Marketing your product catalog on Google base is perhaps the best way to acquire new customers. To get most out of Google base, it is vital to optimize the feeds that you have submitted on Google base.
Hence, it is highly recommend for ecommerce store owners to use Google base as a part of their ecommerce seo strategy.
Out there in Google base blog, you’ll find a plethora of information about Google base and its optimization techniques.
The motive behind the optimization process is to rank well on the Google product search to gain more visibility, traffic and sale. In this post I am going to tell you few basic steps, which you have to carry out while conducting Google base marketing campaign…
How to optimize Google Base Feeds?
Before going into Google base optimization techniques, let’s first understand the real meaning of the word “Optimization”.
What’s Optimization? In Context with Google base, Optimization simply refers to “the process of utilizing the product feeds to the fullest in order to make feeds rank better in shopping engines for a given keyword.
You can look at the screen shots to understand how Google ranks merchant feeds in the Google Product Search.
The first and the foremost ranking factor is “Relevancy” – The default ranking criterion (Relevancy includes quality and accuracy of data feeds with the search term),
Steps to Improve Google Base Quality and Relevancy:
The quality of Google base feeds does matter a lot while creating the feeds. The following are a few bare minimum things to do in order to improve the quality of data feeds. You should also make sure that you adhere to Google base program policy and its guidelines.
Title: Make sure your product title describes your product. Keep it precise, short and simple. Google base shorten product titles to up to 70 characters limit, so avoid overdoing the titles by stuffing keywords.
Description: They say that you should not use promotional messages such as visit now, click here to grab this, free shipping etc. Product description should be clear and comprehensive. A good idea would be to tell the benefits of the product by including the most important and catchy attributes of the product.
Product Type/Taxonomy: The product type signifies the kind of product being sold. The product should fall into a specific category.
Example: If you are selling an MP3 player, it should be categorized into
Electronics>>Audio>>Audio Players>> MP3 Players
Google provides a typical taxonomy structure for various products for you to classify/categorize the product you are selling. If you already have your own categorization system for your items, you can apply it.
It is always good to provide the taxonomy with full “breadcrumb” information. You may also download the taxonomy structure recommended by Google…
Link: Make sure the link provided on Google’s product page is directed to the correct product on your website. When users are directed to some other product page, they are most likely to leave your website rather than take the pain to search your website for the correct product.
Price: This is a mandatory field in Google base data feeds. The price that you include in the Google base feed must be same the price on the landing page.
Product ID: This is your product’s internal Identification code. Make sure that you maintain the same Id when you re-submit your product or send a new data feed.
MPN/UPC: Most ready to buy shoppers will search for the product by entering MPN/UPC number along with some product attribute. So including an MPN/UPC will help the online retailer to make his products more visible to online shoppers.
Product Image: Including an image can greatly increase the chances of a user clicking on your item in the search results. When adding images to your feed, make sure that you include only high quality images that accurately represent the product as it is displayed on your item page. Do not include logo or generic images.
Feed Format: Google allows you to upload feeds in multiple ways. If you have few items, you can individually upload them using a web form. Alternatively you can also upload using single tab-delimited text or XML file. To learn more about data feeds read, “How to post an item to Google Product Search? ”
Set your target country: Specify the location where you'd like your items to be displayed in the search results. This helps you to focus on your target audience, as it screens you from appearing in search results where you don’t intend to sell. This will greatly reduce your bounce rates.
How to improve Google base relevancy?
Folks at Google say that most online shoppers search in a particular way, and it is not like the usual web search. They search with product characteristics ( or “Product Attributes”) to find their desired products. The more relevant product attributes you give, the more are your chances of getting visibility in Google product search and Onebox result when a user types similar or relevant attributes. Google base allows you to insert more product attributes through customized attributes feature.
Utilize custom attributes to improve Google base relevancy:
Currently, Google has some predefined product specifications/attributes (characteristics of a product), like Author, Size, Format, Color, Height, Weight etc. The product attribute type field has been categorized into 3 sections: mandatory, recommended and optional
Google Base feed has an option wherein you can use your own unlimited custom attributes.
When a user starts searching a product-oriented query (long tail keywords) in the search box, such as Canon Power shot A530, the possibility of a sale is higher”
Say for example, if you want to submit information on digital camera… Some general attributes Google base might have is Color, Weight, Size, etc
Optimum usage of custom attributes provides ample information to Google base about your data. More product information you give, higher are the chances of your page appearing on the search engine result page and higher are the chances of getting more conversions.
The following are some of the custom attribute relating to the digital camera
Display
Display Size
Battery Type
Interface Type
Memory Type
Max shutter speed
Min shutter speed
Image Sensor Type
Min Aperture
Max Aperture
Camera Type
Lens Type
Image Format
Min Focal Length
Max Focal Length
Digital Zoom
The more relevant product information you give, the more quality traffic you will get...
