One master rule to rule them all

As an online marketeer, you know the struggle of selling online. You have your own website, but that is not enough. You want to advertise on price comparison websites, marketplaces, affiliates and have lots of SEA campaigns running. To do so, you need a data feed - ideally one that is linked to your website and your actual shop system. This data feed can be used for your export platforms. But because the data feed requirements vary per platform, it is necessary to adjust your feed according to the standards of the platform.

For this task many people use feed management tools, like Channable. In a tool, like Channable, you are able to edit your feed with rules that are based on IF-THEN statements. IF your price is empty, THEN exclude the product from the data feed. Some rules will be specific to certain channels because they have specific requirements. Other rules might be needed for all exports in general, so it can be a real time saver to put them into the newly implemented master rule groups.

Master rule groups is a feature that Channable recently introduced. Normally, you would create rules for the export channel you have chosen. Whereas with master rule groups, you can create several groups and execute them for multiple exports. These rules are very convenient if you want to apply changes that are needed for multiple channels. Per export, you can select which master rules you want to apply. Below we’ll show a couple of examples of how you could use this new feature.

1. Exclude seasonal products It’s winter, there is snow outside and your data feed contains winter coats but also beachwear, swimming suits and other summer fashion. At this time of year, you only want to advertise products that are relevant for this cold weather and exclude anything that is related to summer. With master rules you can easily do that for your entire product feed and won’t have to worry about it per channel.


2. Exclude unwanted Does your feed contain HTML or textual discrepancies (e.g. unwanted capitals)? Do some items lack information like images, price etc.? These are issues in your feed that you certainly want to eliminate for any export. Use the master rules and you’ll save even more time!


3. Exclude blacklisted products Some brands or categories are not meant to be advertised, so you usually blacklist them. Even if you work in travel, you might want to exclude certain destinations. Create a master rule group for the items you want to blacklist and be done with it forever!


4. Exclude parent items Parent items or configurable products can be excluded in advance, so it’s easier for you to advertise only on the products on that you want to advertise.

In our help center, we explain how to implement master rules in even more detail.