▲ SERP where products registered on Google Shopping are exposed

To open a store on Google Shopping, you need a Google merchant account, a product feed that allows you to register shopping mall products in the merchant account, and a Google Ads account, Google's advertising management system. Since Google services can be linked with one Google account, it is recommended to create each account with one Google ID.

First, create a merchant account through Google Merchant Center .

Google Merchant Center Link

▲ Google merchant sign-up page (click SIGN IN on the top right)

When you enter the basic information required when signing up for the service, you must authenticate the site to be linked. If Google Analytics is installed, authentication is possible through Analytics. After authentication, click the Business information menu to register your website, logo, etc., and click the Shipping menu to set the shipping cost to the target country.

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▲ Business information settings

Shipping settings is a menu where you set the target country and enter the shipping cost for that country. If you are targeting multiple countries, please enter the shipping cost for each country. You can choose from a variety of shipping options, including fixed shipping costs (bulk charge), free shipping over a certain amount, and shipping based on product weight.

▲ Google merchant delivery settings

Once you have completed setting up your merchant account, you will need to create and submit a feed of products to be displayed on Google Shopping. There are three ways to create a feed: creating a feed directly through Google Spreadsheets, creating an XML feed through a third-party app related to Google Shopping, or through API integration. For efficient feed integration, most shopping mall operators use third-party apps. Representative product feed-related apps include ShoppingFeeder, DataFeedWatch, etc. These apps allow product management by sending feeds not only to Google Shopping but also to price comparison sites such as Price Grabber and global marketplaces. It's possible.
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The shopping feed required by Google Shopping consists of 13 elements. If you are creating a feed for the first time, be sure to check the following items before creating.

• Product Title: Avoid repeating keywords, and the title should not be written in all capital letters.
• Product Description: Must consist of text (required). Descriptions consisting of only Korean-style image files cannot be registered.
• Google Product Category (Google Shopping Category): Requires matching shopping mall products with categories determined by Google
• Product Type: Product type (category subclass)
• Product Image: Product image link URL
• Price: Selling price
• Brand: Brand name, if it is a self-produced product such as handmade, write the own brand name.
• Apparel Categories: If you sell clothing, you must enter additional information such as Gender, Age Group, Size, and Color.
• MPN & GTIN: Can be replaced with SKU by entering the manufacturing number
• GTIN: UPC, EAN, etc. enter barcode
• Sales Tax: When creating a feed targeting the United States, tax information must be entered in the Merchant Center.
• Shipping: Target country shipping settings
• Other Required Information: Availability, Condition settings
• Custom Labels: Additional options depending on the seller’s needs (not related to Google Shopping exposure)

More detailed feed-related information can be found on the Google Merchant Help page.

Product Data Specification Link

If you have built a shopping mall using a shopping mall builder such as Shopify, WordPress, or Magento, you can easily create a product feed through a feed-related app (extension). As an example of Shopify, a representative e-commerce platform, below, let's create a feed using the Shoppingfeeder App.

▲ Shopping feeder that can submit feeds to dozens of channels other than Google Shopping

Once you finish installing the app in Shopify, select Google Shopping for the country you want to target in Feed Management > Channel Management. After selection, match the product with the Google Shopping category and the feed will be created. When linked to the app, Shopping Feeder imports all products registered in Shopify, so you can easily create a feed.

▲ To be exposed to Google sites in multiple countries, select Google Shopping for each country.

When you click the link icon in the Option menu, the Channel Feed URL appears. This URL is the feed file URL provided by the shopping feeder app. Copy the address and paste it into the Products > Feeds > Scheduled fetch > File URL menu of your Google merchant account.

▲ Select Scheduled fetch

▲ Paste the feed address created in the shopping feeder app into the File URL.

▲ Shopping feed registration completion screen

After registering the feed, Google will review the feed and disapprove any products that do not meet the policy. For disapproved products, please revise them according to the relevant content and resubmit. Reviews usually take about 3 days, but can take 2 weeks or more for US-targeted feeds.

Google Merchant is a site for feed submission and management, and actual shopping advertisement execution is carried out in Google Ads (formerly AdWords). Google Ads is an advertising management system for advertisers, Google's core business model, and the world's largest advertising management system.

To sign up, sign up for AdWords with your Google account, then select the spanner icon in the upper right corner and click on the connected account. The linked account is a menu that shows web and app services that can be linked with the Google AdWords system. Click on the Google Merchant “Google Seller Center” to link the merchant and AdWords accounts. After linking, the merchant account’s feed will be automatically recognized. To set up a Google Shopping ad, create a Google ad campaign by selecting Campaigns > Click the blue + icon > New Campaign > Sales > Shopping. After selecting a shopping ad, select the target country in the “Select a country where the product is sold” field.

▲ Google Ads shopping campaign settings

In order to expose products on Google Shopping, Google's policy is to provide "a page serviced in the currency and language of the buyer's country of residence." However, Google provides an automatic currency conversion function (multi currency) and most pages are reflected in English even in countries where English is not the native language, so if the default language of a shopping mall is English, the seller's products can be exposed on Google shopping pages around the world. I think you can think of it as possible.

For more information about the Google Shopping landing page, please refer to the link below.

​Google Shopping landing page requirements information link

Links to submit feeds to multiple countries

Q: I would like to run Google Shopping targeting the US, UK, and Australia. The Google Merchant Center guide says that the site must be organized in the language and currency of the target country, but we operate a shopping mall that only supports English and USD. Is it possible ?

A: Yes you can. Google Shopping provides its own currency conversion function. When registering a feed at the merchant center, select USD, the basic currency of the shopping mall, and then select the target country, such as the UK or Australia. At this time, you can also set the shipping setting to USD, which is the shopping mall's default currency.

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Q: What is the average purchase conversion rate for Google Shopping?

A: The industry average e-commerce purchase call rate is 1% for domestic shopping malls and 2-3% for overseas shopping malls. Since Google Shopping is an image-based product listing advertisement, it typically receives 2-3% higher clicks than GDN or keyword advertisements.


Q: What is the function of Automatic item updates, the management menu at the top right of the Merchant Center page?

A: When creating a merchant, Price and Availability are enabled by default. This means that Google automatically crawls the price and inventory status (in stock, out of stock) when you submit a product feed.

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The biggest concern for those who are running an overseas shopping mall for the first time is promotion and marketing. Google Shopping is an advertisement with a high click-through rate because listings are shown to people who search for product or brand names in the Google search bar. If you are targeting overseas, start running Google Shopping ads right now.