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If you are looking for e-commerce success as a retailer or as a digital agency, then you’ve landed on the right post. But, what is a google shopping feed and why is so important for your conversions and sales?

Firstly, google shopping is a service that allows customers to search for products, allowing users to view and compare them. When shoppers use google search, they are then presented with a variety of options to view and choose from and sponsored ads will generally appear at the top of the list.

It’s for this reason that google product feed optimisation is such a key aspect of delivering successful google shopping campaigns and ensuring that users are being directed to your e-commerce store or product.

1 – Less is more: use the right keywords and product titles

Avoid exaggerating with the number of keywords you choose to include in your google shopping feed. Yes, keywords are an important part of the optimisation process, however, incorrect or excessive use of this attribute can produce the opposite result to what you were aiming for. As we know, Google uses your keywords to decide what to show to users, so ensure that you have a keyword strategy in place.

Also, don’t over optimise product titles using search queries that do not match your product.

While it is important to make sure you have a well-optimised product title, note that you have limited space, so you need to ensure you have your product attributes correctly displayed. Additionally, you should also consider the order of your product titles. Just like SEO, the most important keywords should be at the beginning for better chances of google reading them first.

So, for instance, Black Size 9 Mens Adidas Adipure 360.3 Trainers is wrong. The best practice for this title would be Adidas Adipure 360.3 Mens Trainers, Size 9 in Black.

The correct use of keywords and product titles can truly enhance the potential of each google shopping campaign, especially if you have a sales season, Black Friday or Cyber Monday offers around the corner. These are examples of occasions when you could boost your conversions and click rates the most.

2 – Don’t include promotional text in your product types

In addition to Product Titles & Descriptions, Google uses your Product Types to better categorise and filter your products as well as matching user search terms to the correct products. Google doesn’t have a ‘Sale’ filter in Google Shopping and will rarely match promotional text to search queries, so avoid using these within your google product feeds.

3 – Craft separate titles for each product

Don’t fall into the trap of using the same product title for multiple items within your google product feed.

Every product is different so treat each one as a unique mini-project when it comes to google shopping. This means, making sure that product variants include unique attributes within the product title section, so that size, colour, material, pattern, etc are all input correctly for each product within your product feeds.

Most retailers have multiple variants of their products, split by size, colour, etc, but serving them all into your Product Feed with the exact same product title could ultimately lead to a lower Click through Rate and a lower conversion rate.

For instance, if somebody searches for ‘Adidas Adipure 360.3 Size 9’ and you have 20 products that all share the product title Adidas Adipure 360.3 Trainers, will Google serve the size 9 option? Probably not.

It’s fair to say that the Shoptimised product feed software came to make all of this easier for you. You’ll just have to reach out to the team to find out how they can help you maximise efficiency and boost sales.

4 – Don’t use images with promotional messages or logos.

Google requires the best quality image within product feeds in order for these to appear on users’ search results. Ultimately, Google will always prioritise a product with a clear, high-resolution image over a product with an image that includes a watermarked logo. Including this type of promotional element on your images will result in google’s disapproval of your advertised product. Check out our extensive guide on how to best optimise your images for Google.

5 – Keep a consistent colour scheme

When it comes to successful google shopping feeds, uniformity is an absolute key. Don’t use one colour in your feed and a different colour on your landing page, keep them the same. Ideally, you will describe your products using a standard set of colours, such as red, blue, yellow, etc. This makes it easier for Google to categorise and filter your data.

With our years of experience within google shopping, we’ve noticed that several retailers prefer to use descriptive colours, which is also a practice that google accepts as long as it’s unified with what’s on your landing page. So, for instance, if you are advertising a yellow dress, and you wish to enrich the attributes within the product feed by adding the descriptive word ‘sunrise’, you can do so. However, if you describe your product as sunrise yellow on your landing page, then make sure that is how you describe it in the product feed.

Now that we’ve given you the top tips to get your google shopping feeds right, you’re good to go with your future ads. Sign up for a 14-day free trial of Shoptimised. Get in touch and give it a whirl – you’ll wonder how you ever worked without it.