Miva Merchant Modules and Applications Search

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From: Import Export Modules / Froogle Shopping Directory Export Modules
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2 Froogle Data Feed Product Export Weiland / Miva Central

Export your Miva Merchant product data in the basic file format required for Froogle^TM (© 2002 Google) data feed submissions for inclusion in their ecommerce search engine. Fields included: product_url, name, description (html removed), price, image_url, category, offer_id (code). This Miva Merchant plugin module works with both MMUI and OpenUI. No mmui.mv edits required.

Most agree, Google is the mother of all search engines on the Internet. Their new venture to create a listing of actual items for sale across the Internet, rather than pages with hits on keywords, is a bold attempt to better target customers and buyers in a symbiotic relationship. This is a giant leap in eCommerce, providing comparison shopping using the Google search engine. If you are a Miva Merchant store owner you CANNOT afford to miss this opportunity, especially since inclusion in the FroogleTM index is free. How much have you invested in getting your store's search engine rankings?

A big side benefit to getting listed in FroogleTM is that the Google company is spidering your site, thus it may increase the number of your pages listed in Google. Coincidentally, my site went from 1220 to 1350 pages in Google within a week after submitting the first data feed to FroogleTM. Granted, I use Static Catalog Generator to create static html pages of all of my products so there were already a lot of pages in Google. Now I have an additional 130 which had been overlooked. If you don't have a good representation of your product catalog already in Google or other search indexes, you may want to use the Static Catalog Generator to optimize site visibility. Search engine optimization requires a multi-pronged approach (static html pages, shorter links, specific paid or unpaid submissions to directories). I have found that use of static html pages consistently gets my site into search indexes better than the dynamically produced Miva Merchant pages. There is no direct indication that listing in Froogle will effect your listing in Google, only time will tell.

A module designed for the specific purpose of creating a data feed for Froogle^TM (rather than a generic data export) can include features which make it the best solution for the task:

• Include an affiliate code in the URLs so that you can better track where actual sales are coming from
• If your store is a single store in the domain, you can remove the Store_Code from the URL to aid in search engine spidering
• If you are using our Volume Pricing module (version 4.53 or newer), you have the option to submit the lowest (bulk) prices as your product prices, thus making your listings more attractive when compared with competitors in the Froogle^TM listing. However, the Google Feeds Support said the quantity option is not yet supported so it would be "best if you just give the price for ordering a single item". Eventually they plan to list the minimum break points to obtain the volume prices.
• Fast Data Feed plugin module creates the datafeed flat file directly from your admin
  • Frequent, no hassle submissions keep your data current in Froogle^TM
  • Eliminates the need to copy product and category databases from the server to your PC to produce a flat file export with software such as MS Excel
  • Uses your data as it exists within admin at the moment it is run
• Control over category insertion
  • Limit export to specific categories
  • Automatically builds the category hierarchy from each product's category up to top level category
  • Optionally modify category placement, overriding actual category hierarchy
• Removes html from your product descriptions; converting the brackets to escaped characters or even hiding html using the !-- technique did not satisfy Froogle^TM support staff - it must be completely removed
• Included in the module are features to eliminate timeouts when generating the data feed export of large numbers of products
• Exports to your documents directory rather than your data directory for ease of capture and transmittal

Don't delay. The Froogle^TM index is still in beta. As such, knowledge about it is not yet widespread due to limited promotion. The Froogle^TM support team has been reviewing requests for inclusion and currently have reasonable turn around time. Your store may or may not be accepted and I would expect it to take longer and have more stipulations for acceptance and continued inclusion as this service becomes more popular. You should request acceptance into Froogle^TM as soon as possible. Once accepted, whether you use our module for building the datafeed or some other software, you should do it now while time is on your side.

As this is a new endeavor for Froogle^TM, I expect them to change their format and add new capabilities over time. Licensees of the 4.x version of this module will have free upgrades of the module through the 4.x version. We do not yet have a 2.x version available but will be exploring that option next week. Please ensure you select the correct module version for the version of Merchant you have.

Miva Merchant (© 2002 Miva Corp.), Google (© 2002 Google), and MS Excel (© 2003 Microsoft Corporation) are copyright by their respective owners. Froogle^TM is a trademark of Google (© 2002 Google).

