In the ultra-competitive world of Google Shopping advertising, certain elements of your product data, like your Google Product Category taxonomy, can double or triple your return on ad spend.

With Google Shopping ads driving 76.4% of all eCommerce ad spend, Google’s shopping platform generates 85.3% of all clicks on Adwords or Google Shopping campaign ads. With statistics like these, it’s worth making use of every attribute of your shopping feed, including the category field, to get the best results out of your ads.

Learn all about how to better structure your campaigns for maximum discoverability by reading the following post.

But first, let’s take a closer look at what Google Shopping Product Categories are, and why you should spend more time optimizing your product’s information.

What is a Google Product Category?

A Google Product Category helps you categorize an item into a specific set of products, which leads to having people easily find your products. It also helps Google to identify the correct category in your shopping feed, to which your products belong to.

The information in your Google Shopping Product Category attribute within your feed is critical to the performance of your Shopping campaigns. Although [google_product_category] is an optional field, if you leave it blank, the data will be automatically populated based on other factors like your GTIN and/or product title.

It’s like leaving the address field blank when you purchase a product online, and you use the autofill function without double-checking that they added your most recent information.

It’s always best to check that the information is correct, or you could have problems. This is why you need to submit a complete product data feed using the most appropriate category for each of your items to the Merchant Center. Otherwise, you leave the decision up to Google’s algorithm.

How Google Product Categories Work

Google Product Categories Optimization

Like optimizing other fields in your feed, such as title, color, and description, you want to choose the best option from Google’s taxonomy that provides your customers with the best results.

The product category field serves a dual purpose.

1. It helps the platform to match your products with search queries for specific types of items.

The result is an increase in clicks from relevant customer searches.

For example, if someone looks for a particular dress and your category only includes “Clothing & Accessories” instead of “Clothing & Accessories > Clothing > Dresses”  , your ad may not show up for that search which means fewer relevant clicks for that Ad Group.

2. Your products get better exposure on other shopping channels, like Facebook, that use the same taxonomy. The outcome is a better result from your omnichannel marketing.

When you run a shopping campaign on another platform, like Facebook, you can use the category attribute to segment your ads. This approach allows for different items you sell to be displayed in a single ad unit based on category.

Now that you understand the fundamentals of what Google Merchant Center Product CategoriesGoogle Product Categories are and how they work, let’s take a look at the next part of the process: the implementation.

Why Are Google Product Categories so Important?

Google Product Categories provide an important signal to the platform about how relevant your products are to a category compared to other advertisers’ products. The more applicable your category is to the product you’re advertising, the better your ads will perform. It’s that simple.

Other benefits include:

The correct tax rate is applied to your products because of the category it’s in

The correct advertising policy is applied to your products based on the category

Increased performance based on the relevancy of your ad to the search query

To explain these concepts further, here are two analogies everyone can relate to.

Scenario 1: No Category

You’re in a hurry, and you need to pick up a golf shirt to wear at a game later that day. You go to a sporting goods store that you know sells golf shirts. When you walk in, you start looking for the clothing section, but instead of sections, everything is everywhere. You scan the store and see golf clubs, shoes, accessories, balls, and clothing mixed together. Where do you start looking for a shirt? How do you find it quickly and then pay to get to your game on time?

Scenario 2: Wrong Category

What if the store had everything categorized logically, but the item you were looking for somehow ended up in the wrong section? The manager saw the item you were looking for was a white golf shirt, but instead of being placed in the men’s section, she placed it in the women’s section. Pretty frustrating from a customer perspective.

These two situations can happen online when you leave Google to guess which category your product is most suited for. At the end of the day, its AI, just like a store employee, isn’t perfect.

This is why it’s so important to place your products in the right category, Think about your customers, and allow them to easily find what they are looking for. The better experience they’ll have with your products and your brand, the more likely they will pursue the purchase, and choose you instead of others.

Google Product Category Taxonomy

To choose the right product category for Google Merchant Center, follow the hierarchy most relevant to your product using Google’s Product Category Taxonomy.

Note: In Australia, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Turkey, the United Kingdom, and the United States, you can use the [google_product_category] to optimize the searchability of your Shopping campaigns.

For all other countries, use [product_type] to help with search and bidding strategies for your Google Shopping campaigns.

Google Product Category Examples

Here are some examples of how to structure your category for different types of products from Google Merchant Center’s product category best practices.

Apparel

An example of a well-chosen product category for a dress is:

Clothing & Accessories > Clothing > Dresses>

Software

Software > Computer Software > Antivirus & Security Software (ID: 5299)

Mobile Phones

Electronics > Communications > Telephony > Mobile Phones

How to Implement a Google Product Category Taxonomy

To accurately implement Google Product Categories for optimal visibility on Google Shopping, there are certain terms, guidelines and processes you need to understand.

