Why Google Shopping IS An Essential Growth Marketing Tactic for Consumer eCommerce-Focused Businesses
The global e-commerce growth rate for 2023 is forecast at 8.9%, bringing global e-commerce sales worldwide to $5.9 trillion. This marks a 1.8 percentage point increase from 2022’s growth rate, which followed a massive dip from 2021.
The COVID-19 outbreak forced governments all over the world to impose strict lockdowns, which meant brick-and-mortar stores had to stay shut and consumers had to remain home. This boosted online retail growth as people went on the internet to carry out their purchases. According to most forecasts, global e-commerce sales growth is set to continue—albeit at a slower pace. For instance, ecommerce sales growth worldwide is expected at 9.4% in 2024. But in 2025 and 2026, this is set to fall slightly to 8.8% and 8.1%, respectively.
Despite the expected plateauing in growth rates, the share that e-commerce comprises of total retail sales is expected to increase. In 2024 this figure is forecast at 20.2% and will increase to 23.3% by 2026.
No matter how you look at it, ecommerce is definitely a necessary, if not mandatory part of operating a business in today's business climate.
Why Google Shopping Needs to be Part of the Growth Marketing Mix At Any Business With an ECommerce Focus
Truthfully, the marketing mix at product-based e-commerce businesses is often very similar to those businesses that offer services or sell to organizations rather than individuals. SEM, SEO, email marketing, trade shows, Instagram, Facebook, Linkedin, etc. are just some of the marketing tactics that most businesses use to increase awareness and grow their revenues. As mentioned in a previous post, remarketing is a highly underrated tactic that companies should definitely have as part of their growth marketing mix.
However, given the importance of emphasizing the visual aspect of the products that your business sells, no marketing channel or tactic works quite as well to accomplish this as Google Shopping.
If your eCommerce-focused business doesn’t have Google Shopping ads as a key part of its arsenal of the growth marketing mix, you’re missing out on some of the most profitable online real estate. According to Merkle, 60% of all Google search ad clicks in the third quarter of 2020 came from Google Shopping ads.
So, how does your growth-focused business maximize its share of those clicks?
Like any Google platform, Google Shopping ads take some self-education, dedication and experimentation to leverage. So let’s start the education process now.
What Are Google Shopping Ads?
Google Shopping ads are a type of paid advertising that allows businesses to promote their products on the Google Shopping tab and Google Search. These ads appear at the top of search results and display the product image, price, and store information, making them highly visible and attractive to potential customers.
A Google Shopping ad is an ad that uses information from your Merchant Center to display information about one of your products at the top of a Google search engine results page (SERP). Unlike Google Ads, Google Shopping ads have pictures and displays based on your product data instead of keywords.
In simple words, Google Shopping ads are dedicated e-commerce product ads that Google displays at the top of the search engine result page (SERP). They also appear at the top of Google’s price comparison engine known as Google Shopping.
Google Shopping Ads are targeted based on the product and its attributes, such as the brand, category, and specific features. This allows businesses to reach customers who are searching for specific products or product types.
For example, if a customer searches for “red sneakers,” shopping ads for red sneakers from various retailers will appear at the top of the search results.
Google Shopping ads each include these components:
Product picture
Product title
Product price
Store name
Extra elements like average review rating and any relevant promotions
Since they appear at the very top of the SERP, Google Shopping ads can make your product the first thing potential customers see during a search — you just have to know how to optimize them.
How to Go About Setting Up Google Ads as A Key Part of Your Growth Marketing Funnel
To create a Google Shopping ad, you need to set up a Merchant Center data feed and connect your Google Ads account to make a Shopping campaign based on that data.
According to the Help Center’s Google Shopping ads guide, you can configure your shopping ads when you first sign up for Merchant Center or go to Growth>Manage programs in the left navigation menu. The process involves four to six steps:
Add the products you want to advertise to a feed in the Merchant Center
(In the US) Add your tax information
Set up your shipping service in Google Merchant Center
Verify and claim your store’s website
Link your Google Ads account for data transfer
(Optional) Add promotions to display on your ads
Once you create Google Shopping ads, you’ll bid on them using cost-per-click (CPC) and maximum cost-per-engagement (CPE) bidding. In other words, Google will charge you based on the number of clicks your ad receives, and you can set a maximum CPE to establish the highest amount you want to pay for one of those clicks.
Why Google Ads Need to be An Important Part of Your Business’ Growth Marketing Framework
Now that we have established that Google Shopping is an absolute must-have for businesses that have an ecommerce component to their business and how to go about getting set up for them, we now need to establish the case for just why Google Shopping Ads need to be part of the playbook for growth-focused businesses that offer products for sale online. With that in mind, here are some key benefits of having Google Shopping ads as part of your arsenal of tactics to help spur growth:
1. Increased visibility
One of the main benefits of Google Shopping ads is that they are highly visible to potential customers. These ads appear at the top of search results, above the organic listings, making them one of the first things users see when they search on Google Shopping or Google Search. This increased visibility can help businesses stand out among their competitors and attract more customers to their websites.
