Here’s Why you need to utilize Google Merchant Center programs
Running short of time? Get PDF of the blog in your mail.
You might already know that your product feed lives in your Merchant Center account. Hence, your journey on Google Shopping wouldn’t begin without Google Merchant Center. But have you ever explored Merchant Center? There is so much more to it than Shopping Actions and Shopping Ads, the two most popular Google Merchant Center programs.
Did you know about the new opportunity that lets you keep all your profits to yourself? With the exclusion of commission fees from the Google Shopping Actions programs, you can enjoy all the profits made through your sales. Grab the opportunity with us today!
Here’s what you’ll learn:
What are Google Merchant Center programs?
Google has brought all the product-related programs together such as the Google Shopping Actions(the marketplace), Shopping Ads(advertisement especially designed for your products), Surfaces across Google(an unpaid and non-ads way to get your products on Google), dynamic remarketing(remarketing for your previous visitors) Local inventory ads, merchant promotions, product rating, and customer reviews.
As mentioned above, your product feed lives in your Merchant Center. You can not only manage everything related to product feed but also you can apply to different Google Merchant Center programs.
Let’s look into the different programs one-by-one.
Surfaces Across Google
Surfaces across Google enable you to display your products on various Google platforms including YouTube, especially in the form of rich product results on Google Images.
Considering the current situation with COVID-19, in a recent announcement, Google has enabled SMBs to get their products in Google Search result pages for free via this program. After this update, your products will appear on the search result pages, right under the Shopping Ads.
Here’s how you can enable Surfaces Across Google
If you have an existing feed in your Google Merchant Center Account then, you are automatically eligible to display your products on all Google platforms. You can simply enable this program in your Merchant Center account.
If you don’t have an existing feed. You can still get your products displayed by setting up Structured data markup for your Merchant Center account.
What is Structured data markup?
It is a machine-readable representation of your product data directly on your site. You need to add this markup to your HTML which helps Google and other search engines understand and process your content.
To enable this, you need to be able to edit your website’s HTML. Search engine crawler crawls your website, it can identify the pages which have product data when you add these markup to your page/website.
Pro tip: Experts at CedCommerce suggest that you use product feed for this program as you can provide more details through the product feed than the structured data.
Perks of this program
With the Surface Across Google program, you can easily boost your product visibility. And considering the current scenario, we are all trying to save some money, and Surfaces Across Google being absolutely free helps your products gain a global audience.
Local surfaces across Google
If you have brick-mortar stores, there is now a separate program in Google Merchant Center just for you, it is called Local surfaces across Google to show products available in local stores on Google Search, Google Images, Google Shopping, Google Maps, and Google Lens. It is a non-advertisement program hence requires no ad campaign.
To choose this program, click “Growth” in the left-hand menu in Google Merchant Center and select “Local surfaces across Google.” This requires separate local product inventory feeds that list the products available in your stores that get submitted at least once per day.
Shopping Ads
Google enables sellers to promote products with images, prices, along with product details on Google. It is easy and can be done by submitting product data via the Merchant Center and leveraging Google Ads for the creation of Shopping Campaigns.
Perks of this program
Stand out from Competitors and get your product to appear at the top of search results. The higher your product appears customers notice your products before your competitors.
Also, Shopping Ads perform well as the users get the essential information right on the result page. Subsequently, you gain a better quality of traffic to your website that has a higher buying intent.
Did you hear about the fantastic news from Google? Google has now allowed sellers to showcase their products on Google Shopping through Google Merchant Center. Thus, a major part of the Google Shopping page is going to be occupied by these free listings. All they need to do is create an optimized Shopping Feed via the Merchant Center and make sure Surfaces Across Google is Active. Enjoy this unpaid experience and create your Google Shopping Feed now:
Shopping Actions
Shopping Actions is the marketplace where you can list your products.
Perks of this program
There are no seller fees, you pay when you make a sale. Your brand gets the visibility it needs because your Google shopping store has your logo. It ensures a great shopping experience for your customers as they can order several items from different stores and add them in one cart i.e. Universal cart, they get same-day delivery, free shipping, and much more.
Dynamic Remarketing
Dynamic remarketing is a seamless way to reapproach your most potential customers. These customers who visited your website before, have higher buying intent.
Dynamic remarketing in your Google Merchant Center Account plays a vital role in turning the interest of the customer into conversion.
Therefore, you should customize these Ads based on using that product information which is more likely to convince the visitor towards product purchase.
Note: Your Google Shopping seller account must comply with Google Ads policies. Dynamic remarketing campaigns must adhere to personalized advertising policies mentioned in the Google Merchant Center.
Perks of this program
Increase your sales by reaching out to your most potential customers with personalized Ads. These customers are interested in the products but haven’t purchased due to some unknown reasons.
Customer Reviews
Another impressive program in the Google Shopping seller account is Customer Reviews.
It is a totally free program provided by Google that lets Google collect seller reviews from your customers and provides you with sellers a badge with your ratings as stars to display on your website.
Your customers can choose to take a survey to rate their shopping experience with just one click on your checkout page.
Perks of this program
- Seller ratings: This data is accepted by seller ratings, helping you gain seller ratings on Search ads and Shopping ads.
- Product Ratings: This data is accepted by Product Ratings, helping you gain product reviews and ratings on Shopping ads.
- Engagement: Product Ratings and Seller Ratings adds credibility to your website and can result in more qualified shoppers visiting your site.
- A badge for your website: Google Customer Reviews badge, adds Google’s guarantee which helps you let your users know what other customers have said about their experiences on your site.
Local inventory ads
Local inventory ads are one of the most exciting features in your Google Merchant Center account. Sellers with only physical stores can bring customers to their stores using these ads.
It displays their products and store information to customers keen on buying products and are geographically closest to your store.
On clicking these ads, customers get redirected to the Google-hosted page called the local storefront.
Perks of this program
Local customers become aware of your physical store. Your local store gets more exposure. This increases foot traffic.
Merchant Promotions
This program is free and it allows you to distribute online promotions with Shopping ads on Google. When you add promotions to products shoppers see a “special offer” link (e.g. 20% off, free shipping, etc.). However, note that Cost per click (CPC) rates still apply.
Perks of this program
It increases your click-through rate as the promotions are prominent on Shopping Ads. It can also increase the appeal of your Shopping ads and encourage shoppers to buy.
Product Ratings
With the product rating program, you can display ratings for Shopping Ads and product listings on Google Shopping.
Eligibility depends on the following points.
- You must link your Google Merchant Center account with the online store.
- Import product reviews feed, which is possible only if you have collected a minimum of 50 reviews, including all products.
- Be in direct contact with the product review aggregator for queries related to shipping product reviews.
- Add extra lines of code to fetch your reviews about products as well as participate in Google Customer Reviews program.
Perks of this program
This can manipulate customer decisions to buy your product since this assures your customers that your products are authentic.
Conclusion
All these essential Google Merchant Center programs make your selling process extremely easy. These programs help in enhancing customer experience and eventually uplift sales.
In light of COVID-19 and to support sellers across the world we have also taken major steps. We have a solution for you, no matter what platform you use and don’t use.
Be it WooCommerce, Shopify, BigCommerce, or Opercart, we have made our extensions/apps mostly free. And even if you don’t use any eCommerce platform, experts a CedCommerce can help you with anything eCommerce related.
CedCommerce is a trusted partner of Google Shopping Actions.
Would you give any of these programs a try? Let us know in the comment section down below!