1. Review Google Shopping’s Product Category Guidelines
   Review their official documentation and resources to understand their product category taxonomy structure.
2. Understand Google Supported Values
   A Google-supported value for the category attribute in your data feed is simply the acceptable content they will approve. Without the correct content, Merchant Center will give you an “invalid categories” error. Using the correct values for your product categories will help you save time when dealing with Merchant Center errors.
3. Implementing the Google Supported Values in your product feed
   There are two options for adding the supported values for a category in your feed.
   1. Using the correct Category ID (example: ID: 227)

   OR

   2. Using the full path of the product category for Google Shopping
      Clothing & Accessories > Clothing > Dresses
      Download all of Google’s product categories using the following: Excel sheet (.xls) OR Plain text (.txt)

    

4. Map Your Products to Appropriate Google Shopping Categories
   Carefully analyze your product inventory and map each product to the most relevant Google Product Category using the correct values. Consider your products’ attributes and intended use to choose the most specific category that accurately represents your product.
5. Monitor, Test & Optimize Your Google Shopping Product Feed Categories
   As your product catalog evolves or Google introduces changes to its taxonomy, ensure that your category values remain accurate and current.

The Difference Between Product Category and Product Type

Knowing the difference between product category and product type in your Google Shopping feed can help you gain the success of your campaign’s performance

A product category is pulled from Google’s taxonomy. On the other hand, the Product type is taken from how the product is categorized on your eCommerce site.

Using the attribute [product_type] achieves more of a campaign-level optimization. You use this field in your Google Shopping ad campaigns to structure and manage your bidding groupings and reporting. It is another descriptor that Google uses to match your products to what people are searching for.

Remember, a successful Shopping campaign optimizes for both [product_type] and [product_category] in your feed.

How to Deal With Google Merchant Center’s Product Category Mismatch

So far, we’ve touched on the basics of Google Product Categories but to put this knowledge into practice, you need to understand the result of not categorizing your products.

Unlike Google price mismatch, errors or warnings in Merchant Center can appear for products because the category attribute was missing and the algorithm added the wrong category.

Here are the potential outcomes of a mismatched category:

The wrong tax is attributed to a product because the tax was calculated based on the wrong category.

Example error: Missing value [tax]

The requirement for additional fields because of the need for more information related to certain categories

Example error: Missing required attribute [color] because the category added was fashion related

To minimize these errors and warnings in your GMC account you need to devote time to getting them right.

Or, as we explore in our next section, use enhanced product categorization to save time and get the best results.

How Enhanced Product Categorization Boosts your Customer’s Google Shopping Experience

Accurate Google categories generate advertising savings and maximize the number of offers to advertise.

Ensuring your products are properly categorized is vital for your customer’s overall shopping experience. You want them to easily find your products and be delighted when they click on your product landing page.

Using an enhanced product categorization method helps you to create, maintain and adapt your feed to Google’s current taxonomy for all applicable marketing channels.

An optimal categorization of your products allows you to create well-structured product groups in your campaigns based on their product category or type. Within these groups, you can assign a max CPC to the group for a more effective bid strategy and serve the most relevant ads to your customers.

How does this work?

This method uses automated mapping techniques to match the correct Google category to each product. Leveraging this technique, you save time and manual labor costs and achieve better data feed quality. The result is a better customer experience and more bandwidth to focus on Shopping campaign strategies.

If you don’t have the in-house resources to do the mapping, you can enlist a data feed management provider who improves your feed’s performance using several techniques.

Here are a few:

Mapping categories to Google Merchant Center’s’s ever-changing product taxonomy

Automating the updates of categories that may change

Working closely with Google to know what GMC category issues may arise to prevent warnings and errors before they happen

Ensure your products are being mapped to the right categories with Suvae.org. Our experience in product feed management, working with top global eCommerce retailers, helps you by optimizing your product data for maximum discoverability and attraction.

Suvae.org handles your product feeds by optimizing your products’ data for the best results, so you can spend more time focusing on campaign management, and other important things for your business.

Give your Ads a boost to reach the right customers & improve their shopping experience.

Learn more about Suvae.org’s Product Feed Management Solution.

The post Google Product Categories: Here’s Why You Should Care appeared first on Suvae.org.

Here are three key benefits of using Google Merchant Promotions:

• Boost your campaign’s CTR
  Discounts and offers like “Free Shipping” stand out and give shoppers a reason to click on your product.
• Increase conversions
  When people see your product is on sale for a limited time there is more incentive for them to convert and buy now.
• Capture multi-screen traffic
  “Special Offer” links are shown on both mobile and desktop platforms for maximum exposure to your promotion.

Curious about the performance boost you could unleash? Dive into the video below, where Google spills the beans! According to their data, ads with promotions have experienced an impressive 28% surge in conversion rates on average.

Dive into the details to understand why incorporating Google Promotions into your strategy is a game-changer for boosting product sales. Let’s take a closer at the step-by-step process of setting up Google Merchant Promotions to elevate your game.