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From: Import Export Modules / Froogle Shopping Directory Export Modules
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3 Froogle Connector Aplus.Net / Miva Central

Froogle Connector (tm) integrates with MIVA Merchant to allow you to easily upload the products in your online store into Froogle. Rather than having to enter information twice, it is all automated for you. So, you can regularly update the information on Froogle to be sure that people searching the web for products you sell will always be getting up-to-date information. For only $99 per month, you can keep your product listings on Froogle up-to-date. This includes adding new products, removing old products, price updates, and any changes to product descriptions. Sign up, today, to Leverage the Power of Google to Sell More Products.

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From: Import Export Modules / Froogle Shopping Directory Export Modules
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4 Ultimate Feed Generator NetBlazon / NetBlazon

Ultimate Feed Generator is a tool for generating product feeds, sitemaps, and more. It can be used to create feeds for:

• Shopping Portals: Shopzilla, NexTag, Shopping.com, PriceGrabber, and more
• Search engine sitemaps: Google XML Sitemaps, Yahoo Search Submit, etc
• HTML Store Maps: page(s) on your own site that link to every (or selected) product and category

Ultimate Feed Generator comes with 5 pre-defined feeds: Google Sitemaps, Froogle, PriceGrabber, Yahoo Site Submit, and an HTML site map. You can create as many new feeds, for as many purposes as you like, through the simply yet powerful interface. In addition, we'll be providing new feed templates on our website in the near future, free for licensed users.

The module provides tokens to display dynamic product and category data, such as name, price, description, weight, and other database fields. It also fully supports OpenTokens for users of OpenUI (although OpenUI is not required to use Ultimate Feed Generator). Feeds can be generated individually, or you can select multiple feeds and run them at once. (Check them all off and go to lunch while it processes, for instance.)

Fully supports OpenTokens, and special link styles (such as Search Friendly Links and others) can be built using tokens.

"If you haven't had a chance to use this yet I think you'll be blown away. It's truly the Swiss Army Knife of feed/export modules." -Marvin Sanders, WineBuys.com

Note: A version of Ultimate Feed Generator for Miva Merchant 5 should be available in February 2006.

See sample UFG tutorials at MerchantHowTo.com:
General tour of the module
Creating Search Friendly Links in UFG

Module documentation available at http://www.netblazon.com/docs/miva/help/nbfeeds.html

Screenshots

Module Administration - List of Feeds

Module Administration - Creating a New Feed

Module Administration - Editing a Feed's Template

Module Administration - Editing a Feed's Options

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From: Import Export Modules / Froogle Shopping Directory Export Modules
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5 Volume Pricing Weiland / Miva Central

Discount your product prices based on the number of items ordered of identical products, eg 1-3 = standard price, 4-6 = lower, etc.

The admin interface provides an easy to enter "from - to cost" format. You can literally have as many ranges as you want to type in. See the image below for example syntax. You can either use actual values or percent of price to be subtracted from the product price. These price differentials are added directly in the admin interface under the product edit screen. You only apply these price differentials in the products that you want to use them.

This module applies the price in your low, high, cost groupings. If you do not include a grouping at the single item level, it will use the method for pricing in your store. It only activates if you include a low, high, cost grouping. For example:
6|10|12%
11|20|14%
21|999|16%

The module only uses price groups when using the percent off discount calculation. If you enter fixed prices for the quantity ranges, then price groups are ignored. Keep in mind that the percent discounts will be over and above the discount already given if you are using price groups.

In the compiled version you can opt to not give the price group an additional discount above the volume pricing. You can even make all or some price groups not eligible for volume pricing and hide the table from them completely. Customers must be logged in to identify the price group they are in before the volume pricing module can disqualify them from volume pricing.

The percentage discounting method subtracts the percent discount from the base price. Base price does not include attribute prices. To apply the percentage, simply include the percent symbol (%) in the line. If you are using cost method for your store (other than price groups), you will not be able to use the percentage discounting method. Instead, use the actual value method.

If you are using another third party module which overrides prices in the basket and recomputes them using the price in the product record, you will not be able to use this module. Other third party modules will not recognize that it needs to apply the calculations in this module.

The module recognizes identical products. Hence different attributes will change the product enough that the discount won't apply. For example 3 red shirts and 6 blue shirts will not give the discount of 9 shirts. Rather, they'll get the discount rate of 3 for one of the line items and 6 for the other.

