iPods and XML

Because my resolution this week was to write a blog a day, I now have blogger’s block – and it’s only Tuesday! Luckily blogger’s block is alot different than writer’s block – mainly because we don’t have editors to weed out the crap, so we don’t hold back when writing it!

One of our developers came to me today and told me the frustrations he had with XML product feeds from online merchants (for those of you who don’t have a clue what I just said, and XML product feed is like an electronic catalog, detailing all the items a merchant offers through his website, with information about the product etc.)

What he is finding is that merchants tend not to maintain their catalog and have duplicates, bad data, bad links etc in the XML feed and this leads to poor results for publishers who use them.

An electronic product catalogue is literally the same as paper catalog, yet those are maintained alot better – why? Probably because it’s taken years to build them up so it’s in a bit of routine to manage them. Companies don’t want to outsource this function, because they think it’s core to their business – wake up – it’s not!! If you can’t do it properly and it’s core to your revenue, let a professional company do it and save yourself the hassle. Online shopping is booming, and if you want a piece of the action, ensure that the websites out there that want to promote your products have what they need, or else you’re not going to make the sales!

Visit DealBay (Still in Alpha Development stage – lots of bugs) for an example of a product search engine that utilizes XML feeds to list products from merchants.

The other issue that’s been overlooked is that most partner websites that will display your XML really want realtime data – they’d rather not send a customer to you if you’re out of stock.

Anyways, on a less technical note, iPods are all the rage at the moment, if you don’t have one – what’s wrong with you? HP has just released an iPod – made by Apple – it’s amazing how brands try to get share of market by following a multi-brand/same product approach. What’s even more amazing, is that it actually works. It’s the usual supermarket dilemna :

You walk into a supermarket and go over to the pasta shelf – 25 different brands, 7 companies, 3 factories – the more shelf space, the more likely you are to make a sale. It’s the same thing online, the more websites selling the same stuff with a different look & feel, the more market share you’re likely to get…

I’m off the V & A Waterfront in Cape Town now for dinner. There is a restaurant called Belthazar there, and it comes highly recommended! Will post comments tomorrow!