New EU Feeds

We’re very excited to announce the release of faster, fresher feeds in the EU. This is basically the same story as the US, with a few tweaks:

• We have changed the response to single offer per JSON line. This is also being rolled out to the US.
• Inclusion of PID (product ID) when available
• Inclusion of markdown price/markdown percentage

But, here are the overall basics:

• Contains all our paid CPC merchant offers
• Generated every 6 hours
• Formatted in JSON, single offer per line
  • File structure:  Root → Folder per merchant (merchant ID) → Data files by category (atom)

FTP location:  publisherftp.shopzilla.com

FTP IP:  67.201.52.146

If you would like access to our new EU feeds and/or view additional documentation, please contact us.

Important: Shopzilla Infrastructure Maintenance on 6/4

Publishers,

We will be undergoing a configuration maintenance event on Wednesday, June 4 that will have potential short term implications for our services. This infrastructure maintenance will take place from 9 PM to 12 AM POST, and during this time the publisher portal will be largely inaccessible. Furthermore, we expect the possibility of short term slowness via the API, but will be making every effort to limit any speed issues to as short of period as possible.

This will only impact our US API, and has no impact on our EU properties.

Thank you for your patience during this maintenance period.

Important Message about the Feeds and API URLs

Happy Friday!

We have a number of announcements to make about changes to our APIs and Data Feeds that we want to share, and provide information that you will need to make any necessary adjustments needed on your side.

 

For Data Feed Consumers -

We have recently started publishing faster, fresher data feeds that will reduce latency in delivering merchant offers to market. Some key highlights include:

• Generated 3-4 times a day for faster consumption on the publishers’ end. Over time, this number will increase to 5-6.
• Formatted in JSON instead of XML to further speed consumption
• 3-5MM+ Additional offers that were not available in the feeds due to the increased processing bandwidth (note that these offers were previously available in the API).
• New file structure to provide more flexibility: Root à Folder per merchant (MID) à Data files by category (atom)
• A subsequent release will contain some additional attribute data not included in this version of the feeds

We will continue to support the current XML feeds for later this summer, at which point we will deprecate these feeds to focus on improved processing times of our new feeds. If you are using the current feeds, make sure to work with our team to start the migration process.

If you would like access to these new data feeds, or the full documentation, please contact us.

 

For API Consumers -

The key change regards our redirect URL, which has been translated in both the feeds and the API into a “shortened URL” that will allow us to generate the content much more quickly and efficiently.

For publishers that may have previously extracted the merchant destination URL from the redirect URL, we are moving this into a separate field named <rawURL>. This can be used for matching purposes, etc, but keep in mind that this URL can not be monetized – only our shortened URL will be monetized. Note that this URL structure will be the same in the new feeds.

To enable time for publishers to make any necessary adjustments, we will release this new URL structure to the API on June 9^th.

Please keep an eye out for more product announcements coming soon!

Important Changes to the Beso Rewards Program

We are sad to announce that on November 1st, we are going to suspend the Beso Rewards program. To begin the transition, we are closing the program to new members as of September 9th. Existing Beso Rewards members can continue to use the program until November 1st, when we will fully sunset the program.

The long and the short of it is that it takes a lot of manpower to keep Beso Rewards going, and those are resources we've decided we'd rather plow into our just-launched Shopping Feed, which celebrates the best shopping on the web, all personalized to your style. We think it's pretty great, and hope you do too! Check it out on the home page of Beso.com.

Also, if you haven't checked out our iPhone app, we hope you'll download it and take the Shopping Feed along in your pocket. We haven't abandoned Android fans out there, as we launched in the Google Play store just this week – you can be the first to download it! All feedback is always welcomed at [email protected].

For those of you who are avid Beso Rewards users, all is not lost: if you have a blog or website, you may be a welcome addition to our official Beso Affiliate Program. We are reaching out to many of you personally, but if you believe would be an appropriate fit for the affiliate program, don't hesitate to apply here. You can send any questions to [email protected].

Thanks again for your patience and for being a Beso Rewards user!