The module for the compiled version of merchant DOES have the ability to amalgamate quantities so in the example above as long as the product code is the same, all 9 items would get the volume discount for 9 items. You have the option for each product code to amalgamate quantities or treat varied attributes as different products.

You can optionally include a table on the product (PROD) and category (CTGY) screens displaying the rates as generated from the products' volume discount record. You can see an example of that with our best seller products. You can optionally have a quantity input in that table display. These options are configured through admin.

New in the compiled version is compatibility interface with the OpenUI Tokens and Viking Coders product template module. Place the table display on the product page so that it better fits your desired look. New configuration options added for the table display. Also, the ability to display the lowest price in place of the standard price when volume pricing effects the product, the store is using the OpenUI, the store is version 4.14 or higher, and there are no other 3rd party modules effecting the price display. This feature is useful if you want to have a sale on one or more items. Simply set the volume to 1 or more with a specific discount percentage and you have a sale with as low as display. You can use the token %product_price_f% to further highlight that with a strike thru. To make this feature even more useful, you can enter a starting and ending date for the sale so that it will start and end automatically. For ease of entry, a flat file import module is included. You can put all product codes in the flat file or use an asterisk (*) and one line of "rules" to apply the volume price to all products in the store. Create a storewide sale, e.g. 10% off in seconds with a specific start and stop date. Then just as quickly remove all settings at your leisure after the sale. There is also a volume price export so you can quickly build your flat file, then edit or add to it. This is useful when you want to have a storewide sale on all products but retain volume prices on your regularly discounted items. Export the volume prices. Import your sale settings. Import your volume discounts on the few you want to maintain at pre-sale prices. The volume price can also be used in our compiled Fast Data Feed module for froogle submissions and our Static Catalog Generator which creates static html pages for better search engine indexing.

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From: Discount Modules / Volume and Quantity Discount Modules
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6 Static Catalog Generator Weiland / Emporium Plus

The StatCat module is both an admin module and a basket interface module. The primary purpose of StatCat is to generate static catalog pages (indexes and sub-pages) directly from your Miva Merchant products and category databases so that search engines will add your pages to their index. Presumably this will allow customers to find your store amongst the millions of web sites on the Internet. As such, the pages generated are basic html pages with links to sub-pages, basket page and individual product pages in your Miva Merchant system. Each page contains your store title, meta description, meta keywords, footers along with the products. Category pages also contain category headers and footers.

Although these are static html pages, they have direct links which allow customers to add the products to their basket which is maintained in your Miva Merchant shopping cart system. If you are using the CIM Inventory Manager or Miva Corp's new Inventory Manager (in Merchant 4.x), it will even check the stock level and return an out of stock message if stock level is depleted

** Caution: If you are using Merchant 4.0 and its Inventory Management system that deducts products from inventory when they are placed in the basket, you should select to NOT use the Add to Basket buttons if you have one-of-a-kind items. The reason for this is that some robots and other indexing software may even follow links which contain the ? and & characters. This could result in the stock level decrementing to zero and out-of-stock emails being sent. The products won't be removed from inventory completely, as they will be re-stocked when you run the Admin:Delete Expired Shopping Baskets. This undesirable situation does not exist in Merchant versions 2.x or 3.x. It is also not a problem in Merchant 4.x if your store does not use the Miva Corp Inventory Management or your product stock levels are not likely to be depleted with one or two passes of the indexing program.

The store owner determines which page the customer will go to when they select to add a product to the basket. They can be taken either to the basket for review or back to the static page they just selected from. Both processes are automatic and do not require Javascript or meta refresh routines. Either click through destination can be used on either of the sort options, store owner choice. In addition to the functionality of this module, it provides an excellent example of how to interface static pages with the Miva Merchant system with return to the correct static page.

Quick links on each sub-page allow the customer to return to the index or go straight to their basket for review and checkout.

Below the sub-pages the store owner can even generate individual product pages. These product pages contain the full sized image and description. If the store uses the Flexible Product Description module and the product record contains a Keyword field, those product specific keywords are added to the store's generic keywords which are already in all of the static pages.

The store owner can decide whether to display the price for each item on the static pages. Since these pages are static and cannot function interactively to determine customer price groups or discounts, the hide price routine has its place. However, if the store has no price groups and discounts are calculated on basket totals or discount coupons, the price listing is useful.

The static pages also have no way to restrict access. So if your store is one which does not allow certain products to be shown to all customers, then this module is not for you, unless you can place all of those restricted products in specific categories. In which case, you could then sort pages by category and simply delete those categories' pages.

