Directives > Columns Map > Google Shopping

Directives are functions performing specific logic that can be applied in the Feed Columns. Navigate through the list below to learn what their logic is.

Static Value

This directive can be used to set a string value for all your products. The parameter accepted is a string value. Most of the times when all your products have the same constant information, you would want to use this directive instead of setting the same value in an attribute for all your products. One good example is setting the brand information for stores selling only products of the same brand. In the default set of columns, condition is set to be new using this directive.

Product Id

Primarily this directive will output the product entity_id, and accepts as parameter Add Store Code Yes/No. For multi-store, ids must be unique across all feeds, and to make them unique, you have the option to concatenate the product id and the store code together.

Parent Product Id

Similar function as the "Product Id" directive, outputs the product entity_id, but it gets the value from the parent product in case of associated product types like the ones from configurable products. The output is empty for products that are not associated items. Most common usage for this directive is to output Google’s item_group_id column.

Product URL

Processes product URLs so that they match the type of product and listing in the feed. Set the additional parameter Add URL Suffix to customize further the end of a product URL with custom string.

The suffix can be used to track referring URLs in web analytics software. Setting this to ?utm_source=google_shopping will generate links like: http://mystore.com/product-url.html?utm_source=google_shopping. Products without assigned categories will not use the SEO friendly version of the URL.

Configurable associated products can append to this URL parameter to target their specific variant, see Unique URLs for associated products not visible setting under Configurable Products section of the feed settings.

Product Image URL

Simply pulls the product's main image URL. Allows the option to set under the Type parameter, which images is the main image, by default it's set to Base Image.

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If your product does not have an image assigned as the Base Image, your product may be skipped if "image_link" is under "Skip product with empty". If you notice problems, try removing it from skip rule.

Product Category Image URL

Returns category image of the first category assignment found for your product. This should only be used for special cases where product images are defined on the category level.

Product Additional Images URLs

This directive outputs a comma separated list of active image URLs for the product. Under the Exclude Type parameter should be set to the main image of the product, so that only the rest of images are added through this directive.

Price

The price directive computes the amount based on the product type been added to the feed. Configurable, bundle and grouped items will have the minimal price of an item.

Setting Add Tax option below to Yes will add tax to this price column, for US all prices should not include tax, the appropriate setting should be made here. The price has been formatted according to the setting called Format Prices, under Columns Map section.

Sale Price

This directive will output the corresponded amount when Special Price has been set at the product, or when the product takes part of a promotion rule and the setting called Apply Catalog Price Rules is set to Yes under Columns Map section.

Setting Add Tax option below to Yes will add tax to this price column, for US all prices should not include tax, the appropriate setting should be made here. The price is been formatted according to the setting called Format Prices, under Columns Map section.

Sale Price Date Range

The date interval has been taken primarily from products Start / End dates of the special price. This interval will never output empty, so when no end date has been specified at the product, the range will be set for a full year. If the start date is not specified on the product, the current processing date has been considered.

This date range is mostly useful in the feed along with the Sale Price, specifying when this sale apply

Availablitiy

Uses regular Zoey stock information to compute whether a product is out of stock or in stock. When the additional setting Use Default Stock Statuses is set to No, a custom attribute specified under Alternate Stock/Availability Attribute, will be used to specify the availability. See more settings under Columns Map section.

Accepted values for this directive are: 'in stock', 'out of stock', 'preorder'. Other values will be replaced by 'out of stock'.

Inventory Count

This is a legacy directive used to map the 'quantity' column which is no longer required by Google. It simply pulls the stock inventory qty information. The Count Mode defines how the qty count should be performed in case of complex products like bundle.

Product Expiration in Feed

Computes an expiration date based on product creation and the "No. of Days" option. Set "No. of Days" option to increase or decrease this date limit. This field is no longer required by Google.

Shipping

This directive computes shipping information into the Google accepted format based on the Shipping Methods available for your products. To use this directive, Shipping section has to be enabled and configured on your feed. To specify which Shipping Methods and which regions will be considered please review Shipping section.

If Shipping is not enabled and no shipping methods are specified this directive will output empty.

Shipping Weight

Outputs the weight attribute of your products along with the unit of measure specified here under options. For bundle products, there's an extra setting called Combined weight found under the Bundle Products section.

Variant Attributes (Apparels)

Allows for using multiple product attributes to specify a different value system for the same property. It comes handy to map apparel specific properties.
Example of size property:
shirts - shirt_size attribute, with values: Small, Large, X-Large, etc. shoes - shoe_size attribute, with values: 8, 9, 10, etc.

Using this directive, you can select both attributes, and when processing the product, the appropriate value will be considered depending on whether a value is specified in one of the attributes. First attribute found having a value for the product is been used.

For configurable items, all values will be computed into a list of values delimited by comma, or a delimiter specified under Associated Product Attribute Value Separator setting under Configurable products section of the settings.

AdWords Price Buckets

This directive uses a set of rules defined under AdWords Price Buckets settings to output labels for different price ranges of your products.

Common usage is to add the google custom_label_0 column which is handy to group your products when running AdWords Shopping Campaigns.

To specify the upper limit of your prices, just use some big number like 99999999.

Product Review Average

Output product's average rating in the interval 1 - 5. Returns 0 if no reviews have been approved on your product.

Product Review Count

Outputs the count of product reviews. Returns 0 if no reviews have been approved on your product.

Product Type using Zoey Category Path

This method is the default way of filling a categorized column of your products that can be used to fill product_type.

Your product category paths are converted into a string revealing the hierarchy like: Root > Category A > Category B. Product been assigned to Category B. All product categories will be used to build a list of comma separated paths, and they are limited to the Paths limit value.

Deeper categories are listed first, so that when the limit is set the most relevant ones are revealed.

Google Category by Category

Uses a set of rules defined under the Google Product Category By Category Map setting to output category taxonomies.

Products will be matched through the set of rules using their assigned categories. The first category found with the most important category rules below will be considered. The rule importance is given by the Order rule column, lower values matching first.

Product categories do not necessarily need to have a direct correspondent rule to cover products deeper in the tree. High level categories set here would dictate inheritance for products deeper in the category tree.

The more categories defied here, the granular your taxonomy definition becomes giving google a better and detailed view of your products.

It is advisable to also set a Replace empty values rule to cover all missed categories from this set, and fill the values with a static default taxonomy or some product attribute holding the taxonomy.

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We recommend that you set all rules with an order value. Setting higher Order values for high level categories, and lower Order value for deeper categories will make deeper categories will match first, dictating the output value.

Product Type by Category

Similar to Google Category by Category a set of rules can be defined under Product Type by Category Map setting.

Identifier Exists

This directive looks at your feed columns to see if two out of three of the following: brand, mpn, gtin columns have a value. Those columns are being considered as identification information of products, and if at least two of them are missing, the value returned here will be FALSE.

Concatenate

Allows you to compose a string using attributes of your products. This method works like a replace in string function, and looks for the {{}} marker through the string template provided and will replace it with the attribute code between the marker characters.

Is Bundle

Outputs TRUE if the item is a bundle item and FALSE otherwise