This guide explains each step of the process of creating a Google Shopping feed in Channable. Follow these steps and all the linked articles to create your feed, categorize and optimize your product data, and finally, to activate your feed.
- Step 1: Create a new Google Shopping Feed
- Step 2: Categorize your products
- Step 3: Map the necessary attributes
- Step 4: Create rules to enrich, filter, and refine your product data
- Step 5: Check and improve the feed quality score
- Step 6: Preview and activate your Google Shopping feed
- Step 7: Upload your feed in Google Merchant Center
Step 1: Create a new Google Shopping Feed
- Navigate to Feeds and click on the + Add new feed button.
- In the Channel field, search for “Google” and select Google Shopping.
- Next, fill in your Feed name
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Select your Target country from the dropdown.
Tip: The country that you select is fixed, which means that if you want to sell your products in another country, you need to create a new feed and select that country at this step. -
Select the Type of market, which is the specific category or sector of the retail market for your products. For example, 'Books' or 'Fashion'.
Tip: Choose the Type of market carefully, as the the fields that you need to complete in the Finalize step are very different per market type. For example, if you select 'Fashion', you need to fill fields such as 'size' and 'material'. You can change the market type later in the feed settings if you choose the wrong one. - Click on Advanced settings to edit settings such as 'Master rule'.
- Once you have completed your feed settings, click Continue.
Step 2: Categorize your products
Once you have created a Google Shopping Feed, you need to categorize your items so that they match the categories used by Google Shopping.
First, set the category field for your project and then use Smart Categorization, Channable’s powerful algorithm, to help you categorize your products.
Once the Smart Categorization process is complete, there is a percentage shown in [Your Google Shopping Feed] > Categories that indicates how well your products have been categorized.
Smart Categorization does not always categorize all of your products and then you need to manually categorize these uncategorized products.Step 3: Map the necessary attributes
To list your products on Google Shopping successfully, you must make sure that your product data has all of the mandatory attributes.
Create and map new data fields
Check the field mapping of your product data in Setup > Import > [Added import] > Edit mapping. If you have errors here, you need to create the new fields. This will help you to connect your product data fields to the Google Shopping fields.
If you create new fields, the newly created fields must be connected with the corresponding Google field:
- Go to Feeds > [Your Google Shopping feed].
- Click on the Finalize tab.
- Look for the 'Channel field name' you want to match (e.g. g:color) and click on the dropdown field in the 'Internal field' column
- Find the field you just created inside Project fields and select it.
Map your data fields with Google Shopping’s attributes
If your import fields are already aligned with Google's expected format, you need to map the internal fields to Google's fields by following these steps:
- Go to the [Your Google Shopping feed] and click on the Finalize tab.
- Match each Google Shopping field ('Channel field name') with the corresponding field from your data ('Internal field').
Note: Make sure the data in your internal field corresponds with the format Google requests. For example, for 'Availability', Google only accepts the values in_stock, out_of_stock, preorder, or backorder. Check the format Google requires by hovering over the (?) question mark in the 'Description' column.
Step 4: Create rules to enrich, filter, and refine your product data
When your product data is incomplete or it does not match the format that Google requires, you need to use rules in Channable to make improvements. Create rules to optimize your products and meet Google Shopping's listing requirements.
Step 5: Check the feed quality score
The Quality step gives you an overview of any errors and warnings in your feed, such as missing required fields or improper formatting. Also, this step displays an overall feed quality score.
To view your quality score follow these steps:
- Go to [Your Google Shopping feed]
- Click on the Quality tab. The bar shown indicates how many of your items meet the checks and how many items fail either mandatory or recommended checks.
How to increase the quality score of your feed
In the Quality tab, there are recommendations on how to improve your feed. The list of quality checks starts with all the ‘mandatory’ issues, which have the highest priority. Not solving these issues may result in your feed being rejected or not showing up in Google Shopping.
For each issue, Channable gives you a suggestion for a solution. To these suggestions, do the following:
- Go to the issue in the list for which you would like a solution.
- In the 'How to fix' column, click on the (?) question mark button. This will show a suggestion on how to solve the issue.
Step 6: Preview and activate your Google Shopping feed
Now that your feed is ready, you can preview it and then activate it.
If you're still on a Channable trial account, you need to change your account to a live account and activate your project in order to activate your Google Shopping feed.
Follow these steps to activate your feed:
- Go to [Your Google Shopping feed] > Settings.
- Click on Activate feed.
- After the activated feed has run, you can preview your feed and access the feed URL in the Preview tab of the feed. Here you can preview how your products will appear in the feed and copy the feed URL.
Step 7: Upload your feed in Google Merchant Center
Once you have activated your feed, the next step is to connect it with Google Merchant Center.
Google Merchant Center supports automatic item updates for the price and availability from your website rather than the feed (or API). This feature is active by default but can be deactivated at any time. However, if you update the price multiple times a day, Google cannot guarantee that the automatic updates will work.