With development information technologies and the increase in the number of Internet users, many new words have appeared in the Russian language, the meaning of which is still clear only to programmers and other narrow specialists.
However, knowing the meanings technical terms It will also be useful for ordinary users. What is a feed and who needs it? Even if this word is not useful in Everyday life, it is always useful to improve your level of education and
What is a feed?
WITH in English the word feed is translated as “graze” or “feed.” WITH technical point From our point of view, this translation quite accurately reflects the essence of this term: it is an information display format created by Google Corporation, the purpose of which is to provide information
To understand what a feed is, it is enough to imagine a news feed that contains the names of articles, their authors, publication dates and other information useful to the reader.
How does the feed help in the development of the site?
Website owners are interested in getting on the first page of search results: this guarantees a stable influx of new visitors. Thanks to the feed feed, Google robots can quickly learn about new materials published on the page, index data in a shorter period of time, which as a result can help the site rise higher in search results.
Feeds can also be used by various aggregators to automatically distribute information to in social networks and other similar sites, notifying blog subscribers about new publications, and generating email newsletters.
There is a possibility that others search engines, for example, Yandex or Mail.ru, use the feed to collect data, but there is no confirmation of this information. Algorithms for generating search rankings are a corporate secret and are inaccessible to ordinary users.
Knowing what a feed is, owners of Internet resources can put it into practice, but no one can guarantee that this will affect the position of the site.
How to make a feed feed on your website?
When the owners of web portals learn the meaning of the word “feed,” they usually have a desire to install a similar feed on their resource. To make your site more convenient and understandable for the Google search robot, you need to go through a simple registration on the page feedburner.google.com, enter your site data, set up the flow of information and observe the result.
For ordinary users, a feed can be useful when you need to collect interesting data from several sites on one page. Information is displayed on the screen of a computer, tablet or smartphone in a compressed form, so that you can read the news much faster. By understanding what a feed is, it’s easy to make the resource interesting and visited.
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An XML feed is a structured real estate database presented in XML format. This is a text file that allows Yandex to process and structure information. Its use saves time and makes the work of real estate specialists easier, eliminating the need for them to independently add and edit information in advertisements.
What is an XML feed
In the process of work, companies that provide intermediary services between seller and buyer experience the need to connect the site to the popular information integrator system - Yandex.Real Estate. The integrator is designed for publishing and searching advertisements for the sale/rent of apartments, houses, land plots and commercial areas.
An XML feed must be created in case of a large number of objects. It allows you to work with a variety of advertisements, significantly simplifying the task for employees. Today, almost every agency uses this tool. It is generated directly from the real estate agency website or offline database in XML format, after which the ad is sent to the real estate board. You can create a feed in several ways:
- Create a web resource with a built-in XML upload module. This is the most reliable and fastest type of data transfer. When creating, we recommend using the real estate website builder script CMS Sitebill. It offers users several modules for generating a feed in XML format Yandex Real Estate, CIAN, AFY.
- Use of external services. There is an application software CRM, it allows you to generate XLM feeds from ads. The most famous services are ReCRM and JCat.
These services save time and contain the optimal balance of necessary functions. However, using them requires investment Money, and in order to publish advertisements on popular boards on the Internet, you need to transfer them from the site database to the service database.
How to create a feed
There are several ways to create an XML feed. The first, and easiest, is to find a specialist. For independent work There are special generator services on the Internet. They allow you to automatically generate XML files for Yandex.Real Estate. The process of working in them is extremely simple: you need to specify a link to a web resource, set individual parameters and start generating.
Another way to create a feed is manual setup. To make the process easier, it is recommended to use ready-made examples from Yandex and, using them, create files for your own website. Here you will need Excel or another free text editor that provides the ability to edit text and automatically create backup copy saved files. Upon completion of work, you need to save the feeds in CSV format and upload the finished result to Yandex.
There are a number of rules that must be followed when filling out the feed. In particular, it should contain only relevant advertisements present on the web resource. Moreover, each ad category must contain a separate set of parameters. If these rules are not followed (the accuracy and number of parameters are displayed incorrectly), the semantic relevance of the ads to the search query will decrease, and they will take low positions in the search results.