Apart from Relevancy, Google helps online shoppers to list/rank the merchant list based up on other 3 things (refer to the above screen shot)
1. Seller rating – Your store will rank top if it has 5 Star or a higher score than other participants. (Higher to lower)
2. Tax and shipping – Your Store will rank top based on the tax and shipping data (Higher to Lower and Vice Versa)
3. Price – If your product price is lower than your competitors, then you site will rank top. (Higher to Lower and Vice Versa)
Increase your seller rating: This purely depends on the quality of customer service you provide. The seller ratings are calculated not just by how many votes you receive, but also depends on the number of quality stars you get. For instance, if 5 users would have rated seller A with 1 star and 3 users would have rated seller B with 5 stars, Seller B is more likely to get ranked higher. Therefore, it’s not quantity but quality ratings that fetch higher ranking.
Tax and Shipping Information: Since more number of shoppers have asked for tax and shipping options on Google product search, Google has recently introduced this feature. Though not mandatory, providing tax and shipping might get you more visibility. Sometimes shoppers mistake the “price” to be inclusive of tax and shipping and are disappointed when they see the final price is higher than what was listed. Therefore, providing tax and shipping rates will help the shopper to calculate the total price in the initial stages itself.
Price: Quote the perfect price. (Perfect price doesn’t mean the lowest price). It’s the right price which will get you more per unit sales as well as good margins.
There could also be a case where merchants clash with each other on the same price/rating/tax and shipping. Under this scenario, Google might rank the most relevant item for a particular search term higher than the rest, or it could be using some other factor, which is beyond our comprehension.Many marketers don’t seem to optimize their feeds due to the lack of knowledge or due to the scarcity of time. They might be busy managing other shopping engine channels, where cost is associated with every single click/sale. But these marketers have to remember that Google base is extremely powerful because it is free, and it will list Google base items in the Google main search on “OneBox” result, if your Google base item is relevant to the search phrase.
Hence, it is highly recommend for ecommerce store owners to use Google base as a part of their ecommerce seo strategy.Out there in Google base blog, you’ll find a plethora of information about Google base and its optimization techniques.
The motive behind the optimization process is to rank well on the Google product search to gain more visibility, traffic and sale. In this post I am going to tell you few basic steps, which you have to carry out while conducting Google base marketing campaign…
How to optimize Google Base Feeds?
Before going into Google base optimization techniques, let’s first understand the real meaning of the word “Optimization”.
What’s Optimization? In Context with Google base, Optimization simply refers to “the process of utilizing the product feeds to the fullest in order to make feeds rank better in shopping engines for a given keyword.
You can look at the screen shots to understand how Google ranks merchant feeds in the Google Product Search.
The first and the foremost ranking factor is “Relevancy” – The default ranking criterion (Relevancy includes quality and accuracy of data feeds with the search term),Steps to Improve Google Base Quality and Relevancy:
The quality of Google base feeds does matter a lot while creating the feeds. The following are a few bare minimum things to do in order to improve the quality of data feeds. You should also make sure that you adhere to Google base program policy and its guidelines.
Title: Make sure your product title describes your product. Keep it precise, short and simple. Google base shorten product titles to up to 70 characters limit, so avoid overdoing the titles by stuffing keywords.
Description: They say that you should not use promotional messages such as visit now, click here to grab this, free shipping etc. Product description should be clear and comprehensive. A good idea would be to tell the benefits of the product by including the most important and catchy attributes of the product.
Product Type/Taxonomy: The product type signifies the kind of product being sold. The product should fall into a specific category.
Example: If you are selling an MP3 player, it should be categorized into
Electronics>>Audio>>Audio Players>> MP3 Players
Google provides a typical taxonomy structure for various products for you to classify/categorize the product you are selling. If you already have your own categorization system for your items, you can apply it.
It is always good to provide the taxonomy with full “breadcrumb” information. You may also download the taxonomy structure recommended by Google…
Link: Make sure the link provided on Google’s product page is directed to the correct product on your website. When users are directed to some other product page, they are most likely to leave your website rather than take the pain to search your website for the correct product.
Price: This is a mandatory field in Google base data feeds. The price that you include in the Google base feed must be same the price on the landing page.
Product ID: This is your product’s internal Identification code. Make sure that you maintain the same Id when you re-submit your product or send a new data feed.
MPN/UPC: Most ready to buy shoppers will search for the product by entering MPN/UPC number along with some product attribute. So including an MPN/UPC will help the online retailer to make his products more visible to online shoppers.
Product Image: Including an image can greatly increase the chances of a user clicking on your item in the search results. When adding images to your feed, make sure that you include only high quality images that accurately represent the product as it is displayed on your item page. Do not include logo or generic images.
