Category target ads now available

I just heard back from the AuctionAds folks regarding categories, and the good news is that there is a way to define a category. The following is their response. I will be implementing this myself to see how it works.


Yes, and AuctionAds is excited to announce that we now offer category targeted ads!

For example if you want your ads to show from just the Digital Art arts category this is now possible.

It is a little tricky so here is how you implement:

First you need to find the category ID (this is the most tricky part). For instance, if you wanted to just show ads from the Digital Art category (http://art.listings.ebay.com/Digital-Art_W0QQfromZR4QQsacatZ20118QQsocmdZListingItemLis tQQssPageNameZdcpArtTextNonFeat) you would have to go to that category first. Just above the first auction you will see an Advanced Search link (not the one all the way at the top of the page), click on that. The advanced search page should look like…

http://art.search.ebay.com/ws/search/RefineSearch?from=R4&fsoo=2&fsop=2&sacat=20118&sofindtype=1

You will see from the URL that the category number for the Digital Art section is 20118.

To implement this into your AA’s script the format is as follows.

auctionads_ad_kw = "category: category# keyword";

or

auctionads_ad_kw = "category: 20118 framed";

Same rules apply for multiple keywords like:

auctionads_ad_kw = "category:116082 keyword; category:12354 keyword2; category:363634

keyword3";

We are still testing the functionality so if you experience any issues please let me know.

This is very good news!

Before getting too excited, there seems to be a bug with this still. I tried it on my site and it returned those unrelated ads again (games and handbags). I sent this back to them for analysis. Hopefully it's not something on my side related to vbseo or something else.

I'll post their answer as soon as I hear something.

I haven't done anything yet. I've learned to wait for the bugs to be ironed out first. :)

I'll post their answer as soon as I hear something.
Any update on this yet ?

Last time I tried this about a week ago it still wasn't working for me. when I set a category I get purses and ipod accessories again. Maybe it has something to do with my using categories that are under ebay motors rather than the general area. I posted a reply to their blog article asking about this but they deleted it... maybe they only want positive feedback :p

If anyone else is getting this to work please share an example of your code.