Jan
13
2008
Opinions

For Sale – 1.5 Billion Products

Author An article by Phil    Comments No Comments

Google Base is not one of the most talked about web applications, but it is quietly becoming an important element in many e-commerce systems. Using the application you can store and share an unlimited volume of structured information of various types including personal ads., event listings, recipes and real estate listing. And, of course, there are products for sale; 1.5 billion products. Product information from Google Base is displayed to consumers through Google Product Search, but in true Web 2.0 style it can also be included in mashups, gadgets, widgets and aggregators using the Google Base API, rss feeds etc.

Loading and storing records is free and can be accomplished in a number of ways. Individual records can be entered by hand, batches can be uploaded from spreadsheets or using tools like Site All’s Base Feeder, while those with Amazon, Ebay or osCommerce stores can upload listings automatically using a store connector.

Matthias Zenger’s presentation at Google Developer’s day in Hamburg gives a comprehensive description of structure of Google Base, and also of its programming interfaces.

One of the most significant characteristics of Google Base is it’s flexibility. Simply through working with RSS feeds customers are able to monitor product prices from multiple stores conveniently in their favorite reader, on Netvibes, in iGoogle or on their cellphone. Meanwhile businesses can use similar feeds to display their latest offerings on websites, in widgets, on web pages or in social network applications.

[Slashdot] [Digg] [Reddit] [del.icio.us] [Facebook] [Technorati] [Google] [StumbleUpon]
Tags: , , , , , ,

Related Posts

About the Author: Phil Rees

Theme Forest
Fonts.com
Adobe
AVG

RSS Google Reader Shared Items

  • Facebook 101 [COMIC] October 1, 2011
    There are some people who think Facebook has become too complicated. There are other people who agree with those people. Mashable Comics are illustrated every week by Kiersten Essenpreis, a New York-based artist who draws and blogs at YouFail.com. More Mashable Comics: 1. The Earliest Social Network Ever Discovered 2. First-Generation GPS 3. There's a B […]
    Matt Silverman
  • Google Maps Launches Helicopter View of Your Route October 1, 2011
    Shared by phrees Found myself whistling the Indiana Jones theme while watching the animated helicopter view. Google has added a 3D aerial route preview option to its Google Maps product. With the new feature, Google Maps users can fly alongside routes to get a birds-eye view of directions while planning road trips, biking excursions, hiking trips or regular […]
    (author unknown)
  • 22 Essential Tools for Testing Your Website’s Usability September 30, 2011
    The Web Design Usability Series is supported by join.me, an easy way to instantly share your screen with anyone. join.me lets you collaborate on-the-fly, put your heads together super-fast and even just show off. A site’s ease of use, or its usability, is an integral part of its success, especially with websites becoming more and more interactive, complex an […]
    Jacob Gube
  • Coding with data from our Transparency Report September 29, 2011
    By Matt Braithwaite, Transparency Engineering Tech Lead More than a year ago, we launched our Transparency Report, which is a site that shows the availability of Google services around the world and lists the number of requests we’ve received from governments to either hand over data or to remove content. We wanted to provide a snapshot of government actions […]
    Scott Knaster
  • What’s happening on your site right now? September 29, 2011
    The web is getting faster, and not just the speed of the pages, but also the speed of change. Before, it was fine to build a website and modify it only when new products were launched. All of us avid Analytics users know that’s just not good enough. We need to be constantly on the lookout for problems and opportunities. Currently, Google Analytics does a gre […]
    Google Analytics team