The ad text should not contain HTML code elements, and the feed should contain the parameters noted by the advertiser for Yandex.Real Estate. It is important to exclude all web resource settings related to geographical coordinates so that this information does not appear in advertisements.
How to edit and validate an XML feed
Export XML files are checked using the XML feed validator from Yandex. The tool simplifies debugging of export files and significantly reduces the time it takes to get into the databases affiliate programs. The validator allows you to check the structure of a file, but not its content.
After the files are uploaded, the user can view detailed information about all advertisements, find out what errors have occurred, and what needs to be done. But checking XML feeds doesn’t end there. There are types of errors that neither the validator nor the loader can recognize.
First of all, you need to get the free text editor Notepad++, since a regular Excel spreadsheet will not be able to display the data correctly. Notepad++ has a lot of advantages, the main one of which is the ability to see the feed as it will be presented in Yandex. Here you need to check:
- Completeness of the downloaded data. To do this, you should select a random ad from the site, find it by IP in the uploaded file in a text editor and check how well the content of the site matches the data presented in the file itself.
- Correctness of data format. It is necessary to check whether the existing format meets the basic requirements for an xml feed on Yandex. Real estate: correct spelling of numbers, units of measurement, text content, etc.
If the site database contains a large number of advertisements (from several thousand to tens or hundreds of thousands of advertisements) and therefore the XML file is too large, we recommend using the gzip file compression and recovery utility. This will speed up the download process and protect against network failure.
What are feeds? I often see "RSS", "XML", and "Atom" on many sites, but I don't know how to use these links.
- “Feeds” are a method of delivering information from websites, somewhat different from the usual browsing through a browser. Feeds allow you to subscribe to regular updates, which will be delivered through a specialized web portal, a reader program, and in some cases even through the good old Email. Feeds can also be packaged into "widgets", "gadgets" (" Gadgets are not widgets" - David Pogue), and other micro-objects that will allow you to quickly track the latest blog entries, new podcast episodes, as well as news, weather forecasts, and exchange rates from your favorite sites.
What does all of this mean?
You must have noticed the feed icon more than once, or such modified buttons (see right) on your favorite sites, blogs, podcast terminals. These icons represent content in any format - text, audio or video - you can subscribe to such a feed and read/watch/listen using a feed reader.
How is this convenient?
Advances in online publishing technology have made it possible to not only easily publish regular updates to websites, but also to track changes across a large number of your favorite websites, blogs, without having to type each URL into the browser and check each site manually. Now you can significantly speed up your process of monitoring information from a large number of sites by subscribing to feeds and automatically collecting information in one place to view when necessary or convenient.
For the consumer of information: Subscribing to feeds makes it possible to view a huge number of online resources in the shortest possible period of time.
For the publisher of online information: Feeds provide immediate delivery of the latest information and the ability to subscribe to receive it automatically.
For advertisers: Advertising in feeds bypasses the shortcomings that appeared when using standard marketing channels - overload with spam, insufficient delivery speed, inconvenience associated with a clogged mailbox, etc. As a result, the advertising is thematic and not overwhelming.
Who publishes the feeds?
Today, almost all major web resources such as USATODAY.com, BBC News Headlines, ABCNews, CNET, Yahoo! , Amazon.com, also Russian-language news sites, for example korrespondent.net, and many many others use this new one, effective method delivery of information. Google publishes feeds for many of its services, for example you can subscribe to various news items from Google News. In addition, hundreds of thousands of bloggers, podcasters, and vloggers publish feeds to stay closer to their readers, listeners, viewers, and commentators. Apple offers a variety of podcasts for download in its iTunes Store, all of which use feeds.
How will I read the feeds?
If you want to view and subscribe to feeds, you have many options to choose from. Today, there are more than 2,000 different feed reader apps, also known as aggregators (mainly for text content) and podcatchers (for tracking podcast updates). There are also reader programs designed exclusively for mobile devices.
