New Terms of Use for Google Base: Verifying Your ePages Shop by 18 May 2010
The terms of use have changed for Google Base, the popular product-search technology offered by California’s search-engine provider. Merchants must therefore verify and claim their website URLs without delay. If merchants fail to do so, they will no longer be able to export products to Google Base. Merchants who already have a Google Base link must verify their online shop by 18 May 2010. Continue reading this ePages blog to find out how to do this.
In order to claim your ePages online shop at Google Base, you must first prove that you are the legitimate owner. Visit Google Webmaster Tools to accomplish this. Log in there by using the same data which you use to access your Google Merchant Center—the portal for Google Base merchants. After you log in, click on the Add a site button in Google Webmaster Tools.
Enter your online shop‘s URL (e.g. http://www.myepagesstore.com). Make sure that you follow these rules:
- The URL must start with either http:// or https://
- No IP addresses are allowed, e.g. http://10.127.127.127
- No ports are allowed, e.g. http://www.myepagesstore.com:8080
- No fragments are allowed, e.g. http://www.myepagesstore.com # top
In your ePages shop‘s back office, you must enter a code snippet generated by Google to confirm that you do indeed own your online shop. First click on Verify this site within Google Webmaster Tools.
You will then see a code snippet similar to this:
<meta name="google-site-verification" content="xebym4K425WgA_EQ4wYZ5FnR5eb1xaUpd-M6wpduypU" />
Mark the snippet and right-click it to “copy” the snippet onto your clipboard. Now open a new browser window and access the administration page of your ePages online shop. In the Settings menu, select General settings. Click on the Status tab to access the Advanced settings submenu.
You can make entries in the large text-entry field within the <Head> area—which stores your online shop’s HTML programming code and renders it “invisible” to visitors.
It is here that you now must enter the code snippet provided by Google Webmaster Tools. Ensure that you transfer the entire code without entering any characters incorrectly. Then click on Save. Use the cache function in the back office of your ePages shop; don’t neglect to update it!
Now return to Google Webmaster Tools and click on Verify. Google will now seek out your website to check whether the suitable snippet is in your online shop’s programming code. If this is the case, then you have demonstrated beyond a doubt that you are the shop’s legitimate owner; last but not least, you can continue posting products from your online shop’s back office to Google Base.
Remarks from ePages The approach described above is a current work-around to comply with Google Base’s modified requirements. In conjunction with updating your ePages shop to Version 6.09.4, we will add to the Google Base settings in your shop’s back office a function for verifying conveniently. When we release Patch 6.09.4, we will correspondingly expand this tutorial. |
Volker Schwarz
Volker Schwarz studied German, History and Politics at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum. From 2004 to 2009 he worked as a freelancer for several marketing and communications companies in Hamburg, including e-commerce companies. Between August 2009 and December 2011, he worked as an online editor at ePages.
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