to find the desired product. It’s important that you add as many information to the feed as possible.

Keep in mind that not every feature is relevant for each category. Below you’ll find some examples.

It’s your own responsibility to add the correct features for each category. When you can’t find certain features on our category pages, we can always add these for you. Add the desired features to your data feed and let us know that you want us to use these.

How can I implement Vertaa’s categorytree in my feed?

In your data feed there are two fields to define the category for a product (category and subcategory). Our categorytree contains a theme, subtheme and category name. In the feed, you should use like this:

• The category field will get the following filling: theme > subtheme
• The subcategory field will get the following filling: categoryname

So, subcategory has the deepest level to define the category for a product. Below you’ll find some examples for the filling for of these two fields. The examples are straight from the categorytree.

Deals in feed

What are deals?

Deals are special offers that you can add to your product feed. There are different types of deals:

• DISCOUNT          in case buyer gets a discount (€ or %)
• CASHBACK          in case buyer can get a cash back after purchase
• FREE_GIFT in case buyer gets free products after purchase
• SERVICE        in case buyer gets extra service after purchase
• BUNDLE        in case buyer gets multiple products for a discounted price

How do I add the deals to my feed?

REQUIRED FIELDS:

• dealType
• dealEndDateTime
• dealRedeemDateTime (in case of CASHBACK)
• dealPromotionText (max 150 characters)
• dealDiscountAmount OR dealDiscountPercentage (one needs to be defined)

Example:

NOTE: deliver product prices WITHOUT the discount amount/percentages. We calculate those automatically. If your price is already with discount we are not able to show from/to prices!

I’ve just added the deals to my feed, what do I do?

We recommend you to always contact us if you made any changes to your feed. The first time you set up the deals, we need to configure them. After that the changes within the content are automatically updated to our system, if the structure is not changed.
Please use the following guidelines if you send an e-mail about feed changes:

• Subject e-mail: Data feed changes * name of your shop *
• Give a clear explanation about which changes you made: added/removed fields etc.

If all is as clear as possible, we can adjust your changes fast.

Technical details

Which format should I use?

The most suitable format is an XML file (UTF-8). This format has the advantage that you can easily add or remove
columns in the product feed without any impact on the process.

If necessary, we are able to work with a CSV-file (UTF-8). Each line in your product feed can contain data from one
single product. To separate the different columns in a CSV file you should use separators. If you use enclosures
(“…”) in your CSV file, then make sure to escape any double quotes that appear in the fields (A”B should be
enclosed as “A””B”).

The separators we support:

• | (Pipe)
• ; (Semicolon)
• , (Comma) Always use enclosures ´´….´´ if the comma is used as separator!

How can you access my feed?

The product feed is hosted by you or a third party on an external location where we can access the feed. Just make sure that you deliver us the correct address for the feed and allow these following IP addresses:

For feeds and images:
78.152.32.16/28 – CG DC1-1 IPv4 + office utrecht
78.152.40.109/28 – CG DC1-2 IPv4
2a02:d28:5580:45:1181::/64 – CG DC1 IPv6
217.100.103.200 – 217.100.103.207 – Zwolle ziggo My-Office (217.100.103.200/29)
193.65.45.246 – Finland office

We renew the product data at least once a day.

FAQ

Can I use the same feed file on the other Compare Group websites?

We use the same product feed structure on all of our websites. However, please note the country-related delivery times, prices and languages in the feed file. Use Dutch for Vergelijk.nl and Vergelijk.be, French for Comparer.fr and Comparer.be and Finnish for Vertaa.fi.

Can I have second-hand, used and returned products in my feed?

We only compare new products: used, returned, samples or second quality products etc. are NOT allowed in the product feed.

I’ve adjusted my feed; does Vertaa automatically adjust the changes I made?

We recommend you to always contact us if you made any changes to your feed. If you change the filling of certain fields, it’s not necessary to contact us. Did you change the sorting of the fields, the names of the fields or did you add any fields? Always contact us by e-mail or phone, because we must check the feed transformation. Please use the following guidelines if you send an e-mail about feed changes:

• Subject e-mail: Data feed changes * name of your shop *
• Give a clear explanation about which changes you made: added/removed fields, changed field names, etc.

If all is as clear as possible, we can adjust your changes fast.