How Google Merchant Promotions work

If you have an active product feed in the Google Merchant Center (GMC) you can create promotions for your shopping campaigns. Even if you’re not an experienced search engine marketer or eCommerce guru, running GMC promotions for your shopping ads is straightforward. All you need to know are the basics to get started.

Google Promotion Requirements

According to Google, there are three requirements for using their Merchant Promotions.

1. Products need to be redeemable at checkout or by the time of purchase
2. The promotion needs to expire within 6 months of the date the promotion starts
3. Promotions have to comply with Google’s promotions policies and editorial requirements

Google Merchant Promotions are currently available in Australia, France, Germany, India, the UK, Canada, and the US.

Google Promotion Types

Before we get into how the set-up process works, it’s important to know what types of promotions are available and their criteria.

• Discounts:
  • $ off or % off – Discounts must be at least $5 or 5% off
  • x% off, maximum discount $y
  • $x off $50+, $y off $100, or $z off $150 – Tiered discounts allowed
  • x% to y% off – Floor discounts (like minimum amount or percent saved) must be stated
  • Buy one get one free or buy one get 2nd x% off
  • $x cash back or $x cash rebates – Must be reflected at the cart  or checkout

• Shipping
  • Free or discounted shipping – Must have a valid redemption code.
  • Exception: No redemption code is necessary when combined with another permissible promotion (for example free shipping + 10% off)

• Free Gifts
  • Free item – Must clearly describe the gift and the item can’t be samples or trials
  • $x gift card on purchase – The title must clearly state the gift card value and the gift card must be from your own store

Source – Google Merchant Help

Google Promotions set-up

To start your set-up, you must fill out the Google Merchant Promotions interest form. Once you get approval verification after a few days, you’ll see a Promotions tab in your GMC account.
From this point, you have four options to set up your promotions:

Option 1: Use the Promotion Builder (manual route)

If you have a small number of promotions you’re running for a specific period, manually add each item by going to your Merchant Center account, clicking on “Marketing” and then “Promotions”.

Once you’re in the Promotions section, this is what you need to do:

• Click the blue plus button
• Choose where you want to run the promotion. You can select more than one.
  • Shopping ads
  • Free listings
  • Buy on Google listings
  • Local inventory ads
• Select your promotion categories.
• Follow the prompts and click Save when you’re done.

Get in-depth information on using the promotion builder.

Option 2: Create a Promotions Feed (automated route)

To run a large number of promotions simultaneously go to the Feeds option in your Promotions tab and follow Google’s instructions on how to connect your feed.

Feed set-up options:

• Create the feed yourself
  If you are experienced in creating feeds then follow Google’s feed specifications to develop your promotion feed.

• Use a product feed management solution
  If you don’t have the time or the expertise to create feeds then use a Google Merchant Promotions Feed Service that works with you as a feed management partner for all of your marketing channels.

Option 3: Use the Content API for Promotions

Another way of sharing your promotions with Google Merchant Center is by using the Content API. This feature is only available in English within the United States and Canada.
Learn more about getting started with Content API for Shopping.

Option 4: Use Promotions from Third-Party Partners (the US only)

Product discounts can be shared with Google Merchant Centre through two platforms:

• Shopify
• WooCommerce

Configure your discounts on the eCommerce platform and it is shown within your product ads without having to set up the promotion in Google.
Learn more about managing your promotions through third-party partners

How to add one or more Merchant Promotions to a Google Shopping Campaign

Once your promotion is set up and connected to Google Merchant Center, the next step is to map it to either all or specific products in your feed.

NOTE: If you’ve used Google’s Promotion Builder then you’ve already done this step.

All Products
You can apply up to 500 products to a promotion at one time and only have to use one [promotion_id]. Use [all_products] as the value for the product applicability [product_applicability] attribute in your feed.

Specific Products
To create specific promotions choose “Apply promotion to products that meet these conditions” in the promotions builder tool, or work with your feed provider to map them to the [promotion_id] of the corresponding products in your feed.

Once your products are mapped to the correct promotion then all you need to do is register your feed once per target country.

Follow these steps to get registered.

• Sign in to your Merchant Center account.
• Click Marketing in the navigation menu.
• Click Promotions.
• Click Promotion feeds in the right corner.
• Click the plus button.
• Provide the mode, target country, content-language, and name of your feed.
• Choose an input method:
  • Google Sheets:
    • Select Google Sheets, then click Continue.
    • Select Generate a new Google spreadsheet from a template, or Select an existing Google spreadsheet, then click Continue.
      • If you selected Generate a new Google spreadsheet from a template:
        • Select Promotions, then Feeds.
        • Select your promotions feed.
        • Click the three-dot icon in the upper right-hand corner, then select Access Google Sheet.
        • Enter your data using the generated template.
      • If you selected Select an existing Google spreadsheet:
        • Browse to navigate to the file of the existing Google spreadsheet that you created on your computer and click Select.
        • Select Continue to upload your feed to Merchant Center.
  • Regular upload:
    • Select Upload, then Continue.
    • Enter the name of your feed file.
    • Select Upload a file now.
    • Drag and drop your feed file into the dotted box, or click Browse to navigate to the feed file on your computer, then click Open.
    • Verify that the filename is correct, then click Continue to upload your feed to Merchant Center.

