All ecommerce marketing channels handle your data differently. Some are quick and efficient, while others take their time.
Got some warnings or errors? Just modify and refetch the data… but it's not always so straightforward—and even when it is, surely you don’t want inaccurate product listings or faulty ads until those problems are fixed.
That’s where a strong validation system makes all the difference.
Product feed validation with GoDataFeed
One of the benefits of using GoDataFeed is that you don’t ever have to blindly submit your feeds and troubleshoot live products.
When a feed compiles, our system assesses fields for different data scenarios and then generates relevant validation messages to help guide troubleshooting and optimization efforts.
Our feed validation system delivers quick updates as you go resolving issues. It even enables you to troubleshoot feeds before they're ever formally published.
Validation messages can be found on a feed's Products page and can be downloaded in a number of ways:
- Validation summary: the download button above Validation messages gives you a concise CSV report of all messages and the SKU count of what they affect. You can also click into a validation message and then download the summary of one particular message.
- Validation details: the download button above products list gives you a CSV report of all products and the issues that affect each one. If you download these details when inspecting a specific message you’ll get a report of all affected products.
- Feed preview & full validation report: the download button on the left side column gives you a feed preview and the full extended validation report.
Traditionally, our validation messages ranged from missing required or optional data to whether a value was supported by the channel. We’ve always been on the lookout for and have reported compliance issues with our validation engine.
Now we’re expanding the capabilities of that engine to better set up our users for success.
Enhanced validation messages
Enhanced validation messages cover a broad range of issues and optimization suggestions. They offer additional details and reference links to aid in troubleshooting.
Channels with enhanced messages also get a whole new class of optimization-based messages, Info messages. These messages suggest optimization tips that may help your products better perform on that specific channel.
Enhanced validation messages are currently limited to our Google Shopping Merchant Center feeds but we’re working on enhancing validation messages across the rest of our feed templates.
With this initiative, we've also adapted the way these messages are displayed.
Message groups
New message groups bundle message types together so that you know the urgency of all messages at a glance.
Validation message groups:
- Info messages point toward areas that can be optimized for better performance.
- Warnings reflect non-critical issues. Warnings deserve some attention but don’t stop products from going live.
- Errors highlight critical issues that prevent products from being published. Errors need to be resolved for affected products to go live.
Navigation & experience
These updates to our validation system introduce some other changes that add to the overall GoDataFeed experience:
- Enhanced sorting options let you sort feed products by error, warning, and info.
- See the status of a SKU, whether included or excluded and easily manually exclude one or more SKUs without writing a filter rule.
- All info and warning messages are dismissible. Any message that isn’t an error can be disabled via the disable button located on the top right of any applicable message. To re-enable any disabled messages, you can do so in a feed’s template settings under Validation rules.
Remember, you'll need to recompile feeds as you address issues in order for changes to go through—that includes enabling/disabling validation messages.
Be great, validate
You shouldn’t need to wait for a channel to tell you where your data can use improvements. After all, one turns to a catalog manager to be more efficient, consistent… more effective.
We’re constantly working on enhancing our feed validation experience.
Soon you’ll be able to see the affected values on screen without having to download a feed and search for it in a spreadsheet program. We’ll also be adding shortcut actions to help you make changes faster from a specific message.
Looking for more info? Drop us a line! Want to see GoDataFeed in action? Feel free to request a demo.
