The ultimate guide to Google Shopping feed optimisation
Introduction
Your product feed is a valuable resource, responsible for 100% of the searches you match for. Just as you wouldn’t neglect optimising keywords, optimising the product feed is crucial for driving relevant traffic and attracting new customers. Many brands make the mistake of simply replicating their website content in their product feeds without considering the specific requirements of Google Ads.
This guide will explore how you can optimise your Google Shopping feed to maximise its effectiveness.
Why product feed optimisation matters:
Over 80% of search queries are matched through content in product titles, making it the most critical attribute to focus on. Neglecting to update your product titles can limit your ability to match relevant search queries. To emphasise the value of feed optimisation, we’re sharing a couple of client case studies demonstrating the impact of making changes to shopping feeds.
Example: Increasing Product Type Depth
Control: Coats
Experiment: {Brand Name} > Womens > Clothing > Outerwear > Coats & Jackets > Coats
Results:
- 40% increase in impressions
- 69% increase in revenue
- 14% increase in ROAS
Example: Adding Additional Information to Product Titles
Control: {Brand Name} Floral Dress
Experiment: {Brand Name} Floral Dress – Size 14 – Designer Blue Dress
Results:
- 73% increase in impressions
- 127% increase in revenue
- 17% increase in ROAS
Top tips for product feed optimisation:
Titles
You can use up to 150 characters in a product title, so use as many characters as possible with relevant attributes. Attributes include product category, colour, size, style, material or brand. Ensure that the most relevant attributes come at the start of the title for the most significant effect. If your customers usually have the brand at the start of their searches, then start with this; if your customer searches by colour first, include this at the start of your title.
Descriptions
15% of all searches are matched to the keywords or phrases in your descriptions, so optimising is important. We would recommend 500 – 1500 characters in your feed descriptions. Also, avoid any promotional text or delivery descriptions. Remove any merchandising text such as “For a more casual look, try pairing with distressed denim jeans and crisp white trainers”, as this will only confuse things, and you will match for less relevant search queries.
Product Types
Google recommends using a minimum depth of 3 product types; however, using a depth of 5 actually yields more relevant results.
Google Product Category
Include a Google product category where you can; this helps Google understand what your product is to match you with relevant terms.
Colour
The best way to label a colour is to use its more generic form, rather than labelling a colour “blossom”, consider using pink. This will allow you to use the colour filters in the Google Shopping tab. If your product is multi-coloured, you can input each colour individually separated by a slash, e.g. Blue/White/Yellow.
Summary
Optimising your Google Shopping feed is essential for success within any retail PPC account. Continuously monitor and adjust your feed, stay up-to-date with trends and analyse search data. Invest time in shopping feed optimisation to unlock the full potential of your PPC campaigns & results.