How Google Shopping works and how to increase lead generation for your online store

Google Shopping is the best that Google could come up with for e-commerce. This is the coolest thing for online stores and users looking for products on the web.

Why? Because Shopping ads are much more informative than plain text ads. From product advertising, the user immediately recognizes the name of the store, price, rating and reviews, and also sees a photo of the product. That is, the information that allows already at this stage to understand whether the offer is suitable. If a click on an ad happens, we can talk about a high intent and a greater likelihood of a purchase.

In this article, we will look at the basic principles of work and show how Google Shopping helps to increase turnover in online stores.

Algorithm for displaying Shopping ads

How Google Shopping works is simple: When a query is entered into the search bar, Google looks for relevant information in the data provided by advertisers. If the system finds matches, then it generates results with ads.

In this case, all information about the products is in special tables - feeds. Here are indicated:

●     title;

●     price;

●     discounts or promotions;

●     availability on the site;

●     Colour;

●     size and other important parameters for selection.

Google Shopping is displayed:

●     on the first page of search results;

●     in the Google marketplace - on the "Purchases" page;

 on YouTube - on the homepage and in search results.

See? The main feature of Google Shopping is displaying products and prices BEFORE going directly to the site. And this affects the conversion rate and cost per click. Check out our case study comparing the effectiveness of search and marketing campaigns for healthcare products:

How Shopping campaigns are created

Google Shopping is created through the Merchant Center using data feeds. The feed is the cornerstone, the result depends on the correctness of its filling. Therefore, it is very important that the feed is filled in as much detail as possible and taking into account the specification . After all, if the system does not find matches with the user's requests, the ads will not appear.

The algorithm is as follows:

1. Registration with Google Merchant.
2. Create a product feed:
   1. manually - Google spreadsheet or TXT and CSV files;
   2. automatically - XML ​​file or online store plugins

3. Creating a Shopping campaign in Ads. Once the data is ready and styled, it can be integrated into the Merchant Center and Google Ads and set up campaigns.
4. Optimization of a shopping campaign. When everything is created and working stably, you can start scaling your account.

Examples of how Google Shopping works

1. Launching a sales campaign from scratch.

Business: sports goods.

Geo: USA.

Objectives: start selling the most popular products.

Stages of work:

●     setting up conversions;

●     Launching smart Shopping campaigns

●     launch of a standard shopping campaign;

Results for December:

2. Launching a shopping campaign in a running account with search and video campaigns.

Product: isothermal waterproof backpacks.

Geo: Australia.

Objectives: increase sales, increase brand growth.

Stages of work:

1. Correct conversion settings.
2. Creation of a brand campaign.
3. Running a search campaign test.
4. Launching a campaign test on the Display Network.
5. Launching a video campaign.
6. Launching and optimizing Shopping campaigns.

Results:

Increase in sales by 8 times and sale of almost the entire assortment.

At least the cases are a reason to think. As a maximum, start with Shopping campaigns or optimize existing ones.