Source – Google Merchant Help

How Data Feed Optimization empowers your Google Merchant Promotions

If you’re using a Google Merchant Center Promotions feed and a Google Shopping feed to advertise your products, consider how your feed is built and updated to get the best results from your ads.

The foundation of your campaign is built upon the structure, content, and synchronization of your product feed. To captivate potential buyers, prompting them to click on your ad and make a purchase, it is essential to showcase accurate product information that is also appropriately formatted.

For the best performance, focus on these Feed Optimizations:

• Frequent Synchronization: Frequent updates of your feed, can prevent a negative user experience with your ads. If an attribute like inventory, has changed to below 1, a feed updated in real-time can signal to Google Shopping to stop running the ad instead of letting people click on an ad when the product isn’t available.

• Enticing Content: The location of certain product attributes in your product listing can change the CTR of your shopping ads. We work with you to ensure important content, that gets your products noticed, is placed in the right order using advanced mapping techniques and look-up tables.

• Well-Structured: Google has specific requirements when it comes to creating feeds for their platform and if you don’t follow them your products will get disapproved in the Merchant Center. Suvae.org is on top of these ever-changing rules to get your products approved at scale.

Create and manage promotions with the Right Technical Partner

If you’re worried that your promotions aren’t being executed the way you want, your products are being disapproved in GMC, or your promotion data isn’t correct; a product feed management solution can help you get on track.

To get your feeds optimized quickly and effectively in time to run your promotions use Suvae.org’s easy onboarding service to create your Google Merchant Promotion Feed.

Get started in three steps:

1. Don’t have a master feed al? Your onboarding specialist works with you to import your product data from one or more sources in multiple formats.

2. Standardize and optimize your product data from your master feed to create a Google Shopping Feed for one or more countries and currencies.

3. By using the Suvae.org feed management platform, you can easily create a Google Merchant Promotion Feed by mapping your [promotion_id] to all or specific products for your promotion in your Google Shopping campaign.

4. Once you create the feed on our platform and submit it to Google Merchant Center, you can quickly make updates within your feed and live on your ads without having to work on your promotions directly in GMC.

Time to enrich your Google Shopping feed with the right promotions. If you have more questions about Google Merchant Promotion Feeds, we are here to help.  Reach out to our team to get started.

The post Drive More Sales with Google Merchant Promotions appeared first on Suvae.org.

This is the exact experience Google Shopping aims to prevent. On April 6th, 2021, they took their already strict “Google Price Mismatch” landing page requirements and applied them to eCommerce checkout pages. The error message called “Price Mismatched value (page crawl): (price [price])” is a common issue advertisers encounter in Google Merchant Center (GMC).

Your competition to attract buyers is increasing and it’s tempting to use tactics like dynamic pricing to increase conversions. Google recommends not changing prices based on cookies, browsers, devices, or any other factors. Instead, they suggest using regional pricing and availability if you only target certain locations within a country.

Fix your price mismatch errors in your GMC account with these easy-to-follow tips and learn more about:

• What Causes Price Mismatch Disapprovals & How to Fix Them
• Risks of Having Price Mismatch Values
• How to Use Google’s Automatic Item Updates to Help Price Mismatch Issues
• How to Prevent Price Errors With the Right Tool

What Causes Price Mismatch Disapprovals and How to Fix Them

A price mismatch disapproval in Google Merchant Center happens when there is an inaccurate price status due to an inconsistency between your Google Shopping feed and the product pricing on your website.

Example of a Google Merchant Center (GMC) Price Mismatch Error

Product pricing best practice involves being consistent across all your selling and advertising channels. This includes your product listings in social commerce, marketplaces, shopping ads, and your website.
Reaching this goal when you have many product listings and ads can be challenging but not impossible.

Possible reasons for a price mismatch error and Google’s suggestions on how to fix it

