Zid to Meta: branded catalog ad images

Zid stores get branded Meta catalog ad images by giving CatalogBadge their Zid product feeds link, then adding our meta-supp.csv as a supplementary feed on the catalog Zid’s Meta app created. Zid keeps sending prices and stock. CatalogBadge plans start at $49 a month in US dollars, and your feeds carry your own photos until a plan or free trial is active.

Step 1: get your product feed from Zid

1. In your Zid dashboard, open Online store, then SEO, then Product feeds.
2. Choose a platform, a language your store has switched on and the currency, and generate the link. Zid writes the same Google RSS file on your own domain whichever platform you pick.
3. Start with the language most of your titles are written in, usually Arabic, and copy the link.

In Zid’s link each product’s id is its Zid product id, a long UUID rather than the SKU, and the brand column holds your store name. Both pass to every channel unchanged.

Step 2: add the feed to CatalogBadge

Create your account, choose Onboard a store and paste the feed URL. The wizard shows sample products with their prices before anything is saved, then you pick your designs, check them in the preview and go live. Create your account

The Zid setup guide has every screen of the wizard.

Step 3: put meta-supp.csv / meta-full.xml into Meta

Which file you paste depends on how your Meta catalog gets products today:

In Meta

1. Open Commerce Manager, choose the catalog your Facebook and Instagram catalog ads use, then open Catalog and Data sources.
2. Make the change from the table above on that catalog: swap the scheduled data feed URL, or add a supplementary feed to the source your platform created.
3. Set the schedule to hourly and save. Choose Upload now on a data feed for a first fetch straight away.
4. Keep the same catalog. Your ad sets point at it, so deleting it and starting again would cut them off.

The image Meta gets

Meta takes the 1:1 image as the main picture of each product. Turn on 4:5 and 9:16 in Rules and they go in as additional images for feed and Stories placements. A product whose image is not drawn yet keeps its own photo, never an older render that shows a different price.

Watch out

The supplementary feed only works when our rows carry the product ids Zid’s Meta app sent, which is the Zid product id in Zid’s link too. Compare three products in Commerce Manager with the link before you go live; rows with other ids are ignored and those products keep Zid’s photos.

Selling in Saudi Arabia

Prices stay in riyals exactly as your feed writes them, the discount badge rounds down, and a tabby or tamara line can show the instalment on the image.

Season presets for Saudi Arabia, such as White Friday, Ramadan, Founding Day and Saudi National Day, switch your designs on the dates you choose.

Check that it worked

• The store’s Overview page in CatalogBadge shows when Meta last fetched each file.
• In Commerce Manager, open Items and a product you expect to be branded: its image address starts with https://img.catalogbadge.com/.
• The first fetch can take a few hours to show in Commerce Manager and in ads.

Questions

Does a supplementary feed change my prices?

It cannot. Meta lets a supplementary feed change fields such as the image, never the price, sale price or availability, which keep coming from Zid’s Meta app.

Do the ids match the ones Zid’s Meta and Snapchat apps use?

Zid’s link names each product by its Zid product id, a UUID, not the SKU. Open two or three products in your Meta or Snapchat catalog: when their ids are the same UUIDs, our files line up with the catalog the Zid app built.