Product UPC, SKU, and Brand now available in the API

Thursday May 23^rd we will be updating the Product Service in the Catalog API to include new elements in the Product Service response. Below is a description of which new elements will appear in the feed and when they will appear:

Product Responses

When the Product Service is returning a Product object (that is an object with an assigned Product ID and one or more offers aligned to that Product ID) we will now also return the Brand ID and Brand Name for that product along with any Product SKUS that align to that Product ID. An example of an updated response with the new elements highlighted is depicted below:

Offer Responses

For each Offer object that is returned (whether it is aligned to a Product ID or not) we will now also return Brand ID and Brand Name along with the product UPC (alongside the SKU which we have always provided at the offer level when we have it available). An example of an updated response with the new elements highlighted is depicted below:

If you are correctly integrating with the catalog API, then neither of these changes should have any impact on your site unless you choose to include them. If you have any issues at all or any questions about this update please contact us any time.

Lower Publisher Payment Threshold

We recently announced some significant changes to the Shopzilla terms and conditions.

One of the more exciting changes is that we have lowered the payment threshold. Until February 2013, in order to receive a payment, you have to have earned at least $50 in affiliate income. Now the threshold is only $25!

This means more publishers will be eligible for payments, so we have included answers to questions we’ve recently received in an effort to prevent any delayed payments.

Do I have to have a PayPal account?

Yes. You will need a PayPal account to receive commissions. If you don’t yet have one, you can sign up here. If you do not supply a PayPal account, a check may be sent. However, checks often take up to an additional 30 days to arrive.

What if I need to change my PayPal email address?

If you need to change the email address that we use to send payments (the email address associated with your PayPal account), please contact us and let us know your Affiliate ID, old PayPal email address, and the updated PayPal email address, and we will get the change made for you.

When will I be paid?

As long as you have earnings above $25, you will be paid within 45 days from when the payment period ends. So the payment for January would be issued on or before March 15. If you haven’t earned $25 since your last payment, we’ll pay within 45 days after you’ve crossed the threshold.

Bizrate IAB-sized Widgets

We've received several requests from our publishers for IAB-sized widgets. You asked, we heard! We're pleased to announce that they're available in the following sizes for the Bizrate Product Search Widgets:

• 728x90
• 300x250*
• 160x600
• 300x600

*Please note that the 300x250 widget may not feature products seamlessly.

Users are able to select either the standard units or previously existing width-height variety, but not both.

If you have any questions, please contact us!

Updated Terms and Conditions

Periodically we review the standard terms of our program and we have recently gone through this process resulting in a few modifications, which include the following:

• Minimum Payments – To help our seasonal publishers who may not generate large amounts of commission on a monthly basis, we’ve reduced the monthly minimum for payments to $25.
• Payments via PayPal – While payment by check remains the standard, we may now offer payments via PayPal. Please keep your email address on your account up-to-date because your email address would be used for PayPal payments.
• New Privacy Policy Requirements – Shopzilla takes online privacy seriously and we appreciate that our publishers do, too. Please review our privacy policy and update your privacy policy to ensure it meets the new requirements. To help you, we’ve included a sample policy that you can start from and make your own.

You can find the revised terms here. Your continued use of the Publisher Program confirms your acceptance of the revised terms. If you have any questions, please contact us!

Paypal Delays with Beso Rewards Payments

Beso Rewards Members –

A number of our dear Beso Rewards users have reached out over the weekend because they have not yet received their Paypal payment. We greatly apologize for this delay, and have found the source of the problem. This is unfortunately an error Paypal is experiencing with their handling of mass payments, which they referred to in their commerce blog on Friday. We have confirmed with Paypal that the mass payment error is fixed, but the next step on their part is to re-route the funds. At this point, Paypal believes that the payments will be rectified within 5-7 business days.

Please note, this does not impact regular publishers through the Shopzilla Publisher Program - only those earning through our Beso Rewards program. 

We greatly apologize for this delay. Our own automated systems alerted you to the payments after we handed payment instructions over to Paypal, which has worked well in the past. This is why you received a notice that was premature, and in the future, we will not send out our notification emails until we have confirmation that Paypal has handed out the funds.

Any questions or complaints regarding Paypal can be directed to their customer service number: 1-888-221-1161, though we know they are focused on resolving the issue as quickly as possible.

Thanks again for your patience and for being a Beso Rewards user!

The Beso Team

Beso Rewards in the News!