• A sale has started or ended but the price in the feed hasn’t been updated; as a result, the sale price effective date is wrong.
  Additionally, ensure the value for the sale price effective date [sale_price_effective_date] attribute is aligned with the timing of changes to your site.
• Multiple prices on the landing page: Shopping supports two prices, the price and the sale price (which are indicated using the price [price] and sale price [sale_price] attributes).
  If more than one price is present, make sure the lowest price is the most prominent and is listed using the sale price [sale_price] attribute.
• Use of IP detection and dynamically changing prices: Don’t change the price of your product on your landing page based on a user’s location.
  Additionally, do not change the price based on cookies, browsers, devices, or any other factor. If you only target certain locations within a country, use regional pricing and availability.
• Outdated microdata or HTML: Check for contradictory information within your site build, and remove it to eliminate crawling issues.
• Minimum order quantity and bulk products: If the shopper must purchase a minimum number of products, such as 10, list the total price for 10 products.
  Don’t submit the price for a single product if a minimum number of products is required.
• Title, description, or image mismatch: Make sure that the product featured in your title, description, and image matches the price you submit.
  For example, if the product description mentions “an engraved product” and the image features a customized product with an engraving, make sure the price in the feed includes engraving fees.
• Variant preselection and price ranges: Ensure each variant in the feed has a URL that loads to a pre-populated page of that variant.
  For example, if you advertise a premium flower bouquet, make sure the price in your feed is for the premium variant and the same premium variant is preselected on the landing page.
• Handling fees: If you have additional logistical fees, rather than bundling them into the price variant, list them on the site as “shipping”, “delivery”, “handling”, “logistics”, or “carrier” and bundle the cost into the shipping [shipping] attribute.
• Dynamic population and page load times: If a price is calculated dynamically and then added to the landing page, or if the page has a slow load time, the crawlers may miss the final price. Make sure to load your price on the landing page immediately.

If none of the above scenarios, provided by Google, apply to your price mismatch issue, Google’s more recent advice suggests “If the price of a product advertised in a Shopping ad or free product listing is different from the price shown in a customer’s shopping cart, that could create a negative experience for the customer and could result in the loss of a sale.”

Get more details about check-out requirements and best practices on the Google Merchant Center Help page.

Requirements to ensure your product’s price is clear

• The price of your product should be consistent throughout the checkout process, not just between the product feed and your landing page. The price shouldn’t increase at checkout, but it may be reduced after the product is added to the cart if a promotion is added. 
• Any additional fees charged during checkout must be disclosed in Merchant Center by bundling them with the applicable shipping costs.
  For example, service fees, handling fees, carrier-related fees, and state fees must be included in the total value submitted in the shipping [shipping] attribute or using the Merchant Center shipping services. 
• Many countries, such as Argentina, Brazil, and Italy, require a value-added tax (VAT) which must be included in your price [price] attribute. 
• For the US, sales tax must be clearly stated in the feed attributes or your account-level settings.
  Overestimating sales tax in Merchant Center is allowed, but taxes can’t be higher at checkout than those listed in Merchant Center. 
• Shipping costs are submitted separately, either in your feed or at the account level. Note that feed-level rates will override account-level settings.
  You can overestimate shipping rates in the Merchant Center as long as they’re not higher on your website at checkout. 
• If you require a minimum basket amount for a customer to qualify for free shipping, make sure to set up your shipping settings on the account level and use the “free shipping over a certain amount” option. 
• If you charge a minimum basket amount surcharge on top of the shipping cost, make sure the surcharge is included in your shipping settings. It’s recommended that you use the range-based shipping setup.

More Details on How to Fix Price Mismatch Errors

Once you’ve worked with your product feed provider or troubleshot the issue on your own with the suggestions detailed above, schedule a feed update for Google to re-crawl your website with your updated pricing.

Additional Tips:

• Apply frequent product feed refreshes
• Use delta feeds to increase feed update frequencies (delta feeds or APIs)
• Update promotions with validity dates

If you have reviewed all of the tips to resolve your price mismatch issues and you’re still getting the error, you may need to get a developer to update your website source code for Google to re-crawl the correct price attribute on the page.

Risks of Having Price Mismatch Values

Now that you know the reasons for the error, it’s important to understand the short-term and long-term effects of continual price mismatch values in Google Merchant Center.

1. The most serious long-term risk of having too many products with incorrect prices is a permanent account suspension. This could happen if you haven’t fixed your price mismatch issue within 28 days from receiving the notification in Google Merchant Center.
2. Having too many products disapproved may also lead to a reduced number of offers available for a Google Shopping campaign.
3. A shorter-term risk, but equally as serious as an account suspension, is providing a negative shopping experience to your customers. If Google doesn’t catch mismatched values and a customer sees a different price on a shopping ad compared to your website, this could lead to fewer people clicking on your ads or completing a purchase on your website.

How to Use Google’s Automatic Item Updates to Help Price Mismatch Issues

Google Ad’s Automatic Item Updates are used to improve the quality of your data and provide a good user experience for shoppers. This option is set up by default and must be manually turned off if merchants don’t want their mismatched pricing to be updated automatically.

