Listing Your Products in Google Shopping Search Results
Scott MorrisSolutions Engineer
Having been with 4mation since inception in 2001 while completing a Computer Science degree at UTS, Scott has played a variety of roles within the business through its almost 20 years of growth.
As a Certified AWS Solutions Architect, Scott has a strong ability to bridge the gap between the technical and business/user world. Scott has a deep understanding of the service we provide our clients having spent years as a Developer, Business Analyst, Team Lead, and Head of Delivery.
His focus now is heading up 4mation’s Internal Operations to make our work and suite of digital tools as efficient and effective as possible.
Tired of seeing your competitors’ products show up with a nice photo in Google search results ahead of your regular web pages? Wondering how they do it? It’s not too difficult to achieve and 4mation can help you. Read on to find out how.
The majority of us have at one point or another used Google to do a spot of pre-purchase product research and found a short list of matching items listed under Google’s Shopping results heading. These results typically appear fairly close to the top of the search results, certainly on the first page to be presented. They are very eye-catching due to their visual appearance compared to other regular search result entries and it’s a desirable spot to have pages and products listed. Often-times, sellers of a product have their link ranked under the shopping results ahead of the manufacturer’s own web page for the product.
How do you get your items listed?
The first step is to have your product database integrated with Google’s Merchant Center. There are several methods of integration, including a direct option where Google automatically pulls in a feed of your product information and a manual option where you are required to upload a pre-formatted file of product data on a monthly basis. 4mation can assist with the set-up and configuration required in both instances, contact us to discuss your requirements.
As with all search engine results presented through Google, there’s no hard and fast guarantee that they will present your product, however, there are a few elements and factors that if given the right attention can help to increase the chances of being selected.
Title – remember, the product title actually says what your product is and should contain a relevant keyphrase when possible.
Price – are you more competitively priced than the competition? Google’s all about helping users find what they want and most people want a bargain!
Description – a keyphrase rich description that describes the product will help Google determine if your product matches a user’s query.
Supplementary data – there are certain mandatory fields that need to be included within the data feed to Google and there are also various other optional ones too. Just because they are optional, doesn’t mean you should leave them empty. Taking a little extra time to complete them could pay dividends. Including relevant, applicable information related to the field will only enhance the value of the information compared to another supplier who has opted to omit it. Fields vary based on type of product, so we can help you work out what is and what isn’t applicable for your products.
Reviews – whilst you cannot supply your own reviews, you can encourage feedback via channels that Google uses as the basis for its star rankings. Positive reviews will likely have a greater bearing on your listing being selected for display and even the odd negative comments will at least bring balance, fairness and authenticity to your listing. Google Checkout, naturally, tends to have more influence on its own Google Shopping listings than other trusted review sites, so consider adding Google Wallet as a payment option on your website, as for every purchase a user makes using the service, Google requests a review.
If you sell any type of product, listing your products via the Google Merchant Center is an important and key factor you should implement as part of your online marketing plan, so don’t hesitate to drop us a line to find out how you can start to leverage this service.
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