Feed Format: Google allows you to upload feeds in multiple ways. If you have few items, you can individually upload them using a web form. Alternatively you can also upload using single tab-delimited text or XML file. To learn more about data feeds read, “How to post an item to Google Product Search? ”
Set your target country: Specify the location where you'd like your items to be displayed in the search results. This helps you to focus on your target audience, as it screens you from appearing in search results where you don’t intend to sell. This will greatly reduce your bounce rates.
How to improve Google base relevancy?
Folks at Google say that most online shoppers search in a particular way, and it is not like the usual web search. They search with product characteristics ( or “Product Attributes”) to find their desired products. The more relevant product attributes you give, the more are your chances of getting visibility in Google product search and Onebox result when a user types similar or relevant attributes. Google base allows you to insert more product attributes through customized attributes feature.
Utilize custom attributes to improve Google base relevancy:
Currently, Google has some predefined product specifications/attributes (characteristics of a product), like Author, Size, Format, Color, Height, Weight etc. The product attribute type field has been categorized into 3 sections: mandatory, recommended and optional
Google Base feed has an option wherein you can use your own unlimited custom attributes.
When a user starts searching a product-oriented query (long tail keywords) in the search box, such as Canon Power shot A530, the possibility of a sale is higher”
Say for example, if you want to submit information on digital camera… Some general attributes Google base might have is Color, Weight, Size, etc
Optimum usage of custom attributes provides ample information to Google base about your data. More product information you give, higher are the chances of your page appearing on the search engine result page and higher are the chances of getting more conversions.
The following are some of the custom attribute relating to the digital camera
Display
Display Size
Battery Type
Interface Type
Memory Type
Max shutter speed
Min shutter speed
Image Sensor Type
Min Aperture
Max Aperture
Camera Type
Lens Type
Image Format
Min Focal Length
Max Focal Length
Digital Zoom
The more relevant product information you give, the more quality traffic you will get...
Apart from Relevancy, Google helps online shoppers to list/rank the merchant list based up on other 3 things (refer to the above screen shot)
1. Seller rating – Your store will rank top if it has 5 Star or a higher score than other participants. (Higher to lower)
2. Tax and shipping – Your Store will rank top based on the tax and shipping data (Higher to Lower and Vice Versa)
3. Price – If your product price is lower than your competitors, then you site will rank top. (Higher to Lower and Vice Versa)
Increase your seller rating: This purely depends on the quality of customer service you provide. The seller ratings are calculated not just by how many votes you receive, but also depends on the number of quality stars you get. For instance, if 5 users would have rated seller A with 1 star and 3 users would have rated seller B with 5 stars, Seller B is more likely to get ranked higher. Therefore, it’s not quantity but quality ratings that fetch higher ranking.
Tax and Shipping Information: Since more number of shoppers have asked for tax and shipping options on Google product search, Google has recently introduced this feature. Though not mandatory, providing tax and shipping might get you more visibility. Sometimes shoppers mistake the “price” to be inclusive of tax and shipping and are disappointed when they see the final price is higher than what was listed. Therefore, providing tax and shipping rates will help the shopper to calculate the total price in the initial stages itself.
Price: Quote the perfect price. (Perfect price doesn’t mean the lowest price). It’s the right price which will get you more per unit sales as well as good margins.
Test, test, test only then you'll be able to identify what works well for you.
8 comments:
hi
is it possible when that i upload so many item together but only few of them comes in google base reasult.is there any specific reason behind this?
You must add more relevant information to your products. Also, make sure you are searching for the products title and not the description.
Very imformative.... Is price a factor in getting visibility with Google Base?
Comparing the positions of my products with their attributes, it seems totally random as to which products rank highly and which don't.
Also, I have tried getting several items on page 1 for one particular keyphrase, but as one product goes up the rankings, another one goes down, indicating that they are all linked somehow, or that a variety of stores are preferred for page 1, rather than all from the same company/feed.
Thanks I was kinda Blurry on on Froogle (Google Shopping) worked with algorythm
Hi, In terms of Seller Rating, is it true that this can only be relevant if you accept Google Checkout as a payment provider?
We use OpenCart and accept PayPal and Credit Cards (again through PayPal) so will we have to opt for Google Checkout too?
Thanks
Would this also apply to the other platforms such as Shopping.net and Bizrate (among others > Google base Seems to have a standard and Their Tab delimited Feed is fickle, So i have my guy creating an API (We will see how that goes) but just curious if they, are using similiar Algorythems (sp?)
Thanks
I've just updated my feed after reading your thoughts to get better conversion. I'll more likely update my base feed if i get good results. Since last couple of months I've dropped putting it up. Let's see how it could help me out for building more conversion.
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