Best practices Google Ads provides on their Help page to get the most out of their Automatic Item Update feature include:

• Schedule feed uploads or updates via the Content API immediately after the products have been updated on your website.
  This will help you avoid errors due to the time difference between updates on your website and updates of your Shopping data.
• If you’re using the sale price [sale_price] attribute, make sure that the period in which the sale is active is specified correctly with the sale price effective date [sale_price_effective_date] attribute and that the timezone is correct. When a sale is active, the sale price is shown as the current price in Shopping search results.
• For products sold in bulk quantities, you should submit the total price for the minimum number of products sold.
  Landing pages must list prices in the appropriate currency of the target country and the same currency as submitted in your product data.
• To detect and update mismatches, Google crawls the landing pages listed in your data feed or provided in the Content API.
  You can increase Google’s crawl rate to allow us to cover more products on your website

Pros of Automatic Item Updates

• If mismatched prices are fixed automatically, shoppers will enjoy a better experience which means more traffic to your products and higher conversion rates
• Ads that would have been disapproved can still run
• Advertisers don’t have to worry about errors as they resolve the price mismatch warnings

Cons of Automatic Item Updates

• Relying on Google automatically updating your prices isn’t a long-term solution for regularly updating your product data
• If too many mismatches occur, your automatic item updates will stop working and your account could be at risk of suspension
• Google’s crawler may not be able to detect the correct prices (often because of price dropdowns for multiple sizes) and apply the wrong prices, even if feed data is correct

Prevent Price Mismatch with the Right Tool

Using the right product feed tool and service can help you avoid ongoing price mismatch errors that affect your marketing performance and put you at risk of account suspension.

Suvae.org GMC Diagnostics Warning/Alert Features

At Suvae.org we provide master feed and channel-specific feed optimization services for channels like Google Shopping.

Fix price errors in your feeds with:

• Diagnostics support that notifies customers with reports and alerts about significant numbers of price mismatch errors
• Optimization techniques that improve your feed data’s structure related to product variants, such as color, size, and minimum order requirements to minimize price mismatches
• Frequently scheduled and fast feed updates with delta feeds so Google is always matching the correct product data with your website
• Summary emails of all outstanding issues to customers generated programmatically with our GMC Diagnostics API connection

Part of the optimization process is ensuring that your product information is complete with quality, up-to-date and accurate data. This is especially important to avoid price mismatch issues in your Google Merchant Center (GMC).

Ensure the accuracy of all the data in your product feed. Reach out to our experts and get your product data optimized for Google Merchant Center with Suvae.org.

The post Fix Google Price Mismatch for Effective Google Shopping Ads appeared first on Suvae.org.

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Google Shopping is constantly updating its platform and new data sources to boost campaign performance become available over time.

Working Together to Achieve Better Product Listing Results

The first step towards developing specialized feeds that improve our customer’s campaigns is to develop a close working relationship with both our brand and agency partners.

Suvae.org has been working with The North Face as their Product Feed Management Solution for quite some time. Part of this solution involves creating a Performance Feed that collects The North Face’s sales data from their Google Analytics to automatically create and update a list of best-selling products, and assign a bestseller custom label in their Google Shopping Feed.

Because of our close working relationship with The North Face and their agency, PHD Media, we were able to collaborate on the details of adding a new data source within Google Merchant Center called the price competitiveness report.

What is Google Merchant Center’s Price Competitiveness Report?

This report offers two ways to segment and view data:

1. When you’re viewing data by category, brand, or product type, you can track how competitive you are in Shopping ads auctions over time.
2. When you’re viewing data by-product, you’ll see information on individual products for which a benchmark metric is available.

Performance Feed + Google Merchant Price Competitiveness Report

By adding the data from Google’s price competitive report, we were able to identify and mark the best-selling products that were also priced competitively.

Why does it matter? The result gave PHD Media the ability to create targeted campaigns on a subset of high-converting products that are updated automatically based on price competitiveness and sales data – a search marketer’s dream.

What advertiser wouldn’t want a segmented group of products that had a higher likelihood of converting to sales based on their popularity and competitive price?

“I would recommend working with Suvae.org for product feed management. They were quick to accurately configure the feeds and they actively participated in discussions on how to construct the feed in a way that would give us the results we were looking for. It felt like a true partnership where our common goal was to provide The North Face the best Google Shopping results.” Andrew Griffiths – Senior Search & Social Manager, Digital Solutions – PHD Global Business

Ready to start using different data sets to improve the ROI of your product feeds?  Contact Suvae.org to book a consultation today.

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Before you keep reading this article first check if your country is eligible to use Merchant Promotions.

Which countries have access to create Google Merchant Promotions for  PLA campaigns?

Merchant Promotions are currently available in:

• Australia
• France
• Germany
• India
• United Kingdom
• US
• Canada

Why are retailers in these countries taking advantage of Merchant Promotions for their Google PLA campaigns? SEM Rush has published data that in many countries around the time of Black Friday, people’s online search behavior changes and it’s all about the deals.

Consumer interest in Black Friday is consistently increasing every year. When we compare YoY global searches (2019 vs. 2020), there is a 14% growth of interest for the discount period.     In countries where Black Friday has traditionally played a significant role within the retail space, the growth numbers are even higher, with Brazil, Australia, and the US leading the way.

What does a Google Merchant Center Promotion look like?

A Merchant Promotion provides more visibility to your Google Shopping Ads by adding the text “Special Offer” to your product listings. As you roll over the special offer text you’ll see a pop-up box. The video below shows what a promotion could look like including a call-to-action, description, expiry,     and potential promo code.

