Any ecommerce site can have free Google Shopping listings.
This blog comes directly from a client conversation and is aimed at those less familiar with Google Shopping integration. I shouldn’t be surprised at how many smaller ecommerce brands don’t realise they can have free Google Shopping listings. The topic has cropped up on numerous occasions in recent years.
Major brands ands established online retailers know all about product feeds and Merchant Center. Conversely, when I’m dealing with newer companies, you’d be surprised how many are completely unaware of the opportunity.
What are Google Shopping listings?
You’ve almost certainly seen the listings I’m talking about. However, for clarity, here is a screenshot of what I mean:
This is a screenshot from a search for Remington Hair Dryers and then selecting the “Shopping” tab of search. If you didn’t click on the Shopping tab, you’ll still see a selection of Google Shopping listings. However, they’ll all be “Sponsored” listings – i.e. paid for advertisements.
Many business owners think that you have to pay to have products appear in the Shopping tab. That isn’t true.
Google Merchant Center
Google Merchant Center is free to use and add your products to it.
By doing so, they’ll be shown in Shopping search listings and there is a benefit to your product and brand visibility.
It is absolutely worthwhile doing, but it is more involved than you might first imagine. There is an administrative overhead, but I’d still recommend you look at the advantages.
Furthermore, you can reduce the administration by integrating Merchant Center with your site. You do this via a product feed (and this is the recommended type of use). You can manually input products, but it will become very time consuming indeed if and when your products change. It can also be a risky choice if you change product pricing on your site and forget to make the same alterations in Merchant Center. Manual maintenance of your products isn’t a sensible choice for websites with more than a very small range of products.
Merchant Center requires you to have a Google account, but you’ll have one of those if you use Google Analytics, Google Search Console or Gmail.
However, I always recommend clients have a Google account dedicated to their brand management. The accounts are free to create and you then have a single point of control.
I’m not going to give you a step-by-step guide to using Merchant Center, because there are full instructions throughout the process and there is more documentation specific to free Google Shopping listings.
I will, however, give you some basic pointers.
Free Google Shopping listings – points to note
The first thing to be aware of is that you shouldn’t expect to rocket to the top of Google Shopping listings with free product entries. You’ll probably find that you have to scroll considerably down any search results to find newly input products.
However, let’s not forget that this is free visibility. It is additional exposure for your products and brand, giving a greater chance of traffic.
Local search benefits
There is a major local shopping advantage, because your products will appear next to your business/store profile in Google results. That is a particularly useful feature for potential shoppers.
Below is an example showing how Craze Central’s 360 Photo Booth hire shows on their Google Business Profile.
Clicking on the “View All” link reveals a larger window in which multiple products would be displayed (in this instance there is only one product, but it also shows the company contact information):
Google Lens search results
Another advantage is that your products are far more likely to be shown when someone submits a search using Google Lens. This is a Google feature that allows users to search for products by uploading a photograph.
Google’s systems match uploaded photographs/images with Merchant Center product images amongst others, so again it is more free potential exposure.
Unique identifiers
Merchant Center likes products to have unique identifiers, such as a MPN (Manufacturer Part Number) or some other form of unique code for each product. If you don’t use these, you’ll receive notifications from Google and it’ll show a red message next to the product.
It is easily addressed by using the product/part no. field in your ecommerce store or, if you have no other way, inputting a unique identifier against each product in Merchant Center.
Product image quality
Google will also send you warnings if your images aren’t of sufficient quality, but they need to be very poor quality indeed for you to receive those notifications. Product photograph quality matters when it comes to conversion rates on your website. I recently published another blog about the importance of product photographs that you might find useful.
Manual product editing
If you find that the automated product feed that Google Merchant Center displays isn’t how you want items to appear in Shopping search results, you can again make manual amendments.
Keep an eye out for Merchant Center warnings
The key is to make sure you monitor Merchant Center and stay on top of any warnings it issues against products, otherwise you’re limiting your potential visibility in search results.
Building the elements of SEO
One of the reasons you should be considering Google Merchant Center and free listings is very easy to explain. I have mentioned it many times – all the small elements that go into SEO.
SEO is not about 1, 2 or even 10 things. Best practise SEO is the culmination of hundreds of small details that build to give you the visibility and rankings you want.
If you take every small opportunity, you’ll open doors. Yes, they need time, effort and maintenance. However, there is no way of avoid any of those if you really want to get the visitors, conversions and growth you want.
Think of it like ALT tagging images
Free Google Shopping listings are a prime example of ways to increase your exposure, however small it might be. It’s no different to ensuring all your images are ALT tagged, even though you’ve probably read that has no direct impact on your website rankings – but they all have an indirect effect. You can read more why images matter for SEO on my blog.
A listing for your product that requires 5 screen scrolls down search results is better than not having the product there at all. Similarly, the possibility of one of your website images appearing on Page 4 of Google Image Search is better than it not being there because you didn’t use the ALT tag.
If you look at SEO strategy properly, these tiny and time-consuming details make a difference.
Changes to SERPs results
You’ll notice something else once your products are configured on Google Merchant Center.
In some search results, Google will show the Title and Description of the product (from the product page) and will suffix the listing by displaying the price of the product.
It is a good example of one of the smaller benefits – providing your potential website visitor with additional information. It also adds to the trust factor – because it catches the attention of the person searching. They don’t know you’ve gone to further lengths than your competitors may have done, but they’ll see that your listing is different and offers more information.
Yet again, it represents the value of putting that little extra effort into SEO.
Summary
Free Google Shopping listings are the gift that keeps giving. There are several benefits, albeit small, that all increase your potential visibility – and therefore increase your potential sales.
If you run a medium or large store, it can be transformative in getting your products to the frontline of Google Search.
Even if you run a small store, it is exposure you’re losing out on if you don’t put the resources into setting it up.
Ecommerce platform configuration
It isn’t particularly difficult to configure. Most ecommerce platforms, from Shopify to Woocommerce, Magento & Adobe Commerce to Umbraco, all cater for product feeds.
If you’re not running one of the mainstream platforms, you might have to put a little more effort into troubleshooting any issues you encounter, but there are very few I’ve come across that won’t provide the product feed that Google Merchant Center requires.
What are you waiting for?
If you’re not using Merchant Center, you’re missing out on free Google Shopping listings and therefore missing out on potential traffic. Do I need to say more?
Feedback
Let me know of any issues you’ve encounter with Google Merchant Center. Please also comment if you’ve got a reason not to use it. I’d love to hear of any tales of transformative sales growth, or if you’ve found it hasn’t been worth the effort.
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