Some of the aggregator programs will cost you little money, however, they will delight you with ease of use and will contain many pre-installed news channels, among which you will probably find some that are interesting for yourself. Free programs There are also a great many, try searching for the word “Feed reader” or “Feed aggregator” on popular search sites - you will get enough suggestions. Some popular feed aggregators will be listed at the end of this page.
A typical feed aggregator interface will display your news feeds and the number of new (unread) posts in each feed. You can group feeds into categories.
If you prefer online tools, you can easily find these. They will allow you to view the news feeds you subscribe to from anywhere you can find an Internet browser. Updates and new features are installed automatically.
How do I publish my own feed?
If you have a website, blog, audio/video materials, or just photographs, you can “attach” a news feed to your materials. If you use a popular blogging platform or publishing tool like TypePad, WordPress, or Blogger, then most likely news feed is created automatically for you. Even some other non-blog sites, such as the photo sharing network Flikr, provide feeds for the content you post to make it easier for your visitors to access that content. There are also tools that help convert traditional web content into a format suitable for RSS distribution.
The FeedBurner service allows web content publishers who already have a news feed (feed) to better understand the capabilities of this method of content delivery and improve interaction with their audience. If you already have a feed, run it through FeedBurner to get many new features and benefits.
Learn more about FeedBurner's services for blogs, podcasts, and business publishing.
And finally, some technical information
The new way to easily distribute content is often called "web feed", and technically this is implemented in the RSS format, which stands for Really Simple Syndication, Rich Site Summary, and/or Rockdale, Sandow, and Southern (Railroad) if you believe in fairy tales at AcronymFinder.com. RSS is based on XML, a widely used standard for exchanging text information between applications on the Internet. RSS feeds can be read as a regular text file, but they are designed for computer-to-computer communication.
Note that RSS is only one of the formats for describing XML feeds. Another, also quite well-known format is Atom. Both formats have their adherents, and it is unlikely that they will be combined into one format. However, most users are only interested in receiving fresh content, without particularly worrying about the shadow implementation of the service. FeedBurner helps publishers avoid the uncertainty of which format to use - it's all the same thanks to the SmartFeed service, which makes any format readable on any subscriber's device.
To create a smart banner, you need to add a feed - a file with information about products and services. Direct will analyze the content of the feed and automatically generate a smart banner with product offers for display on networks. You can use the feed loaded when creating dynamic ads.
Types of businesses and feeds
To load your feed, you need to select the type of business you are advertising.
| Feed type | Business type | For what |
|---|---|---|
| Yandex.Market feed (XML) | Retail | Sale of electronics and accessories, household appliances, industrial equipment, clothing, furniture, gardening supplies, sporting goods, building materials, children's products, tires and wheels, cosmetics, perfumes, etc. |
| Feed "Hotels and rental housing" Google Ads (CSV) | Hotels | Hotel reservations |
| Auto.ru feed (XML) | Cars | Sale of new and used cars |
| Yandex.Real Estate feed (XML) | Real estate | Sale of residential real estate |
| Google Ads Flights Feed (CSV) | Flights | Airline ticket sales |
| Universal feed (CSV) | Other business | Products and services not suitable for other types of business |
| Yandex.Market feed (XML) | ||
| Google Ads Custom Feed (CSV) | ||
| Google Ads Travel Feed (CSV) | Sale of tours, train tickets, ferries, etc. |
Product offers that are not described according to their type will be rejected.
Feed requirements
Any XML document can only contain one root element. The YML format uses the element as the root
- Simplified description type
- Custom description type (vendor.model)
Basic, simpler type of description.
Example:
Element Attributes
Elements included in
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| name | Name of the product offering. It is recommended to indicate the name and code of the manufacturer in the title of the simplified proposal. Required element. |
| url | Product page URL. Required element. |
| picture | |
| price | |
| currencyId | |
| model | |
| vendor | Manufacturer. |
| vendorCode | |
| description | |
| categoryId | |
| market_category | |
| store | |
| pickup | |
| delivery | |
| oldprice | |
| sales_notes | Information about order: |
| manufacturer_warranty | Availability of guarantee: |
| country_of_origin | Country of origin of the product. |
| adult | |
| age | |
| downloadable | Possibility to download the product: true - the product can be downloaded; false - the product cannot be downloaded. |
This type of description is the most convenient and universal; it is recommended for describing products from most categories.