How do you create a Google Merchant Center Promotion?

To create a promotion you first need a Google Merchant Center (GMC) shopping feed. If you have this feed and a GMC account then you need to fill out a Merchant Promotions Interest Form.
It is a fairly short form with the following message at the top.

Once you get the ok from Google to start your Merchant Promotions there are two ways to go about it.

Option 1: Google Promotions Tool

Once you’ve selected Merchant Promotions in your GMC account and added a promotion, the next step is finding the right category.

Google states that GMC Promotions Builder offers 4 categories to choose from:

• Amount off: Offer a monetary discount for your items
• Percent off: Offer a percentage discount for your items
• Free    gift: Offer a free gift based on an item purchase or amount spent
• Free shipping: Offer free shipping based on an item purchase or amount spent

Update your promotion by choosing your spend thresholds, the discount, gift descriptions, and more. The tool is very straightforward once you choose your category.

Follow the in-depth step-by-step directions from Google.

Option 2: Promotions Feed

If you are submitting a high volume of promotions to GMC a Promotions Feed containing all of your promotions could help to streamline the submission process.
A .txt file, .xml file, or Google Sheets are acceptable formats for your promotions feed.

Merchant Promotion Feed Specification and step-by-step details about how to create and customize your feed.

Once your feed is ready you’ll need to submit it to GMC in this location.    To make sure your feed is always updated we typically select “Scheduled Fetch”.

Next Steps

Review the specific details of your Google Promotions as you decide what products you want to include. Google has strict criteria for what they allow.

Promotions criteria include:

• Limited for a 6-month time period
• Redeemable at check-out or time of purchase
• Compliant with policies and editorial requirements

If your feed doesn’t meet Google’s technical requirements, policies, or editorial guidelines it could prolong the approval of your promotions. Start the submission process as early as possible to ensure your promotions are approved.

Suvae.org helps clients to optimize their product data feeds by adding the required information so their ads display the right content to the right person at the right time. We are experienced with the management of promotions by extending our managed feeds with rule-based promotion ids.

Get your store and products found locally with a full-service feed management provider/service.

Contact Us to set up your Google Promotion Feeds today.

More on Product Feeds:

• How to create a Google Local Inventory Products Feed
• How to create an Instagram Product Feed
• 4 Product Feed Solutions to Save you Time & Money

The post How to Create Google Merchant Center Promotions appeared first on Suvae.org.

Quick Guide to avoid disapproved products and get them approved

1. Export your GMC diagnostic report
2. Review the GMC issues systematically with your tech team and prioritize fixes
3. Update your product data to meet Google’s specifications for each issue
4. Re-submit your product feed to GMC with the changes made to either your feed,
website, or both.
5. Google will crawl your site and compare it to the information in your product feed
to resolve issues
6. You’re done unless Google decides they don’t like the changes you’ve made.

What if GMC still disapproves of my products?

You think you’ve made all of the necessary changes to get your products approved but then you go back to GMC, and there are still errors. Unfortunately, Google’s approval process isn’t a perfect science. That’s when you start looking at how you can tweak individual product data. A variety of technical issues could raise a flag for Google. I’m not going to lie, troubleshooting at this level can be tough and time-consuming.

What if I am not able to make the changes necessary to get my products approved in GMC?

Here are some examples of disapprovals that may be very challenging to fix:

1. Item requires a GTIN

It’s not an easy task to source product GTINs. You can go to the manufacturer or your merchandising team and speak with some people, and none of them will have an answer on how to get the codes. Keep trying! The numbers exist, you just need the right connection or method to source them.
In some cases, products don’t require GTINs. In this case, you can follow Google Merchant Center’s documentation on how to label these products in your Google Shopping feed.

2. Invalid color name in attribute color

Google is not a fan of complex color names. Your tech team can use a color mapping technique using look-up tables to standardize product catalog colors specifically for your  Google Shopping feed.  An example of this would be mapping “lilac” to “light purple”. Any instance of the product color “lilac” would be automatically replaced with “light purple” for present and future products.

When it comes to multi-colored products, Google requires you to choose the dominant color. Finding the dominant color can be a painful and sometimes manual process that is necessary to get your products approved. Here are some tips from Google on what they’re looking for when it comes to including multi-colored products in your feed.

3. Temporary item disapprovals due to incorrect prices.

If you are selling products in more than one country, Google is going to expect your website to display the prices in the currency of that country. It may seem easy because you have a website that dynamically changes the currency to the IP address of the user. This redirect method provides the user with a good experience, but it doesn’t allow a comparison of prices in your feed to the prices on your website. Google is looking for a unique URL for each country. For instance, if you use the same URL for the US as you do in the UK, Google will see a price discrepancy. Updating your website to fix this issue can be a lengthy and labor-intensive process, but it is not impossible.