This module is for Miva Merchant 2.x, 3.x and 4.x. It works with both the Miva Merchant look and feel (mmui.mv) and the OpenUI look and feel (oui.mv). If using the mmui.mv, there are two edits that need to be made to the mmui.mv file.

StatCat produces pages similar (mirror) to the layout in Miva Merchant with admin control. The following configuration settings are made within the standard Miva Merchant admin interface: Page title, home URL, optional title/store logo, title background color, title foreground color, category title header size, number of product columns on the category sort page, Meta description of the site, Meta keywords on the site, return action after adding a product to the basket, option to hide the prices, category column background color, category column foreground color, category column font, category column size, product background color in the category sorted pages, product foreground color in the category sorted pages, product font and size in the category sorted pages, optional display of thumbnail images in the category sorted pages, store front page welcome screen, search button input, product descriptions on category pages, and page footer.

Once generated, the index pages can be linked to your main home page. The catalog can be left in the directory it is generated in or copied to any web site (or multiple web sites) to increase search engine visibility. The links to images and back to your Merchant.mv store will work across servers. An example of this remote distribution can be seen at my Yahoo/Simplenet web site. The limitation to the remote distribution is that these remote static pages are one way, ie. placing a product in the basket will take the customer to the main Merchant.mv, but not back to the remote static page. They would then continue shopping in Merchant.mv. This limitation exists only if the static pages are not in their original catalog directory. If they are in the catalog directory on the local server with Merchant.mv, then return to the static pages is one of your options in admin.

The StatCat also has the ability to generate static pages which can be placed on a disk and used as a catalog which can be mailed or given out to potential customers. When using this option, links to your web site or the shopping cart are suppressed. An example of this type of catalog can be seen online. It has no links to the cart and the images are virtual to the static html pages.

When generating the catalog, the store owner has the option of restricting the html output to a list of specific categories. This is particularly useful when the store owner wants to place their static pages on remote servers which have specific themes in a mall environment. Some categories may "fit in" and some may not. This also might be useful if you want to create disks with only certain categories of products on them to be given to customers.

Note 1: StatCat uses the first letter of the product name to name the sub-pages. If you use illegal characters for the first letter of product names, you will not be able to generate the by-name catalog. An example would be the left bracket, as some might have put the font tag at the beginning of the product name. If that is the case, use the by-category catalog.

Note 2: If you have an excessively large products database, you will probably not be able to run StatCat on a server without timing out. However, you should be able to run it in MivaMia if you have a mirror of your store on your PC. You would then need to upload the static pages manually. This store of 600 products took about 5 seconds to generate the category pages.

Example static catalog pages

• Sort by name
  • This example has the add to basket button disabled
  • This example contains StatCat generated individual product pages
• Sort by category
  • Click through returns to the originating static page after addition (alternatively you can have it remain at the merchant.mv basket)
  • This example contains StatCat generated individual product pages

Several new features have been added to the compiled version; background image, functional navigation bar, "smart" metatags, extensive implementation of keyword and header and footer usage, product page names can be product code or name ending with html, inclusion of product links at the top or bottom listed as featured products or similar designation, include any fields in the products database on product pages (including modified structure), optionally hide subcategories on category pages as applicable, additional product page links such as "check availability or latest prices", and export to any directory within the store's path (creates directory if it does not exist). Discontinued (inactive) products can continue to have modified static pages generated so that search engine links remain viable, yet do not result in errors when linked to the store. Additionally, affiliate codes can be included with every link so that the static catalog pages can be given to affiliates who wish to mirror your catalog at their site. If you are using the OpenUI, StatCat adds "smart" metatags to your merchant.mv so that when the customers (and search engines) click from your static pages to your actual store, the pages will contain metatags related to category headers, product descriptions and product keywords (if used). It also reverses the title tag with the category and product screens so that the category or product name appear first, then the store name. If your store has our Volume Pricing module version (4.53 or higher) installed, StatCat can optionally include the volume price table on the static pages. When creating the static product pages, a flat file is created in the background which can be used for a data feed file for submission to Froogle^TM. It contains the header and data for the basic file format.

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Compatibility: MMUI/OpenUI Versions: 2.x, 3.x, 4.x, 4.14-4.16x (Available Compiled)
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From: Search Engine Optimization Modules
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