We recently launched a new affiliate program where we wanted everyone to be rewarded. Introducing Beso Rewards! When a Beso user shares a product or collection on their social networks and/or blogs, their friends, family, and followers can click to merchants and retailers and the user can generate revenue. For more information please visit the Beso Rewards FAQ.

Our new program has gotten some press the last couple of weeks from CBS This Morning and The New York Times. See what they have to say about being a paid shopper!

Adjustments Now Reflected under Earnings Report

More improvents to the Publisher Portal! Now when there have been positive or negative earnings adjustments made to your account, they will be reflected below your earnings report table. Hopefully, you will see more positive than negative!

Placement IDs Unavailable

Publishers,

Unfortunately, with the release of the Payments Report, it affected the Placement ID by earnings. If you use Placement IDs, you might be seeing Other (#) in your reporting dashboard:

We are aware of this issue and are looking to rectify this as soon as possible.

Thank you for your patience and understanding as we continue to improve our program for you!

- The Shopzilla Publisher Team

Payments Report Now Available

Good news, Publishers! The Payments Report is now available under the View Reports tab. You can view past payments and keep track of payments coming your way!

The Payment Date refers to when you should receive your payment by. Most publishers receive their payment much sooner than the date supplied.

If you have any questions, comments, or suggestions, please let us know below!

Scheduled Maintenance on 4/24, 10PM-2AM

Publishers,

Please plan for a brief outage due to a scheduled infrastructure maintenance on Tuesday, April 24, from 10PM to 2AM, PST. During this time, all feeds and APIs will be operative, though the publishing of one set of feeds will be delayed on the morning of Wednesday, April 25.

The Publisher Portal will also be unavailable during this designated time and all earnings will be delayed on Wednesday.

We apologize for this future inconvenience and thank you in advance for your patience and understanding. If you have any questions or concerns, please let us know.

Thank you,

The Shopzilla Publisher Team

Publisher Feedback on Our New Features

We love getting feedback from our Publishers about new features. It helps us know what we're doing right and what we can do to continually improve the user experience! Here is what Chloe from The Chloe Conspiracy shared with us...

"I know there are a few shopping/affiliate programs popping up at the moment, but I love how you guys respond to things personally (like this!) and give off almost a closer-knit, familial vibe.  And I am excited to not only see how you guys grow and expand, but to be a part of it too. You guys rock."

"I just wanted to send all of you at Beso and Shopzilla a huge 'thank you' for the new "show monetized retailers only" filter on the Beso affiliate program--it is amazing! It has taken a lot of the guess work out of using Beso to its fullest capacity in conjunction with my blogs, obviously, and I absolutely love it. Best thing ever!"

Thank you, Chloe!

Have comments? Suggestions? We'd love to hear from you! Contact us!

Filter Beso results to only monetized offers!

Beso Fans and Publishers - 

We are excited to launch a small but very significant improvement to the Beso Affiliate Portal, where you can now filter your widget and link results to ONLY offers monetized in the Beso marketplace. We've always provided publishers the comprehensiveness of our product inventory, which gives your readers and visitors a more complete user experience. But now you have easy, one-click access to limiting those results to only what our merchants are currently paying for.

It's simple. 

Next time you're linking to an individual product or a multi-product widget, simply click the "show only monetized offers" check box if you'd like to limit the result set to offers with a CPC bid attached. 

We hope this will make it even easier to populate your sites with great product offers available on Beso!

-- The Publisher Team

Important: Planned Maintenance on Monday

Publishers, there will be a planned maintenance for the Publisher Portal on Monday, January 9, for five hours from 9 AM – 2 PM, PST. During this time, access to reporting and account management tools will be unavailable. However, no services or applications will be interrupted, e.g. Catalog API, XML feeds, widgets and assets.  

We apologize for this inconvenience and thank you for your continued understanding and patience. If you have any questions, please contact us.

 

Update 1:58 PM PST:  Maintenance has been extended until 3 PM.

Update 3:04 PM PST:  Maintenance has been extended until 5 PM.

 

Update 1/10/12, 1:13 PM PST:  Due to maintenance yesterday, Publisher Reporting numbers will not be available until tomorrow. We apologize for the delay.

Publisher Holiday Rate Increase!