Example:Element Attributes
| Attribute | Description |
|---|---|
| id | Product ID. Required attribute. |
| type | Required attribute. |
| available | Possibility to buy goods:
|
| Attribute | Description |
|---|---|
| id | Product ID. Required attribute. |
| type | Offer description type. The value should be vendor.model . Required attribute. |
| available | Possibility to buy goods:
|
Elements included in
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| url | Product page URL. Required element. |
| picture | A must-have element for smart banners. |
| price | The price at which this product can be purchased. |
| currencyId | Currency code (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). |
| model | Required element. |
| vendor | Manufacturer. Required element. |
| vendorCode | Product code (manufacturer code is indicated). |
| description | Description of the product offer. |
| typePrefix | |
| categoryId | Required element. Element |
| market_category | |
| store | Possibility to buy goods in a retail store: true - the product can be purchased in a retail store; false - there is no possibility of purchasing in a retail store. |
| pickup | Possibility of self-pickup from points of issue: true - the goods can be picked up yourself; false - there is no possibility of self-pickup. |
| delivery | Possibility of courier delivery of goods: true - courier delivery is possible; false - the product cannot be delivered by courier. |
| oldprice | The old price of a product, which must be higher than the new price. |
| sales_notes | Information about order: minimum order amount, minimum quantity of goods, the need for prepayment; payment options, descriptions of promotions and sales. |
| manufacturer_warranty | Availability of guarantee: true - the product has an official guarantee; false - the product does not have an official guarantee. |
| country_of_origin | Country of origin of the product. |
| adult | |
| age | |
| downloadable | Possibility to download the product: true - the product can be downloaded; false - the product cannot be downloaded. |
Hotels: Google Ads Hotels & Rentals feed
Feed "Hotels and rental housing" Google Ads CSV format must be used for the Hotels business type. The first line contains the names of the columns, and the next lines contain the data itself. The contents of the columns are separated by a comma. Data in the feed must be in UTF-8 encoding.
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| Hotel ID. Required element. |
|
| The name of the hotel. Required element. |
|
| Offer page URL. Required element. |
|
| Destination name | Required element. |
| A must-have element for smart banners. |
|
| Price | |
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| Hotel ID. Required element. |
|
| The name of the hotel. Required element. |
|
| Offer page URL. Required element. |
|
| Destination name | Hotel location (max. 25 characters). Required element. |
| A must-have element for smart banners. |
|
| Price | Offer price. Number and currency code (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). Use a period (.) as a decimal separator. |
| Number of stars. An integer from 1 to 5. |
|
| User rating, number. Use a period (.) as a decimal separator. |
|
| Maximum possible score, integer. Default is 5. |
|
| Hotel services. Specify the values separated by semicolons: bar;pool;free Wi-Fi |
Note. Values containing a comma must be enclosed in quotation marks (\"\"). For example, \"Moscow, center\".
Cars: feed Auto.ru
The Auto.ru XML feed should be used for the Automobiles business type. Data in the feed must be in UTF-8 encoding.
A list of advertiser's real estate offers is contained in the element
In one feed you can transmit information about different residential complexes from different developers. To do this, indicate in each
Attention.
We only accept feeds with offers for the sale of residential real estate.
Example:
Element Attributes
Elements included in
The table below describes the feed elements that are used to create smart banners or dynamic ads.
