Factory redesign... Coming soon!

[Eric]

Hi,

I realized that Stefan and I keep referring to some big changes that we are working on at datafeedr but haven't posted officially about them.

After getting a lot of good feedback about 'The Factory' (where you create and build your store), we decided to do a complete overhaul of the Factory area. We are halfway finished and hope to rollout these changes in August. Here are some of the major changes that you will see:

SEARCH

You will be able to search by many different product attributes such as the products' name, description and keywords. You'll also be able to filter your results by price, merchant and network.

It will be an entirely new way of finding products but we feel that this method will allow you to find exactly the products you want without going through dozens of pages to find them.

SUBSCRIBE TO SEARCH QUERIES

In the current system, you add specific products to your store. This is very useful as you know exactly what products are in your store. The only problem is, what happens when new products that you would like in your store are released. They should be automatically included in your store, right?

So, our new 'subscription' feature will allow you to subscribe to a search query that you create and if new products are returned in the query, they will automatically be added to your store.

Let's take a look at an example. Let's say you do a search with the following parameters:
Merchant name: Modern Bike
Keyword search: Mountain Bike Tires
Price: $25 - $80

The first time you do the search, it yields 30 results. But then 1 month later, Modern Bike releases 10 more tires that match your search. They will automatically be added to your store the next time you update your store.

Of course you will still have the ability to add specific products and you will not have to use the subscription feature, but we think that it will help you keep your store current with the newest products on the market without having to sort through your feed when you wnt to do an update.

CATEGORY MANAGEMENT

We have realized that category management, depending on the structure of the merchant's datafeed, can be a time consuming process especially when you need to move many hundreds of products from 1 category to another, need to delete many top-level categories but keep the sub-categories or just categorize many uncategorized products.

So we are completely re-doing the way your products will be organized. Now, instead of relying on how merchants categorized (or did not categorize) their datafeed, you will choose what categories the products will go into.

Let's take the bike store example again. If you have a bicycle website, you know there are specific categories that you want to have in your store. One of them is Mountain Bike Tires. So you do your search (like the example above) and just add those products to the category you create.

Simply type in the category name and you're done.

If you want to have your categories nested within other categories, just add your category structure separated by slashes '/' and you can quickly build a multilevel category structure:

Mountain Bike / Accessories / Tires

UPDATE STORE FROM WP-ADMIN

Soon after the release of the new Factory, we will also make it possible to update your store from within your site's admin area. This will make it a lot easier to keep your store up-to-date without taking up too much of your time.


These are just some of the major changes we will be rolling out soon. And if you are wondering how this will affect your current stores, don't worry. We will make it backwards compatible so you won't lose any of the stores that you have already created.

Thanks for everyone's input and feedback.

Eric

[1800HART]

Well .. I'm excited

I have blindly added products from merchants that I want to cut down (delete non-related items from within my stores) - but was worried that when it came time to upgrade, all would be lost.

Keep up the good work!

[Eric]

UPDATE:

We are in the final stages of testing and debugging of the new factory! We don't have an exact date that the new system will go live, but we are getting very close.

We've already added 5 times as many products to the new factory (15,000,000+) and we're not done importing our datafeeds.

The products all have keyword and keyphrase tags.

All products are completely searchable based on Network, Merchant, Title, Description, Price & Tags (tags correspond to categories).

Now, when merchants add new products to their datafeed that match your factory search criteria, they will automatically be placed in your store when you update your store!

We've held off on releasing major functionalities to the plugin itself until the factory is finished so we can focus on a smooth transition from the old factory to the new factory. We have some cool things planned for the plugin once the move is complete.

Thanks for your patience!
Eric

[madataf]

Eric,

Am sure everyone is looking forward for this new functionality...this would definitely make our life a lot easier for the coming holiday season.

[Eric]

UPDATE

Here's a quick update on the status of the new Factory. We are running a little behind schedule and we do not have an exact date for release but we are just a few small steps away from release. We really hope to release within the next week.

We are so close, in fact, that I've posted 4 screenshots of the new, fully functioning Factory below. From the screenshots, you can start to get a sense of just how powerful the new Factory is going to be for you and your building of highly keyword targeted web stores.

Additionally, here is some more information regarding the new factory that might not be apparent from the screenshots:

1. Currently, there are 33,973,850 products to choose from! That's 10 times more than are in the current factory.

2. All products are searchable by network, merchant, title & description, price, keyword and keyphrase tags.

3. We've also added a few hundred new merchants with plans on adding hundreds more within a few weeks of launch.

4. The 10,000 product limit per store has been lifted.

5. Faster page loading in the factory and no more pop-up windows!

6. If new products are added to the database that match your subscription criteria, those products are automatically added to your store! No need to go on the hunt for newly released products.

7. The new Factory is hosted on it's own dedicated server to serve up the products and shops to you as fast as possible.

If you have any questions regarding the new Factory, please post here.

Thanks for your patience while we work through these last few days of testing and account transfers.

Eric

[drdawg81]

This is going to great!

[lucky7]

wow, cant wait for this

Hurry Eric

[Eric]

Here's a video preview of the new Factory: http://www.datafeedr.com/new-factory-video.php

[1800HART]

Yes. The video looks wonderful! I've been holding off on my "medieval" store until the factory is released .. so I can give it a good test ...

I don't suppose you need any beta testers, eh?

[Eric]

Originally Posted by 1800HART

I don't suppose you need any beta testers, eh?

We're trying to do a Beta launch today. Cross your fingers.

[Eric]

Beta released! Read more here: http://www.datafeedr.com/forums/showthread.php?t=282