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GOOGLE MERCHANT CENTER FORUM RE-POST

QUESTION

Hi, I have several items disallowed disapproved on Google Merchant.  When clicking on the error it says:

Diagnostics

• Example: Uvex Classic Black Ladies Boot 9482
• Item ID: 1099
• Sampled on Jan 06, 2015, 16:03:10 UTC
• Value in feed: 47.99GBP
• Value on the website: 69.94GBP
• Current status: Disapproved
• Input system: Feed Id:
• When I check on our website we have the 47.99 display (like the feed and 69.94 is nowhere).  How do I resolve this problem?

ANSWER:

Many e-commerce shopping carts have a default currency (locale) that is made semi-permanent after a user selects a currency; this is also not allowed; the landing page must be identical for all users.

The most common methods to correct the issue are to either use a separate link landing page or domain per target country or URL parameters to pre-select the appropriate country or currency;

Also, the price submitted and on the landing page must include VAT.. Be certain that if any display information can be changed that the proper display is pre-selected in the link URL submitted to Google.

For example, if a user selects vat-excluded but later returns to that same landing page via google-shopping, the price must include VAT. Also, if any variants are being submitted (e.g. size) be certain those variants are submitted using google’s rules and policies for variants — especially if the variant might affect the price of the submitted item — e.g. identical item_group_id for all variants in the variant-group, at least one variant identifier that is unique among all variants in the variant group (e.g. size), and either a separate lading-page or a URL-parameter that pre-selects the exact variant submitted.

Otherwise, only the default variant on the page should be submitted.

———————————————————————————————————————————————————————-

These tips are just a snapshot of GMC disapproval that Suvae.org handles for our clients. If you experiencing issues with fine-tuning your Google Shopping disapproval, Suvae.org  product feed management solution can help by taking care of all your product listing needs. We help you maximize shopping campaign performance and produclt lisitngs , weather you’re in the fashion, apparel, consumer electronics, and household industry.
Contact us for a free consultation with one of our product feed experts to get started.

The post How to handle Google Merchant Center Disapproved Products appeared first on Suvae.org.

In this post, you’ll learn 6 tips on how to optimize your product feeds for Google Merchant Center.

How to optimize your Google Merchant Center Feeds

Here are 6 tips to help you optimize your Google Merchant Center feeds to improve your Google Shopping campaign outcomes:

1. Optimize Titles

Titles are extremely important to Google when matching search queries to ads. Make sure all product titles are unique and differentiate every product in your catalog. Optimizing titles will improve impressions and rankings. A title can have up to 150 characters, of which up to 70 will show in the Product Listing Ad (PLA).
Google recommends using different formulae based on what type of product you are selling.

2. Optimize Product Descriptions

Make sure you have rich and meaningful descriptions for each product.  Titles and Descriptions are key factors Google uses to match ads to search queries and they affect the overall quality of PLAs.
Good descriptions can lead to improvements in:

• Product Listing Ads (PLA) ranking
• Ad visibility
• Click-through rates (CTR)

3. List all variant items separately

This is especially useful for apparel retailers and although related to the product feed, it refers to building separate pages with distinct URLs for each product variant. This will be a little more work for the merchant, but if implemented properly, it means that customers are taken straight to the product they have chosen and can add it to the basket in one simple click. This means that they don’t have to reselect the size/color they want.
Listing variant items separately improves the customer experience and can result in increased conversion rates.

4. Optimize Google Categories

To improve performance and avoid product disapproval you need to categorize your products appropriately. Ideally, you want to drill down to as many product categories as possible.
To ensure a good product’s performance you need to categorize your products to the third level of Google’s taxonomy.

5. Improve data quality

Give Google all the information required to help match your product listing ads to a customer’s search query. The more relevant attributes that you include in your feed, the more likely your products will be discovered by motivated customers, bringing them to pursue their purchase.

• Color
  • Make sure you standardize colors (no one searches for a violet/bone/aquamarine dress, change the color to purple/brown/blue).
  • Only one color column per feed
  • You can specify up to 3 colors in the multicolor field e.g. blue/green/red or black/white
• Size
  • Make sure you have a separate size system attribute. Don’t put a value on your system and the size in the same field.
  • Not necessary to convert the size to the local market. If there is no size system attribute then Google will assume the size system is the US.
• Add relevant attributes
  • Material attribute – leather, silk, cotton
  • Pattern attribute – stripes, spots, animal print

6. Changes to Google Taxonomy

Don’t forget the changes Google is making to its taxonomy. Retailers need to make the required changes by September 2015. Details of all changes can be found here.

Next Steps

Focusing on constantly improving the quality of your Google Merchant Center feeds takes time and effort. A product feed management solution can help you get your products optimized for Google Merchant Center, as well as other marketing channels. Suvae.org optimizes & manages all your feeds to  automatically showcase your products among potential buyers, helping you increase product visibility, and boost shopping campaign performance

For the best results of your Shopping Ads, Reach out to the Suvae.org team and get started.

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