Google Introduces The Auto-tagging Option
02/01/2022Google revealed another useful feature to the Google Merchant Centre. More help is on the way when it comes to better analytics and measurements. Its name: auto-tagging for free product listing. With it, you will be able to track your shopping campaigns better, by adding a result ID to your URLs.
“With auto-tagging, after someone clicks your free product listing and free local product listing, auto-tagging adds a bit of additional information — a parameter called “result id” — to the URLs people click through.
When used together with a third-party web analytics tool (like Google Analytics), this will allow you to see how effectively your free listings and free local listings lead to valuable customer activity, such as purchases. – says Google.
The same result ID will be used for a customer that clicks on your listing multiple times. It will also be tracked through your analytics tools, thus helping you analyze in more depth,
How to Turn Auto-tagging On?
This feature is not a default one and has to be turned on by the admin. To turn auto-tagging on, you simply sign into your Merchant Center Account and find the option under Conversions. Turn it on, and you’re good to go!
Why Is This Important?
With the data you get from the analysis of your free listings and conversions, you can make informed decisions that will actually make sense. Now that you can track better and have more information about conversions and purchases, you can determine if you need to change anything in your marketing strategy.
read more Google Merchant Center To Require Unique Product Identifiers On Free Merchant Listings
09/14/2021Get ready folks – starting tomorrow (September 15, 2021), Google Merchant Center will start enforcing the requirement for products in free listings in the merchant feeds to include unique product identifiers.
In its official announcement, Google re-enforced the importance of unique product identifiers (UPIs), stating:
“Providing the correct unique product identifiers (UPIs) for your products ensures that Google recognizes them and can provide optimal customer experience…In order to unify the enforcement of UPIs across programs, specifically the enforcement for multiple different products that use the same GTIN, we’re expanding this enforcement and applying it to products listed in free listings.”
For those who are unfamiliar, the term UPIs refers to products that include Global Trade Item Numbers (GTINs), Manufacturer Part Numbers (MPNs), and brand names in the product feed that is submitted to Google Merchant Center.
Here is the full breakdown of what to expect with this new crackdown from Google.
“Different products that use the same GTIN with the same variant attributes will be considered ambiguous and will be disapproved,” said Google. “Variant attributes include condition and multipack for all products, as well as color and for apparel products. If a group of products are identified as duplicates, only one will remain active and eligible to show in free listings.”
What This Means For You
For those who currently utilize the free version of Google Merchant Center and are not actively including UPIs with your products, this could become an issue and result in products being rejected. So, the takeaway here is to make sure that all of your free product listings have UPIs going forward to avoid any issues.
Check out this great resource from Google that breaks down all approved UPIs so that there is no confusion.
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