It was on the last day of May this year that Google announced a new initiative that enabled shoppers to improve their shopping experience. The new initiative allowed shoppers to research products, compare products, compare prices and then find retailers to make the purchase.
This new initiative transformed the way shoppers shopped in the United States. Google product search in the US was transformed and is now based on Product Listing Ads. Google did this because it believed that having good commercial relationship with traders and retailers would lead to updated product data thus improving shopping results for shoppers. Increased traffic to merchant sites was also considered while making this change.
The transition in the US was completed on October 17th and has been a huge success.
Google shopping goes international
Encouraged by the success in the US Google has decided to launch Google Shopping, based on Product Listing Ads, in UK, France, Germany, Netherlands, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland, Australia, and Brazil. Google believes this launch will bring the same high quality shopping experience to the shoppers of these countries. And also increase the revenues of merchants in these countries.
However, merchants in these countries will have to make the transition and Google is giving them time to optimize their campaign. The new model will be rolled out gradually in steps. The first major change is expected on February 13, 2013. From that day onwards shoppers will see cleaner results for shopping queries on Google. Products will be displayed in a single unit and shoppers will no longer see current search results. The new format will appear as ‘Sponsored’ and will appear in the space presently occupied by AdWords ads.
This change will enable shoppers to refine their search and they can then search for products by price and brand. The product images will also be larger for improved clarity. Google announced that they are beginning the tests from today for this new format. The initial tests will be limited for small percentage of searches. However, Google is confident that by the second quarter of 2013 they will transition to the complete commercial model. Google has announced that they will be announcing certain incentives to traders and merchants willing to transition to the new format.
Ranking will be based solely on price and relevance. Google hopes this new change will offer better shopping experience to shoppers in these countries. Shoppers will be able to find products in a convenient place, compare prices, compare features and identify stores or merchants closest to them.
