1. Five Optimization Tips to
Improve Your Performance
on Google Product Search
An Online Marketing Guide
Andrew Davis
David Weichel
blog.cpcstrategy.com
www.cpcstrategy.com

2. introduction
CPC Strategy is a full-service comparison shopping engine (CSE) agency. We specialize
in shopping feed and merchant account optimization for niche retailers and Internet
Retailer 500 merchants. Our comparison shopping studies and articles have appeared
on blogs and industry publications such as Internet Retailer, Website Magazine,
GetElastic, Amazon Seller Support, and Auction Bytes.
If you’re interested in learning more about our full-service shopping engine management
solution click here to speak with our Marketing Director, Andrew Davis. This white
paper illuminates five important optimization techniques you can use to increase
the amount and quality of traffic from Google Product Search.
TIP ONE
Optimize your product_type
We’ve seen traffic increases of over 100% with an optimized product_type column.
Results like that aren’t typical, but the traffic increase that comes from optimizing this
column is substantial.
The product_type category is basically the category column for Google Product Search.
If you have your own categories you can use them, but we only recommend this if you
have detailed categories for each individual product.
Recently we wrote a blog post detailing the significance of this column and some
merchant best practices when submitting this attribute data. We cannot stress its
importance enough.
To get the most (and best) traffic use both top level and bottom level categories.
For example, Furniture > Office Furniture > Desks > Cherry Desks is better than just
Cherry Desk.
If you see that the categories assigned to your products are not as detailed as they can
be in Google’s product_type taxonomy you should revisit and update the data with the
most specific information possible.
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3. TIP TWO
Include tax and shipping
It’s important to include this information to improve the shopper’s experience.
Now, you might think, “All I want to do is capture free traffic from Google Product
Search. Why do I care if include tax and shipping if it’s going to make my offer
look less appealing?” Well, nobody likes being surprised with hidden fees and
charges when they’re shopping! You’ve already gotten the shopper to your site,
don’t risk losing them now.
It’s easy to include this information in your shopping feed. Just add a column titled
“tax” and specify the following sub-attributes for each product:
Country State Tax rate y/n (whether you charge tax on shipping)
Separate each sub-attribute with a colon and keep in the same cell. For example,
a merchant in California that charges 8.25% sales tax on the order amount + shipping
would format their tax information like this:
US:CA:8.25:y
More info can be found here:
http://www.google.com/support/merchants/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=160162
The same methodology applies to adding shipping info. Just add a column titled
“shipping” and separate the following sub-attributes with colons:
Country State Service (class or delivery method) Price
A product with free ground shipping to anywhere in the US should look like this:
US::Ground:0
You’ll be surprised by the uptick in conversions after you include tax and shipping information.
Note: Google will require tax Information starting June 6th. After that date, product
listings that do not include tax information at the account level, or in the “tax” attribute,
may be rejected.
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4. TIP THREE
Take advantage of the ability to submit unique attributes
These attributes define different characteristics of your products. The more you
can add the more traffic you’ll get.
There are required and recommended attributes here but you can include any
attribute you have. For a custom attribute, simply add a c: in front of the attribute name.
For example, c:style could be used.
The impact custom attributes can have on traffic is substantial. If you have custom
attributes but are not including them, take some time to add them.
TIP FOUR
Use the featured_product attribute to showcase special deals and product offerings
This attribute is semi-new to the list. It’s simply a category where you enter y or n
to declare whether a product is featured or not. Try adding this attribute for featured
products on your webstore to increase visibility on those items.
TIP FIVE
Highlight discounts in your feed by using price and sale price columns
Google is adding two attributes to the United States Product Search feed specifiction,
sale_price and sale_price_effective_date. The attributes are recommended for the
items that you have put on sale, but are not required.
Note: If you include a sale_price column continue to include a price column.
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5. We’ve yet to see how the sale price is going to be integrated into the actual
listings on Google but we’re assuming it’ll sport a strikethrough feature similar
to what some of the paid shopping engines are already doing. Read more
about strikethrough prices here.
Here’s an example of how to format your sale_price_effective_date column:
2011-3-10/2011-3-29
When does sale start? March 10th, 2011.
When does sale end? March 29th, 2011.
More information on sale_price and sale_price_effective_date can be found here.
Useful Links
Much like their natural search algorithm Google’s Product Search algorithm is
ever-evolving. Here are the most notable changes they’ve made to the system
since the start of the year:
Google Announces Changes to Data Feed Specifications
Google Sends Email about Attribute Requirements for Google Product Search
Instructions: How to Implement Local Product Availability on Google Place Pages
Google Merchant Blog Releases Local Product Availability on Google Place Pages
Google Product Search Refuses New Attributes
conclusion
Thank you for downloading CPC Strategy’s white paper, Five Optimization Tips to
Improve Your Performance on Google Product Search. We hope this guide makes
managing Google Product Search at least a little easier.
If you are interested in learning more about our full-service shopping engine
management solution click here to speak with our Marketing Director, Andrew Davis.
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