With the holidays just around the corner, we here at Shopzilla wanted to remind you of a rate increase to get in the spirit of giving. The increases by category are up to 25% and you should expect your blended increase to be about 22% (higher or lower depending upon your category mix). You should see a CPC increase in your earnings report starting Monday, November 7.

The increased minimums will be reflected in the data from the API or FTP feeds and will be implemented automatically for all merchants in our system and will continue through and including all day December 25^th.

 

TaDa: New Site, New Look!

 

TaDa recently got a new look to the website along with more sales and extended time for each sale! We've even increased the referral bonus for our Publishers. Now, for every referral you send to TaDa that results in a sale that same day, you will earn $5. For every email subscription, you will earn $3. Unfortunately, these adjustments won't be reflected in the Reports tab. Once you accrue $50 including the TaDa referral bonuses, you'll receive your payment!

If interested contact us and we'll send along the next week's deals as well as your customized TaDa affiliate link, which will allow us to track your referrals. If you have any questions, feel free to ask in the comments below!

Tips on Getting Started in the Shopzilla Publisher Program

You've just been accepted into the Shopzilla Publisher Program. Now what? 

1. Enter your payment information

You won't be paid until you do! Please enter your payment information under the My Account tab so that you'll be paid when your balance reaches the minimum payout of $25.00 (USD). If your address changes at any time, please update your account accordingly so we know where to send your next payment.

2. Get content

There are some simple self serve banners/panels that you can create here:  Bizrate Product Search Widget and here: Beso Assets. Be sure to include your account ID so that traffic will be credited to your account! Also, when logged in to the Shopzilla Publisher portal, at the top of the site, you will see the Content tab.

3. Beso Affiliate program

If you post about women's or men's fashion, home, baby and kids, beauty, and/or jewelry, the Beso Assets may better complement your website. Your Shopzilla account ID works for the Beso Affiliate Program, too. No additional registration is needed and your activity will be reported in the Shopzilla publisher portal. For a general breakdown and help on how to fully utilize the Beso Affiliate Program, please refer to this blog post.

4. Integrate Shopzilla Publisher text links into your posts

If you have written about certain products in the past and linked directly to the retailer, change it to a Shopzilla Publisher link to earn revenue! If your product is related to fashion, home, baby and kids, beauty, and/or jewelry, refer to the Beso Affiliate Program mentioned in #3 above. Visit this post to learn how to create a Beso text link.

5. Create content-rich posts around featured offers

If you don't have posts mentioning specific products for Shopzilla link integration, you can start by searching for your desired product at Bizrate or Beso and converting the link into an affiliate link mentioned above in #4. To ensure high traffic quality, these posts should be rich in content and quality accompanied by the associated text links.

6. API & Data Feeds

For our more robust implementation options, our API or FTP Data Feeds may be a better option for you (if you're not sure what that means, they're probably not for you). Please apply for access to either application under the Contents tab. Please review our Terms and Conditions before applying for access. For more information on our API and feed, please feel free to browse these previous posts.

7. Placement IDs for additional tracking and insight

As an affiliate publisher, you may be interested in tracking your performance more granularly -- for example for a specific page on your site, marketing campaign or for additional websites. Once you have an approved Shopzilla Publisher Account, you can publish Shopzilla links on any site you operate, as long as our team gets a chance to look over the website and approves it for use. There is no need to register new accounts for separate websites under the same ownership. You can use the Placement ID tool for track multiple websites (or sections, campaigns, etc.). For more information related to Placement IDs, please visit our blog post on Placement ID usage. Please contact us if you would like to add additional sites to your account or if you have any additional questions.

Adding Additional Websites to Your Account

As an affiliate publisher, you may be operating several websites at once. Once you have an approved Shopzilla Publisher Account, you can publish Shopzilla links on any site you operate, as long as our team gets a chance to look over the website and approves it for use. There is no need to register new accounts for separate websites.

We suggest that you use the Placement ID tool for multiple website publishing so you can keep links from each website separate on your earnings report. For more information related to Placement IDs, please visit our blog post on Placement ID usage.

Please contact us if you would like to add additional sites to your account or if you have any additional questions.

