Monday, January 9, 2012

New Tutorial at Fauxlaroids.com

Just added a new tutorial, PST29: Using Excel to Change Title Case to comply with Google Policies.
Many eBay merchants list their products using ALL CAPS for their titles (and sometimes their entire description!) under the erroneous assumption that it increases their listings visibility. In fact, scientific studies have shown that “all-capital text was read 11.8 per cent slower than lower case, or approximately 38 words per minute slower,” and that “nine tenths of adult readers consider lower case more legible than all capitals” (see Readability).
If that isn't reason enough to abandon ALL CAPS, Google will reject any product listings in the ProStores datafeed file that is in violation of their excessive capitalization policy. Only standard English capitalization can be used. Not ALL CAPS.
Okay, so you've just opened your ProStores account and have have imported 1,500 listings from eBay WITH ALL OF THEIR TITLES IN ALL CAPS, and now for the first time you learn about Google's excessive capitalization policy with your first Datafeed Disapproved email from them. How do you efficiently edit the case on all of your 1,500 ProStores products to comply with Google's policies so you can get your items into Google Shopping?
See ProStores Tutorial 29 at Fauxlaroids.com for the answer!