Google recently updated requirements and guidelines for submitting products to Google Shopping (Google Product Search). Specifically, they now require that merchants include unique product identifiers in their data feed (this applies to most products). They also require that merchants specify tax and shipping settings in their Google Merchant account.
- Read the original announcement about the changes to Google Product Search
- This policy goes into full effect on June 20th (see Enforcement of our Unique Identifier Policy)
After June 20th, your data feed might get rejected if the required information is not included.
As you know, submitting products to Google Product Search is important not just because potential customers might be shopping on Google Shopping, but also because Product Search listing are often included among organic search results (top 3 listings for a specific keyword phrase).
For example, our Early Impact Web site does not appear in the top 10 results on Google for “ecommerce software”, but the “ProductCart Shopping Cart Software” listing is in the the top 3 results in Google Product Search on that same keyword phrase, and therefore gets us into the top 10 organic search results (see screen shot below) … at least when we checked tonight 🙂
Since ProductCart v4.5 (our next release), is still a couple of weeks out (as we finalize the Sales Manager feature for which you have provided a lot of good feedback), we wanted to make available an updated version of our Google Product Search data feed generator (previously referred to as the Google Base data feed generator) so that you can submit properly formatted data feeds.
This updated version of the Google Product Search data feed generator (get the updated file):
- Allows you to submit unique product identifiers by leveraging Custom Search Fields
- If unique identifiers do not apply to your products, it allows you to indicate that you have received an exemption (learn more about asking for an exemption)
- Allows you to specify the shipping weight (which is another, new requirement)
- Allows you to include the featured product attribute
- Delivers much faster performance
Links and additional information:
- Unique Product Identifiers (Google Merchant center)
- Google Product Search data feed generator (ProductCart documentation)
- Download the update Google Product Search data feed generator
Please note: this is a BETA release. Let us know if you have any problems with this new version of the Google Product Search data feed generator.