How to Check for Bidded Only Offers for Beso

With all the products featured on Beso, it can be difficult to know which offers will generate revenue for you as a Publisher when creating a Beso text link. You can determine which offers generate revenue through our Catalog API. You can find out if a certain product is bidded, meaning you will earn revenue for redirects through the correct Beso affiliate link, or nonbidded, meaning you will NOT earn revenue for redirects through the correct Beso affiliate link.

This slide show will show you step-by-step how to check for bidded only offers in Beso through our Catalog API. If you do not have access to our API, please apply here.

How to Fully Utilize the Beso Affiliate Program

Now that we have introduced you to our new Beso Affiliate Program, what is the best way you can maximize your revenue with quality traffic?

There are two ways to integrate Beso content on your site: text links and widgets.

Text Links

• Link to Any Page

This application is great for our Beso Offer Detail Pages like this one below:

It is best when used for casual linking -- when you are unsure if customers will purchase the product upon clicking on the link. To create a correct Beso text link for an offer detail page, please follow these instructions.

Another great way to use this application besides for Beso offer detail pages is for Beso search results. If you are unable to find a product, for example, J Brand Skinny Jeans in Phoebe Wash, use the Beso search link at the top of your browser instead of an offer detail page. Search links produce more redirects which produce more revenue for Publishers. Instead of linking to one product, you are linking to hundreds giving your visitors more options to click on.

• Individual Product

This application allows you to create very specific links to products. We encourage our Publishers to use these links in a limited and appropriate setting:  they are best for product placements in which the pictures, prices, and relevant information of the featured items are revealed.

You can create these types of links by searching for the item, clicking on the product you want to link to, and choosing "text link" as the display instead of "image." Be sure to include your Publisher ID! At the bottom of the page, the code in the text box will be ready for you to use.

Widgets

• Link to Multiple Products

Create your own dynamic assets through our search widgets. Their dynamic aspect creates new product content in the widgets when available. Place them on the sidebars of your website or place them in your posts when referring to certain products to catch visitors' attention.

If you need some suggestions, here are a few keywords you can use:

jordan shoes
dressing table
style happy bedding
jeffrey campbell lita
juicy couture charms crayon
gold shark tooth necklace victorias secret
palm key patio furniture
polo shoes
vm7013
lisa rachel hair products

 

And as always, if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Announcing the Beso Affiliate Program!

Ready to monetize your blog?!

Managed by the Shopzilla Publisher Program, the Beso Affiliate Program allows you to earn money per click when you refer visitors to your favorite stores.

The Beso Affiliate Program helps you easily build all sorts of content to help you monetize your blog:

Link to Any Page
Link to any page on Beso and get paid when your readers move on to shop on a retailer's website!

Individual Product
Want to feature an individual product? Search for the right one, then create a banner or text link.

Multiple Products
Help your readers shop a set of products: search for the right set, then create a banner.

Search Box
Add Beso's search box to your website to let your readers search Beso directly from your site.

So, just as Beso let's you shop all your favorite stores and brands, all in one place, the Beso Affiliate Program allows you to build all your monetized shopping content, all in one place!

Get Started or Read More

Catalog API: Introducing JSON & JSONP

Hey Publishers,

At the request of several of your fellow JS-loving publishers, it is now possible to query our Catalog API and return a response in JSON or JSONP. While XML is a wonderful thing, JSON and JSONP should open new opportunities to those of you creating widgets, banners, and other snappy ad content.

While the default response format is XML, you are able to specifically request the response format using the below parameters in your query:

XML: <format>=xml
JSON: <format>=json&callback=callback
JSONP: <format>=js&callback=callback

Release: June 2011
API Versions: Bizrate, Beso

The release of these new fields should not impact you unless you have developed a means of auto-generating your XML handling code based on the XML schema document for any individual service.  If you have done this, you will need to update your schema.

Don't forget to follow us on Twitter for snappy release notifications!  Upon release, you will be able to see an example result set returned with this new value through our Catalog API Interactive Documentation.  In order to access this documentation, you will need to log in with your Catalog API Key & Publisher ID.  Once you are in there, view any of the individual service resource sections.  At the very bottom of any section, you will see a link "[ + ] show test form".  This will allow you to test out queries, viewing sample responses. 

As always, please do not hesitate to contact us should you have any questions.

The Shopzilla Publisher Team