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| type | Transaction type. The meaning is only sale. Required element. |
| category | Possible values:
|
| location | Required element. |
| locality-name | Name of the locality. Required element. |
| sub-locality-name | |
| address | |
| metro | Nearest metro station. |
| name | |
| time-on-transport | |
| time-on-foot | |
| url | Required element. |
| image | A must-have element for smart banners. |
| building-name | Required element. |
| sales agent | Required element. |
| organization | Required element. |
| price | |
| value | |
| currency | Currency code (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). |
| area | Total area. \n |
| value | |
| unit | Unit of room area. |
| floor |
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| type | Transaction type. The meaning is only sale. Required element. |
| category | Possible values:
|
| location | A set of elements that describe the location of an object. Nested tags provide detailed information about the object's address. Required element. |
| locality-name | Name of the locality. Required element. |
| sub-locality-name | |
| address | |
| metro | Nearest metro station. If there are several stations, each should be indicated in a separate element. Nested tags provide detailed information. |
| name | |
| time-on-transport | Time to the metro in minutes by transport. |
| time-on-foot | |
| url | Required element. |
| image | A must-have element for smart banners. |
| building-name | Name of the residential complex. Based on this element, apartments are combined into residential complexes. If the name of the residential complex is unknown, indicate the street and house number (Lenina, 25) Required element. |
| sales agent | Information about the developer. The nested tags provide detailed information: Required element. |
| organization | Name of the developer's legal entity. Required element. |
| price | A set of elements describing the value of an object. The nested tags indicate the price and the currency in which the cost is indicated: |
| value | |
| currency | Currency code (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). Required if there is a value element. |
| area | Total area. The value and unit of measurement of the area are transmitted in nested tags: \n |
| value | |
| unit | Unit of room area. The element is used if the price is specified per unit area. Possible values: sq. m/sq. m. |
| floor |
Flights: Google Ads Flights feed
The Google Ads Airline Tickets CSV feed must be used for the Airline Tickets business type. The first line contains the names of the columns, and the next lines contain the data itself. The contents of the columns are separated by a comma. Data in the feed must be in UTF-8 encoding.
Example: Elements included in CSV
The table below describes the feed elements that are used to create smart banners or dynamic ads.
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| Required element. |
|
| Destination name | Destination name. Required element. |
| e-commerce |
|
| Name of departure point. |
|
| Offer page URL. Required element. |
|
| A must-have element for smart banners. |
|
| Flight price | Offer price. Number and currency code (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). Use a period (.) as a decimal separator. |
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| Destination ID. Required element. |
|
| Destination name | Destination name. Required element. |
| Origin ID. If you indicate Origin ID in the feed and have connected e-commerce in Yandex.Metrica, use Origin ID and Destination ID separated by a hyphen as the offer identifier in the Ecommerce object. For example, \"id\": \"VKO-LHR\" . |
|
| Name of departure point. |
|
| Offer page URL. Required element. |
|
| A must-have element for smart banners. |
|
| Flight price | Offer price. Number and currency code (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). Use a period (.) as a decimal separator. |
Other business: universal feed
A universal feed in CSV format can be used in the Other Business type. The first line contains the column names, and the next lines contain the data itself. The contents of the columns are separated by a comma. Data in the feed must be in UTF-8 encoding.
Elements included in CSV
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| Offer ID. Required element. |
|
| e-commerce |
|
| Offer page URL. Required element. |
|
| A must-have element for smart banners. |
|
| Title | Name of the offer. |
| Description | Description of the offer. |
| Currency | Currency code (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). Required if there is a Price element. |
Offer page URL.
Required element.
A must-have element for smart banners.
Description of the offer.
Offer price without currency. Use a period (.) as a decimal separator.
Currency code (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT).
Required if there is a Price element.
The old offer price, which must be higher than the new price (Price).
Other Business: Google Ads Special Feed
The Google Ads Custom CSV feed can be used in the Other Business type. The first line contains the column names, and the next lines contain the data itself. The contents of the columns are separated by a comma. Data in the feed must be in UTF-8 encoding.
In Yandex.Metrica, use ID and ID2 separated by a hyphen as the offer identifier in the Ecommerce object. For example, \"id\": \"VKO-LHR\" .
Offer page URL.
Required element.
A must-have element for smart banners.
Name of the offer.
Description of the offer.
