Catalogs - what it is, how to create, edit and delete

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The Catalog is a place that contains information about all the items that you want to advertise or sell.

Catalogs can be created for different types of assortment, such as products (e-commerce), real estate, transport, or services.

The Commerce Center supports the creation of catalogs using the feed files of the following business verticals:

General requirements for catalogs are described in this article

Creating a catalog

Open the Commerce Center tab.
Click Create a catalog.
Go to configuring the catalog.

Product catalogue (available at the link)
If you have a link to a product catalog that you have hosted remotely, select the Feed or Community option.
1. Enter the name of the catalog.
2. In the Link to feed or community field, specify a link to the product feed.
3. If the feed file is protected by HTTP authorisation, click the Enter login and password button below the link entry field. Then enter the login and password to access the feed.
  You can also specify login and password in the link in the format http://username:password@example.com/feeds/trg.xml. In this case, you do not need to enter your login and password additionally in the form.
4. In the Update period field, select how often the feed should be updated.
5. If necessary, enable Automatically remove UTM tags - this will allow the system to remove added third-party tags that may conflict with VK Ads tags.
6. Click Create Catalogue. This will open the Upload History tab, which displays the upload status of the feed.
Goods and services from the VK community
If you are advertising goods and services from a VKontakte community, select the Feed or Community option.
1. Enter the name of the catalog.
2. In the Link to feed or community field, enter a link to the community with goods or services. Separate catalogues are created for goods and for services.
3. In the Update period field, select how often the feed should be updated.
4. If necessary, enable Automatically remove UTM tags - this will allow the system to remove added third-party tags that may conflict with VK Ads tags.
5. Click Create Catalogue. This will open the Upload History tab, which displays the upload status of the feed.
Products from the marketplace
If you are advertising on a marketplace, select the Marketplace option and follow the detailed instructions in this article.
Product catalog (file)
If you have a product catalogue file, select the Manual option.
1. Enter the name of the catalogue.
  In the Feed Category field, select the type of catalogue: what products or services are contained in the feed.
  
  You can find the requirements for fid design in this section. You can also download an example of the file design by clicking the button on the right: Download feed template.
2. Download the catalog.
3. If necessary, enable Automatically remove UTM tags - this will allow the system to remove added third-party tags that may conflict with VK Ads tags.
4. Click Create Catalogue. This will open the Upload History tab, which displays the upload status of the feed.

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After creating the catalog, you need to configure the connection between the feed and the event sources.

Adding event sources

Event sources are tools that track user actions on a site or mobile app and send that data to VK Ads. As a source, you can use the VK Ads pixel or an app for which you have set up integration with the mobile tracker.

To add link with an event source:

Go to the Commerce Center → desired catalog → Events tab.
Click Connect Data Source.
In the window that opens, select Pixel, iOS app or Android app.
Tap Save.

Editing the catalog

Click the Commerce Center tab and select the desired catalog from the list.
Press "..." and select Customize catalog.
Change the desired settings for the catalog depending on its type and how you want to add items.
Click Save.

Archiving a catalog

A directory may get the Archived status if:

It is not used in active advertising campaigns for more than 3 days.
The system fails to successfully import the product feed for more than 3 days.

Deleting a catalog

In the list of the catalogs, select the desired directory.
Press "..." and select Delete directory.
Confirm the directory deleting:
- If the directory is used in campaigns, click Delete and stop campaigns;
- If the directory is not used in campaigns, click Delete.

Catalog accesses

You can share your catalogs or product groups with other users. You can do this in the Accesses section.

Users with whom you share catalogs and groups will be able to:

Launch campaigns with accessible product groups.
Create, edit, and delete product groups based on the catalog they have access to.
Change links to counters and pixels for a third-party catalog.

Grant access

You can give other users access to the catalog and product group based on it in two ways: from the catalog and from the product group.

To access from the catalog:

Click the Commerce Center tab and select the desired catalog from the list.
Hover your cursor over the catalog line, press "..." and select Customize catalog.
In the window that appears, click the Accesses tab.
Click Open Access.
In the window that opens, enter, separated by commas, the IDs of the accounts you want to access. You can find account ID in the Settings section.
Select the level of access for the user:
- Catalog and all product groups - both the catalog and all groups based on it will be available to the user.
- Catalog and selected groups - only the catalog and selected groups will be available to the user.
Click Save.

An activation link will appear. Copy it and give it to the user you are granting access to.

To give access from a product group:

Click the Commerce Center tab and select the desired catalog from the list.
Go to the Product Groups tab and open the desired group.
Click "..." and select Open Access.
Specify the account IDs and user access level, and then share the link to activate the catalog with the user, as described above.

Revoke access

To revoke access to a catalog and product group:

Click the Commerce Center tab and select the desired catalog from the list.
Hover your cursor over the catalog line, press "..." and select Customize catalog.
In the window that appears, click the Accesses tab.
In the table with the list of accounts that have access to the selected catalog, click the Revoke Access icon.

After you revoke the user's access to the catalog, his account will be removed from the list.

Add, edit and delete positions using the API

Using API allows mass creation, updating and deleting items with just one HTTP request. This option is suitable for large companies with extensive catalogs (with hundreds of thousands of items) that frequently change their assortment.

The description of the API methods for adding, editing and deleting the catalog items is available here

The API can be used to get detailed information about validation errors. Learn more