In addition to appearing at the top of search results, Google Shopping Ads also include the product image, price, and store information, making sure that users can see all the necessary information at a single glance. This can help increase the chances of users clicking on the ad and visiting the business’s website.
Moreover, the fact that the images of the products are what is emphasized allows you as a business to really feature your products in a way that best shows the value that they provide.
2. Targeted advertising
Google Shopping ads are tailored to the individual product based on criteria such as the brand, category, and features. This improves a company’s chances of making a sale by connecting them with customers who are actively looking for a product or service like theirs.
3. Pay-per-click pricing model
Shopping Ads use a pay-per-click (PPC) pricing model, meaning businesses only pay when someone clicks on their ad. This allows businesses to control their advertising budget and ensure that they only pay for results.
4. Increased ROI
The click-through rate (CTR) for shopping-related queries is roughly 0.86%, which is significantly higher than the CTR for other types of queries. Merkel claims Google Shopping ads have 30% higher conversions on desktop and 21% on mobile compared to traditional text ads.
5. Wider reach
In addition to appearing on Google Shopping and Google Search, you can also display Google Shopping ads on other websites and apps through the Google Display Network. This allows businesses to reach a wider audience and increase the visibility of their products.
11 Growth Marketing Tactics to Use with Google Shopping Ads to Help Boost Revenues
Now that we have established some key benefits that Google Shopping Ads provide, here are some key tactics or tactical steps that can help to ensure maximum benefit for businesses looking to shopping Ads as a key tactic to drive growth.
1. Perform keyword research
Google Shopping ads may not use keywords like traditional Google Ads, but by no means should you brush off your keyword research.
Beyond placing a product listing, product titles, product descriptions, and image names should match users’ top search queries in order to rank better and have a better Quality Score.”
In addition, keyword research helps define the campaign’s structure, uncover competitive keywords to target, potentially the most profitable products to promote, and just as importantly, negative keyword matches to put in the campaign.”
2. Apply negative keywords
Expanding on the previous point, setting negative keywords allows the opportunity to tell Google exactly what they do not want to show up for. Understanding which keywords are unprofitable will go a long way to maximizing your marketing ROI.
Working through the search term report will provide you with the search terms that are triggering your products in the search results. Understanding your niche will help you determine whether a term is a good fit and what should end up on the negative keyword list. With that in mind, be careful to watch out for generic terms related to your products that incur far too high a cost with little to no return.
3. Optimize Your Product Feed
Given that Google uses the information in your product feed to feature your products in a shopping ad. A higher quality search result can be expected when the feed is formatted in a way that is easily readable by Google.
Here are some tips to optimize Google Shopping ads product feed:
a)Use clear and detailed product titles
Make sure to include important information such as brand, product type, and any unique features in the product title. This helps online hoppers more easily understand what distinguishes the particular product and why it is worth consideration.
b) Use high-quality product images
Use clear, high-resolution images that showcase your products from multiple angles. This allows shoppers to better visualize what they are considering purchasing.
c) Include product details
Besides just the title and image. Include all pertinent details, such as cost, availability, and features/benefits. Doing so will increase the likelihood of a purchase and help users make better choices.
d) Assigning your products to the most relevant and specific product categories
This further helps Google Shopping match your products to relevant searches and improve the chances of your ads being shown to potential customers.
e) Use custom labels
Custom labels are additional attributes you can add to your product feed that can help you organize and analyze your products. You can use custom labels to differentiate between different product types, promotions, or items on sale.
f) Keep your product feed updated
Needless to say, it is essential to take care to regularly update your product feed to ensure that it includes the most accurate and current information about your products.
4. Run separate campaigns for branded and non-branded products
It is strongly recommended to create different campaigns for branded and non-branded products. Having at least two shopping campaigns that focus on branded and non-branded search terms allows your business to have better control over budgets and bids.
A standalone brand campaign prioritizes traffic that is already familiar with your products and is more likely to convert. Just as important is to ensure that you add your brand name as a negative keyword to any other (non-branded) shopping campaigns you’ll be running at the same time to ensure branded queries only trigger your brand campaign and reduce your CPA.
5. Target advanced demographics
If you want to get as many eyes and clicks as possible on your ads, it helps to target both familiar and new customers. In doing so, you should also focus on the interests of the audience, the brands they like, and their behavior. Although the personalized audience is great for recruiting people who have already had an interaction with you, a similar audience allows you to target new users who do not yet know you, but who are likely to become your customers.”
6. Import your website reviews
Importing reviews from your site into Google Merchant Center can help them stand out to more people and increase traffic and more importantly, credibility.
If you don’t use Google Customer Reviews or an approved third-party aggregator, you can add a review feed to your Merchant Center. The process involves uploading validated XML files pulled from your product reviews.