Offer price with currency code in ISO 4217 encoding (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). Use a period (.) as a decimal separator.
Second offer ID.
If you indicate ID2 in the feed and have connected e-commerce in Yandex.Metrica, use ID and ID2 separated by a hyphen as the offer identifier in the Ecommerce object. For example, \"id\": \"VKO-LHR\" .
Offer page URL.
Required element.
A must-have element for smart banners.
Name of the offer.
Description of the offer.
Offer price with currency code in ISO 4217 encoding (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). Use a period (.) as a decimal separator.
Other Business: Google Ads Travel Feed
The Google Ads Travel CSV feed can be used in the Other Business type. The first line contains the column names, and the next lines contain the data itself. The contents of the columns are separated by a comma. Data in the feed must be in UTF-8 encoding.
Elements included in CSV
The table below describes the feed elements that are used to create smart banners.
| Element | Description | |
|---|---|---|
| Destination ID. Required element. |
||
| Destination name | Destination name. |
|
| Origin ID. If you indicate Origin ID in your feed and have enabled e-commerce |
||
| Name of departure point. |
||
| Offer page URL. Required element. |
||
| A must-have element for smart banners. |
||
| Name of the offer. |
||
| New offer price, which must be lower than the old price (Price). | Origin ID. If you indicate Origin ID in the feed and have connected e-commerce in Yandex.Metrica, use Origin ID and Destination ID separated by a hyphen as the offer identifier in the Ecommerce object. For example, \"id\": \"MOS-AMS\" . |
|
| Name of departure point. |
||
| Offer page URL. Required element. |
||
| A must-have element for smart banners. |
||
| Name of the offer. |
||
| Offer price with currency code in ISO 4217 encoding (RUB, USD, UAH, KZT). Use a period (.) as a decimal separator. |
||
| New offer price, which must be lower than the old price (Price). |
Adding a feed
To add a feed, on the campaign list page, follow the Feeds link. On the page
You can place your feed in an archive created using the ZIP (.zip extension) or GNU ZIP (.gz extension) compression algorithm.
If there was an error adding a feed (for example, the size, format of the feed, or link to it does not meet the requirements), you will see a status "Loading error" and a link to the bug report.
File Validation
When reading a file, the following conditions are checked:
- everyone is present required elements;
- all element names are correct;
- Each element appears at most once.
If any of these conditions are not met, the file is rejected.
Yandex.Direct offers a number of tools that will help automate the creation contextual advertising. In particular, for online stores there will be useful creation product feeds - unique product databases that, with certain manipulations, can be shown in Direct ads without additional tedious manual work.
What are feeds in Direct?
Feeds are used primarily to create and. That is, these types of ads that provide a template where you can simply insert product names, prices, and some other data, and in a couple of clicks create ads for hundreds or thousands of products.
A product feed is a file in one of the following formats:
- YML (Yandex Market Language) - a format created specifically for
Using the feed is very convenient because it makes it easier to update information on product availability, prices, promotions, add product characteristics, and group ads depending on product category.
How to create a feed for Direct
As mentioned, feeds work for dynamic ads and smart banners, which have their own restrictions on the subject of goods. Perhaps the number of topics will expand over time.
We will look at creating a feed for retail .
The feed for retail products must be in YML format (for other topics, CSV or XML is possible). It, like an XML document, uses one element:
There are several ways to create a YML file. We recommend trying the automated one using the service mysitemapgenerator.com. Here you will need to go to the section YML generator.
As can be seen in the example above, there are a number parameters, which can be entered into an XML file (or YML). For retail, for example, the list looks like this.
As you can see, there are many settings. Each topic has its own list with its own characteristics, and the full set of parameters can be found in Help from Yandex.
Create dynamic feed ads
When uploading a feed, select its type and provide a name.
Let's move on to creating a campaign.
And in its settings, specify the feed as the data source.
There is nothing supernatural about setting up feeds. This may take some time, from an hour or more, which will take to compile the file and select all required parameters, but it will end up being a time saver if you plan to actively use smart banners or dynamic ads.
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