How to optimize Google Shopping Ads. PLA Campaigns

A successful shopping campaign goes beyond just collecting relevant and accurate data. Frequent monitoring and checking of the campaigns are important to ensure optimal performance.

Google shopping ads are generated based on your data to the Merchant Center account. There are key places in the Google Ads where you can monitor the effectiveness of your Google Shopping ads:

• Product group’s page
• Auction insights report
• Products page
• Bid simulators
• Dimensions page

Even though you can define the various product groups in your shopping ads, the performance of the campaigns is directly linked to the submitted data in the Merchant Center account. Hence it’s important to ensure the data is accurate and updated. 

Optimizing your Google Shopping ads will increase your sales while helping you save money by spending zero money on products that aren't selling.

Things to have into account when optimizing Google Shopping campaigns

If you want to optimize your Google Shopping campaigns, a few important things should be considered. In this detailed guide, we want to provide you with the best tips and tricks on optimizing your Google Shopping ads fully.

1. Optimized feed XML file

Optimizing your product feed is very important since Google uses the product data to create and display ads. Hence, it’s crucial to ensure that Google can easily "read and understand" your product data; this will increase your chances of targeting the correct customers. You might have all the data in your file, but it must be in a straightforward format easily translated by Google. How do you optimize your feed, and what do you focus on?

When optimizing your feed, the following key factors are considered, among others:

• Image: images are the main component of any audio-visual advertisement. Google has specific regulations on how to optimize your image.  Images make the first impression of your product; hence they have to be high quality.
• Product titles: like images, product titles are also important. Use the most important keywords first, which will be eye-catching. There are online tools that can help you create the best product titles.
• Price: correct pricing is very important in every ad.  To prevent Merchant Center errors, ensure you use the correct currency and price. The formatting should also be correct so that Google can pull the correct pricing data.

Additionally, there are different online tools to help you optimize your feed. These feed solutions allow users to fully optimize their feed covering every aspect of your Google Shopping ads.

2. Updated product catalog

A product catalog is an essential tool for any eCommerce business. It can be described as marketing collateral, describing all the product details used by the buyer in making a purchase.  The product catalog has the following key details about the products:

• Product URL
• Features
• Descriptions
• Dimensions
• Weight
• Price
• Availability
• Size
• Colour
• Customer reviews

A good example is the Amazon product catalog, where you can acquire plenty of information related to a certain product and even the brand. Having an updated product catalog is very important. Customers make faster purchasing decisions when they have all the information about a product because they spend more time researching their specifications and details. 

An updated product catalog will also improve the user´s experience. When you have consistent product information in all your Google shopping ads, it is easier to understand what the ad is about.

3. Optimize bidding depending on the product price

Smart bidding strategies are very helpful to optimize your Google shopping campaigns. Google urges advertisers to use automated bidding strategies. The Google smart bidding strategies allow business owners to:

• Get customized reports and updates
• Have agile control over the Google Shopping ads performance controls
• Analyze plenty of signals and data useful in bidding performance.

Google has developed several bidding strategies for advertisers tailored to their various campaigns. Are you targeting your campaigns on conversions, clicks, views, or impressions? Optimizing your bidding having in mind the product's price will help increase the conversion rate and sales. Smart bidding is an automated bidding system using machine learning in optimizing conversions.

Below are the five key Smart bidding strategies offered by Google to increase conversions:

• Maximize Conversions
• ECPC (Enhanced cost per click)
• Maximize Conversion Value
• Target ROAS (return on ad spend)
• Target CPA (cost per action)

There is still the Manual CPC which will allow you to set the maximum CPC that you are willing to pay for each product. If you use Manual CPC have into account which is the maximum CPC that you are willing to pay for each product. It's recommended to use target CPA or target ROAS. 

4. Remove non-profitable products

When updating your product catalog for Google Shopping, you shouldn't only focus on updating the product information. Compare the sales performance of the products and look at the sales of each product. There is no need to have a bulky and full catalog of products that aren't making any profits. If a product isn't bringing any sales, it's best to remove it from your Google shopping campaigns.

Having only profitable products reduces your expenses and advertisement costs and increases sales and revenue. How do you determine which products are getting the chop in your catalog and shopping campaigns?

4.1 Very low priced products

Pricing determines how much revenue a seller will get from a product. If a product is low priced, the expected revenue will be very low. When expenses and costs are included in a low-priced product, the seller doesn't profit. Therefore it's logical to remove low-priced products from your Google Shopping ads.

4.2 Very high priced products

While focusing on low-priced items, you should also look at the extremely highly-priced products. Why do we rarely see highly-priced products being advertised online by their various brands and sellers? If you have highly-priced products, it's best not to include them in the Google shopping campaigns.

4.3 Products where you can’t beat your competition in price

While online shopping has its advantages, pricing can be very frustrating, especially when competing with established brands. If you price your products too low, you won’t make enough profit, and you won't make any sales if you price them too high. Therefore when it comes to picking the best products to include in your Google shopping campaigns, you have to be very strategic.

If you can’t beat the market price of your competitor, then it’s best not to include the product in your Google Shopping Ads.  While you focus on increasing your product’s exposure and conversion on the top search queries and platforms, you should spend less on non-profitable products. Consider not advertising your losing products by excluding them from the campaigns.

4.4 Products with low availability

The availability of a product is very important. Nothing discourages a buyer more than getting the notification “Currently Unavailable." If products have stock problems or production has been interrupted, you should exclude them from the Google Shopping ads.

When removing the non-profitable products, you can manually exclude them from your Google Shopping campaigns. There are various online data management tools like the DataFeedWatch, where you can sort out your product data and identify which products should be excluded. The tools can also help you in setting up an automated rule and exclude the data that falls in the following categories:

• Products with low availability
• Products where you can’t beat your competition in price
• Very high priced products
• Very low priced products

Conclusion

When it comes to Google Shopping Ads, it's best to avoid making drastic changes all at once. The Ads are very sensitive, and a minor change on your bid can trigger a big performance change. Excluding the low profitable products from your campaigns is a wise move that won't trigger any drastic negative changes.  Also, it's important to track all the changes you make when optimizing your Google Shopping campaigns. Hence more reasons why you shouldn't make many changes at once.