7. Write titles that get results
Your Shopping ad’s title is one of its most important fields for gaining traffic. The reason is that the product title serves as the keyword that triggers interest. In addition to the product image, the product title is most visible in Google Shopping ads
The titles have a maximum length of 150 characters, but, in many cases, only 70 characters will display in the ad itself. As well, avoid unnecessary capitalization, because excessive capitalization is a spam signal to Google and can cause your ads to be disapproved.
A good formula for the titles for apparel items is “Brand + Gender + Product Type + Attributes (color, size, material).
Distinguishing your product titles also allows you to prevent Google from indexing products with the same title, showing only one of your products.
8. Adjust your bidding strategy
Bidding is an important aspect of running a profitable google shopping ads campaign. The bid you choose for your campaign determines how much you are willing to pay for a click on your ad. It can have a significant impact on the performance and success of your campaign. That being said, be careful about simply raising your budget when you increase your bids as this can often trigger your shopping Ads to trigger for far more general terms.
Here are some tips for choosing the right bidding strategy to increase sales on Google shopping ads:
Set a realistic budget
Determine how much you are willing and able to spend on your Google Shopping campaigns, and set your budget accordingly.
Use automatic bidding
Automatic bidding allows Google to automatically adjust your bids based on factors such as the competitiveness of the keyword and the likelihood that your ad will lead to a conversion. This can be a good option if you are starting out or don’t have the time to adjust your bids constantly.
Use manual bidding
If you have more experience with Google Shopping and want more control over your bids, you can use manual bidding. With manual bidding, you can set the maximum bid you are willing to pay for a click on your ad.
Use target CPA bidding
Target CPA (cost-per-action) bidding allows you to set a target cost-per-conversion and lets Google automatically adjust your bids to try to achieve that target. This can be a good option if your primary goal is to drive conversions, and you have enough data to know roughly what your existing CPA is. By knowing this, you can set a baseline for what costs versus what they ought to be.
Monitor and adjust your bids
Regularly monitor the performance of your campaigns and adjust your bids as needed. You may need to increase your bids if your ads are not getting enough impressions. Or decrease your bids if you are getting too many clicks but need more conversions.
By choosing the right bidding strategy and regularly monitoring and adjusting your bids, you can help ensure that your Google Shopping campaigns are successful and meet your business goals.
9. Performance-based bidding
Just as you should prioritize which products to advertise based on their performance, you should focus your bids on your best-performing Shopping ads.
“If you really want to optimize your Google Shopping Ads campaign, use search-level query bidding. With this account structure, you can set different max CPCs based on how valuable a search query is for your brand. This ultimately increases ROAS (return on ad spend) rather quickly.
In order to be able to achieve this, it is imperative that you adjust your bids as you learn about an ad’s performance
10. Boost your ad performance with promotions
When you have a promotion going on for your advertised products, make sure that people who see your ads catch it with a merchant promotion. “Merchant promotions can make a big impact on your Shopping campaign performance, especially since one must always to be aware of Amazon and Prime shipping and the price pressure it puts.
Special offers give retailers an opportunity to highlight their products and better their chances of click-through rate and conversion. Online advertisers can feature coupons or promotions right in the search alongside their product or store information on Google’s PLA (product listing ad) grid.
Specifically, there are three types of promotions on Google Shopping ads — discounts, free gifts, and shipping specials.
11. Subdivide product groups in the shopping campaign
One of the effective shopping ads strategies to get more sales is subdividing product groups in the campaign.
When you set up your Google Shopping campaign and ad group, Google will automatically assign all of your products from the product feed file to this single ad group.
For all of your products, the $1 bid you set for your Ads group, for instance, will be the maximum amount you’ll pay. Unfortunately, the real issue is that not all products are created equal.
After all, a customer may spend $100 on upsells after clicking on a single product but spend almost nothing on a different product altogether. Clearly, sales of one product here are booming while those of another are not.
Bids can be lowered on comparable products while being raised on successful product categories or specific items.
Why Google Shopping Ads Is an Essential Part of the Growth Marketing Funnel, Especially for eCommerce Businesses
Overall, Google Shopping Ads are a powerful advertising tool that can help businesses reach potential customers and drive sales. By using an optimized product feed and the right bidding strategy, eCommerce businesses can effectively promote their products and reach customers who are actively searching for what they offer.
Hope this article on how to increase sales on Google Shopping ads was of help to you. Hopefully, you will now be able to optimize your Google shopping campaign for more sales with the help of this Google shopping ads guide.
If you’re looking for another option to maximize your Google Shopping Ads ROI, consider also enlisting the help of our Google Shopping experts. eCommerce Made Simpler is a trusted growth marketing agency that specializes in helping businesses develop effective (predominantly) digital marketing strategies that drive increased revenue growth. Our experienced growth marketing experts can help you create strategies and execute campaigns that help to get the highest ROI possible. Why not book a growth-marketing consultation today?