Only registering your Shopify store with the Google Search Console or any web search engine may not be enough to boost your business. It is where an online advertisement platform such as Google Ads comes into the picture.
Price – Google Shopping Feed Specification Guide
If you are to employ Google ads to optimize your Shopify store, it is necessary to understand some of the technical aspects, for instance how the Google feed software works or how the Google product category is updated, or the right format in which product data needs to be organized.
The purpose of this guide is to introduce the nuance of how to format your product information and submit the data to Google in the right format to ensure a successful advertising campaign for your Shopify store.
Table of Contents
Price – Definition
It is the attribute that tells the audience how much you are charging for the product or service. The information is shown to users in your ads. Throughout this guide, we will answer some questions, and clear some doubts around the attribute of price in Google feed.
Is it required or optional?
The price attribute is required as the most important attribute or data that needs to be submitted to Google. Even if you are not charging for the product or service, the information needs to be included so that it can be communicated to the customer while publishing the ads.
Format
When you are selling on shopify, your audience is not limited to locals or even the same country. Hence, it is very likely that some of your potential customers might not have a common currency. To avoid any issue, It is necessary to adopt a particular format as laid down by the Google shopping feed specification guide.
According to this, it is required to include the type of currency along with the amount. It is also necessary to ensure that you use the correct code for the currency. It is advisable to refer to ISO 4217 for currency code and symbol. For example 15.00 USD (US Dollar) or 15.00 CAD (Canadian Dollar)
Minimum requirement
According to the Google merchant center feed guide, there is some minimum requirement that needs to be met for any ads to be published via Google ads. If the requirement is not followed, the product will be disapproved for ads. It will be communicated on the Diagnostics page of your Merchant Center account.
Dos:
- Make sure that the price on your product data meets the landing page requirements. The price included in the product data, which is shown to the audience, should be the actual price that is to be charged.
- Submit an amount and currency that matches the price on your landing page
- Include the price in the currency of your country of sale prominently on your landing page.
- Keep the prices the same, irrespective of the user location. Regardless of the location, the user should be able to purchase the product online for the price that has been submitted.
- Display variants and prices in a straightforward way on your landing page.
- Display the submitted product and price prominently on your landing page.
- Charge the submitted price to all users in the country of sale. Google does not endorse regional pricing or membership prices. Every user in a particular country of sale should be able to buy the product for the submitted price without paying a membership.
- Include any minimum order value in the shipping settings.
Don’t:
- Don’t submit products with a price that constantly changes such as auctions and prices based on live currency exchange. Products that you submit must be sold at a fixed price.
- Don’t include the shipping cost in your price. Instead, use Merchant Center shipping services or the shipping attribute in the feed.
- Don’t include any import or export-related costs in your price. Instead, indicate relevant charges on your website.
- Don’t submit Zero as a price. Always submit a price that’s greater than 0. Only products that are sold with monthly installment payments and/or subscription plans can have a price of 0 if there is no up-front payment.
- Don’t provide more than 2 digits after the decimal point. If you include more than 2 digits after the decimal point, they’ll automatically be rounded to the nearest acceptable value. For example, 1.0234 will be rounded to 1.02, and 29.8999 will be rounded to 29.90.
- Don’t include activation fees for wireless plans in the price attribute for mobile devices and tablets sold in the US. Wireless subscription plans are not supported for Shopping ads in the US.
- Always comply with local laws when submitting price information.
Best practices
Below are some of the practices that are encouraged. It can help you to go beyond the basic requirements to optimize your product data for performance.
- Submit a price that can be represented in your country of sale’s currency (according to ISO 4217). For example, instead of 1.0012 USD, submit 1.01 USD. If your price can’t be represented in your country of sale’s currency, then Google feed software will round it to a value that can.
- Enable automatic item updates for price. Automatic item updates use the Schema.org micro-data on your landing page to help keep your data fresh. Keep in mind these updates only happen when Google crawls your landing page, and you still need to resubmit your product data regularly.
- Highlight sales that promote your products. Use the sale price attribute to tell users how much you’re charging for your product during a sale. During the period that you specify, your sale price will show as the current price in your ad. If your original and sale prices meet certain requirements, your original price may show along with the sale price, allowing people to see the difference between the two.
- Use currency conversion as an easy way to target a country that uses a different currency, instead of the one on your landing page and in your product data. If you use currency conversion, the price on your landing page and in your product data must still match. Google will display the converted price in your ad, but the converted price doesn’t need to appear on your landing page.
Examples
- Variants: If your landing page has multiple products on it, such as variants or similar items, the particular product data which was submitted must be the most prominent.
- Products with a minimum order value requirement: If the product costs 10 USD, and it is required that users spend at least 50 USD to place an order, then that would be a minimum order value.
- Products sold in bulk: Don’t submit the price for just 1 product if a user can’t purchase only 1 product. For example, if you sell pens, and users must purchase at least 50 pens to place an order, then submit the price for 50 pens.
- Unit pricing: It is required to submit the price along with the base measure. If you sell a perfume that comes in 30 ml, 60 ml, and 100 ml. It is necessary to include a unit pricing base measure which could be for 100 ml.
- Software subscription: 1-year subscription for the Google Security Software Basic Edition cost 29.99 USD.
Conclusion
Price is one aspect that can make or break a business. For instance, if it is higher than usual, it is just a few clicks for a user to find another option and if it is lower than usual, the user might be suspicious of the quality of the product. The majority of the user can be nudged into buying from your Shopify store if your product is priced appropriately. Hence, while submitting the product data for Google ads, it is advisable to keep it transparent and use the specification as elucidated in this guide.
Further readings on Google Feed
- How to Troubleshoot your Google merchant center data feed?
- What are the Requirements for the Google shopping feed?
- Tips to Optimize Your Google Shopping Feed
- How to create the correct Feed for multiple countries?
- Google Shopping Feed Guide.
