Integrate Google Shopping With Magento Go – Part 2

Integrate Google Shopping With Magento Go – Part 2

Following on from our first part here, we look at how to integrate the Google Shopping API with Magento Go.

In the first part we set up a Google Merchants account and linked it up with Magento Go. In this part we’ll look at adding the necessary attributes required by Google Shopping and adding them to products.

Step One

Google Shopping requires certain non-standard attributes applying to each product before it will allow them to appear. These attributes are Condition and Product Type.

Navigate to Catalog -> Attributes -> Manage Attributes.

First we will add the Condition attribute.

Click “Add New Attribute” and populate the fields as follows:

• Attribute Code: condition
• Scope: Global
• Catalog Input Type For Store Owner: Dropdown
• Unique Value: No
• Values Required: No
• Everything else leave as they are.

Click Manage “Label/Options” and populate the following:

• Admin: Condition
• Default Store View: Condition
• (Any other languages populate the field with the appropriate translation).

Click “Add Option” and add the following:

• Admin: New
• Default Store View: New
• Position: 1
• Click “Is Default” button

Click “Add Option” again and add the following:

• Admin: Used
• Default Store View: Used
• Position: 2
• (Also add any appropriate language translations for the above)

Click “Save Attribute”.

Now we need to add the “Product Type” attribute, which is similar to above requires a bit more work.

As above, click “Add New Attribute” and populate the fields as follows:

• Attribute Code: product_type
• Scope: Global
• Catalog Input Type For Store Owner: Dropdown
• Unique Value: No
• Values Required: No
• Everything else leave as they are

Click Manage “Label/Options” and populate the following:

• Admin: Product Type
• English: Product Type
• (Any other languages populate the field with the appropriate translation).

This is where things differ from the “Condition” attribute above. We need to find an appropriate Product Category from Google, which we can find at this link.

Scroll down the page until you find the heading “The Google Product Category attribute”, scroll a bit further until you see the Search box. In here enter the name of your first category (For example, if your site sells Laptop Cases and Mobile Phone Cases enter “Laptop Cases” into this search box). Under the Search box you will see all categories that Google will accept for this product type. Copy the one that most closely relates to your product category, this must be word for word.

Back in Magento, click “Add Option”. In both the Admin and Default Store View boxes enter the Category title you got from Google above. In position put “1” and select “Is Default”.

Do this for every category that you want to use, first finding them at the above Google link, then clicking “Add Option” and adding each one, word for word, and increasing the Position number by 1. Leave the first Category as “Is Default” (Unless of course you specifically want to change this).

Once all your Google approved Category names are entered, click “Save Attribute”.

Navigate to Catalog -> Attributes -> Manage Attribute Sets. For each Attribute Set do the following:

• Click on the Attribute title
• Find “Condition” in the “Unassigned Attributes” column and drag it to the bottom of the “General” section in the “Groups” column.
• Do the same for Product Type.
• Click “Save Attribute Set”

Step Two

We now need to add these new attributes to any existing products

All new products added from now on will have the option for the client to choose the Condition (Generally “New”, but Google requires “New” and “Used” to both be options) and Product Type.

Navigate to Catalog -> Manage Products. Select every product you want to update from a particular category (every product you want to add to Google Shopping must be updated). From the “Actions” dropdown select “Update attributes” and click “Submit”. On the next page find the attribute “Condition” (probably at the very bottom of the page), tick the box that says “Change” and select the option you want for “Condition” (this will more than likely be New). Do the same for Product Type, choosing whichever option is closest to the products you have selected.

Click Save and all products that you had selected will now have the two new attributes updated.

Repeat this process for all products that fall under a particular product type/category.

Clients with existing sites will need to be told that all future products will have to have these two attributes filled in for all products they want adding to Google Shopping and clients with new sites will need to be informed of what these fields are for.

Next time we’ll look at mapping the Magento and Google Shopping attributes together and finally pushing the items up to our Google Merchants account.

Read Part One here.
Read Part Three here.