Once upon a time there was this thing called Froogle which then later turned into Google Shopping. While Froogle was free the other turned into a pay service for featuring your products in Google. Well guess what? Google Shopping is now available to merchants that sell products for free!
You no longer must pay to be in Google Shopping. If you have a product that qualifies then you will now have the ability to appear in Google Shopping for free. If you are already running paid ads, then nothing has changed for you and you have been automatically opted into the free service. However, check your growth tab to be sure. This is good news for e-commerce sites and their owners!
How Can You Take Advantage Of Google Shopping Being Free?
If you have an e-commerce site or you are thinking of getting into selling product online, then this gives you another way to get more visibility in Google search. You combine this with a good optimization from a SEO Company and you get more visibility then before and without having to spend more on your advertising.
Getting a Google Merchant Center account is fairly easy and it now does not require you to have a Google Ads account or at least it should not. When we tried to set this up, we did have to tie it to a Google Ads account but this should change since you are running on Google surface for free.
If you have an e-commerce site running WooCommerce then you simply need to look for a free plugin that will create a google shopping feed for you. Once the feed is generated you can then submit it to Google and all your products that qualify will appear in Google Shopping. You also have the ability to manually add products if you have a small shop and want to go that route.
How To Set up Your Google Merchant Center
If you do not have merchant center set up it is a fairly easy process. It can get a bit confusing but the basic steps to setup the account are as follows.
- Go to merchant center and use your current login for your Google Analytics account to set this up. This is the easiest way to get everything verified.
- You will also need to set up a shipping policy page or add verbiage on how your shipping works on your page somewhere where you can link to it.
- The system will step you thru the process until you have completed everything that is required to get you set up. Be prepared to answer about your shipping and how it is done and calculated. We chose to use USPS and their rates on all products which makes this easy.
- You will need to be ready to add information on taxes and how you handle them. If you collect in one state or in many. There is also an option where you can set up the area you are required to charge tax and Google will calculate that based on where the user is.
- Once that is done set up your feed and add it to merchant center and you are all set.
Setting Up A Google Shopping Feed If You Are Using Word Press & WooCommerce
If you already have and SEO friendly website that is running WooCommerce for a shopping cart then you are in a good position to easily add all your products to Google Shopping quite easily.
There are quite a few plugins to choose from. We opted to use this one. We are currently using the free version on our test site for this. I would recommend you go with a paid version if you like the free and you are planning to continue to use Google Shopping in the long run.
We are not affiliated with this plugin in anyway nor can we guarantee it will work with your build and your hosting company. We mentioned it here simply because it is doing the job for us and it did not have any cost associated with it to make it work and get us testing this new free google service.
How To Add Your Products To Google Shopping Without A Feed
If you happen to have an e-commerce site that cannot provide you with a feed for Google shopping, then you can still advantage of the service by using several other methods of adding your products.
- Manually Add Products – You can literally manually enter the product and its description, images, and all that is needed by manually entering them in merchant center.
- Google Sheets – You can use Google Sheets to add your products and needed product details in Google Sheets which you can link in directly in merchant center. That way any updates can simply be made in sheets and will be pushed live.
- Upload File – Your last choice is to upload a file that contains all your product data.
Even without a feed you can easily get your products live on Google shopping. Preferably a methods like using Google Sheets or a feed are really the best ways to manage Google Shopping when you have a many products and those products availability or pricing changes often. Using these methods allows you a central location to make your changes and update merchant center.
If you do not have a website that does e-commerce and you are considering selling online please contact us and we will be happy to help you get a SEO friendly website with a shopping cart set up.
