Glossary · Categories & taxonomy
What is a category confidence score?
Every category SellerSort suggests comes with a confidence score between 0 and 1. The score is banded — strong at 0.90 and above, fair from 0.85, weak below — and the same two boundaries decide which rows go into the ready-to-upload feed and which go into the file for review.
What this comes down to
- Strong (≥ 0.90): safe to put straight into a feed.
- Fair (0.85–0.90): probably right; worth a glance before submitting.
- Weak (< 0.85): check it — a description or product type usually fixes it.
- The runner-up is always shown, so a near tie looks like one.
The three bands
| Band | Score | Advice | Bulk output |
|---|---|---|---|
| Strong | 0.90 and above | Safe to put straight into a feed | supplemental-feed.csv |
| Fair | 0.85 to 0.90 | Worth a glance before you submit | full.csv only — held out of the feed |
| Weak | Below 0.85 | Check it; add a description or product type | needs-review.csv |
The boundaries are the constants the pipeline itself uses, so what the finder tells you and what the files contain cannot disagree. Fair rows sit in between on purpose: not confident enough to upload unseen, not doubtful enough to join the review queue. Filter full.csv on the confidence column to see them.
Separation from the runner-up
A score alone can hide a coin flip. The Category Finder also reports how far the answer is ahead of the next-best category — “clearly ahead”, “ahead, but not by much”, or “nearly tied” — and lists the alternatives. A nearly tied answer between two sibling categories is a prompt to decide, not a verdict.
The score is not a guarantee of what Google will do with the value; it measures how sure the classifier is that this taxonomy entry describes the product.
Questions
How do I raise a weak score?
Give the classifier more to go on. A short or vague title is the usual cause; adding the description, brand or your product_type typically moves the answer into the strong band.
Are fair matches wrong?
Usually not — they are probably right. They are kept out of the upload-ready feed because a glance is cheap and a wrong category at scale is not; you will find them in full.csv with their score.
Read next
- Leaf categoryA category at the end of a branch of the taxonomy — one with no subcategories beneath it — and so the most specific place a product can be filed.
- google_product_categoryAn optional product-feed attribute that places a product in Google’s fixed product taxonomy, sent as a numeric category ID or as the full category path.
- How to find the right Google product category (with ID)A practical walkthrough: read the taxonomy, pick the most specific category that is still true, and get the numeric ID your product feed needs.