Your Definitive Guide to Google Shopping for Shopify—Master The Channel

5 Comments
Google Shopping for Shopify

Google Shopping offers the ultimate way to level up revenue for many Shopify stores. We have managed approximately one hundred Google Ads accounts for various stores, and it’s common for my team and I to produce a return on investment for our clients of 300-2000%. While these results are not possible for all businesses, the Google Shopping channel is a golden source of customers wanting products. By searching, they are wanting.

Maybe you work with an ad agency who do little behind-the-scenes to improve your campaigns. Perhaps you implemented Shopify’s Google channel then had its automated bidding burn through ad spend.

I’m sick of seeing people lose money in their businesses all because of bad freelancers, agencies, or information.

While it makes great business for me, it is heartbreaking to see people lose on business ventures they pour their hearts, souls, and finances into establishing.

So after 10 years of Google Ads management and 4 years working only with Shopify stores, I rolled up my writing sleeves to distil everything I have learned about Google Shopping into Google Shopping For Shopify: The Definitive Guide. The book sheds light on the tried and tested strategies of what works, and what hasn’t, for our clients on the channel. Since its first publication in 2019, I’ve kept it updated with features like Performance Max to be relevant today.

Don’t be fooled into thinking you can fudge your way through this. Paid advertising is most successful when you know all the levers you can pull that make up the whole ad platform then benchmarking these against quantifiable metrics to determine performance. Otherwise it’s all too easy to pour money down the drain that could have been spent elsewhere in your business.

I created this guide, not only as an easy reference for clients and team, but as a way to squelch a lot of the misinformation out there about Google Shopping basics. This is a step-by-step guide to show you how to get started then grow any shopping or Performance Max campaign.

Here are the Google Shopping lessons I reveal:

1. The Power of Google Shopping

See exactly how Google Shopping can make a store succeed overnight. You’ll understand why Google wants you to succeed and how the channel is growing. I’ll show you the three reasons its a killer platform then round it off with the whole truth by covering the downside.

2. How Does Google Shopping Work?

In this chapter we’ll dive into the nuts and bolts about how Google Shopping works and the lesser known ways the channel can help your store growth.

3. How to Profit From Google Shopping

Success on Google Shopping comes down to your goals, people wanting what you offer, and competition. You will struggle to do well on the channel if you have unreasonable goals, people don’t want what you have, or competition is fierce. In this chapter you get bonus worksheets to set goals, understand search intent, and conduct competitor research. With these three factors lined up, you can profit from the channel.

4. How to Setup Key Google Products for Ad Growth

I walk you through the various account types you need to setup and how to do them right the first time. With this understanding, be ready to profit from Google Shopping ads.

5. Your Google Shopping Feed in Shopify

Now it’s time to look more closely at the best ways to create and manage your Google Shopping feed in Shopify. This powerful integration makes it so much easier to leverage Google Shopping ads for your Shopify store. Learn how to do this they right way from the get-go and you’ll save yourself time, energy, and money (and be faster on your way to maxmising your ad returns!)

6. Google Shopping Campaign Structure

Learn how to create the most effective structure for your ad campaigns. By implementing appropriate campaign structures, you’ll be able to easily manage, optimise, and track your Google Shopping ads.

7. Optimise Your Google Shopping Campaigns

Now it’s time to learn the juicy part of Google Shopping campaigns: optimisation. I provide a methodological framework to scientifically optimise your campaigns where they need it the most. These are insider tips we use to grow top performing, multimillion-dollar clients.

8. Performance Max Campaigns

Performance Max campaigns can save advertisers time while using machine learning to improve results. The campaign can replace Google Shopping or work beside it. The chapter gives you guiding principles and frameworks to make the campaign driven by artificial intelligence profitable for you.

9. Google Merchant Center Programs

There are strategies to squeeze even more sales out of Google Shopping by applying for Merchant Center programs. The programs give retailers more value for shopping ads. Learn about dynamic remarketing, Merchant Promotions, Local Inventory Ads, and more. Even better, I’ll show you how to implement each of these programs in Shopify.

10. Expand Beyond Google Shopping

In this final section, we’ll look at channel expansion beyond Google Shopping ads. While I’m clearly a big fan of Google Shopping, it’s just one way to generate revenue for your store. You can leverage the work and data insights from the channel, for YouTube, remarketing, display, discovery, and Microsoft Advertising. I’ll give you a bonus worksheet to scale YouTube ads.

Start reading Google Shopping for Shopify: The Definitive Guide.

With a strong understanding of how Google Shopping operates that you’ll gain from this guide, you too can create a strong foundation for implementing effective shopping campaigns for your Shopify store. I keep all my Shopify books up-to-date with the latest strategies and tactics that change with technology and consumer behavior so rest assure its the most comprehensive tutorial ever written.

Liked this article? Get more free Shopify guides:

You Might Also Like Learning:

5 Comments. Leave new

  • You mention the Shopify Google Shopping app and 3rd party Feed tools in the article – We have way too many variants than make sense for many of our products and would just like to sync one variant – possibly the least expensive one – can you comment on if there is any way, perhaps with Google Merchant Center Feed Rules to easily do this?

    Reply
    • I’ve never used Merchant Center feed rules because we create and manage all our feeds through DataFeedWatch. It gets the data right at the source before it enters MC. If you want to advertise just the least expensive one, then you can alter your feed in DataFeedWatch and your campaigns to use just that.

      Reply
  • Great guide Joshua. Seems some things have been updated in Google since it’s been written, or I’m doing something wrong, as I can’t get everything set up as per the guide. There doesn’t seem to be a condition in Analytics when creating an audience for “Pageviews” the only one seems to be “AdX Monetised Pageviews” – is that the same?

    Reply
  • I am seeing many issues with the Pmax but this did not happen with smart shopping.

    1) Every time I do a change (one product/variants) in my store, (product description, photos, product removal, inventory change, even adding reviews) the performance is affected. For example, my performance is 3 ROAS and I do the change, immediately it goes down to 1.2-1.7 and after 20 days it goes again close to 3. This has happened to me many times in the last 8 months. Any way to fix this issue?
    2) My Account (not happening after May 2022) is generating unreal conversions on the current day and then when you check it the next day is different. For Example, if I check at 9 AM how many conversions are been generated today, I have 15 conversions (varies during the day), then 4 PM could be 23 and then 9 PM could be 18. But when I check today’s results the next day, I have 4 that are the real/correct ones. Why this is happening and if someone knows how to fix it?
    3) My G4 conversion tag is tracking conversion but the conversion value is not being calculated; for example, it counts 40 conversions and conv. values are 40. I haven’t found a way to fix this. My universal analytics is counting correctly (40 Conv equal to $3,800). Any way to fix this?

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Fill out this field
Fill out this field
Please enter a valid email address.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.