Migrating Brands to the new Bol.com API

The technical migration to the new Bol.com version 7 API is finalized by the Icecat team. Bol.com is the dominant e-tailer and marketplace in the Benelux. And, it is the Benelux e-commerce branch of Ahold Delhaize, with its chains of supermarkets in Europe and the US.

For around a decade, Bol.com connected to Icecat’s XML pull-API and maintained taxonomy mappings in-house. Last year, Bol.com decided to outsource this process to Icecat, given that the marketplace has advanced its push-APIs. Firstly, Icecat built a connector to version 6 of Bol.com’s API. Secondly, Icecat migrated from version 6 to version 7, as this newer Bol.com API provides better reporting capabilities. Thirdly, the Icecat taxonomy team reviews the existing mappings of brands, categories, specs, and spec values.

Free Vendor Central

In addition to product data, Bol.com is also using Icecat Videos and advises Free Vendor Central to its brand suppliers. Through Free Vendor Central brands enrich their product content on Icecat themselves, free of charge. Next, Icecat syndicates it to the brand’s (authorized) users. And, of course, one such (authorized) user is Bol.com via the above-mentioned API v7. The videos are still uploaded by Bol.com via a separate video-interface.

What does the new Bol.com connector mean for Icecat brands?

In the short term, it will lead to further improved spec and catalog coverage and thus reduce work for a brand’s product managers to enrich their products in the Bol.com catalog themselves. Bol.com has its own data model, and Icecat takes care of mapping Icecat’s taxonomy to Bol.com’s. Further, Bol.com can have specific requirements. One example of such a unique requirement is that Bol.com wants to receive an image of the CE marking on a product. Icecat processes such CE mark images as pdf. Not all brands are yet providing such images.

Importantly, in Bol.com’s environment, a brand can set the prioritization of content sources. Basically, there are three options: Bol.com is the primary source, the brand is the primary source, or Icecat is the primary source of branded content. In case, that a brand owner chooses Icecat, it is important to verify that all data in Icecat is complete, and all content update processes are in sync.

Thanks to the reporting function in Bol.com’s API v7, our taxonomy quickly understands which brand content is missing, and what the best fix is: through mappings, editorially or by reaching out to the respective brand.

If you have any questions, please reach out to your Icecat account manager, contact us via the site or reply below.