Imagine a shopper has searched for a product on Google Shopping and found the perfect offer at the perfect total price inclusive of shipping. They reach checkout on the merchant’s site only to realize that the final price differs from what they’ve seen on Google due to inaccurate shipping costs. Our users consistently tell us this is a primary source of frustration.
To help you display more accurate total prices to shoppers, we've made the configuration of shipping rates in Merchant Center more powerful and easier to use with a new
shipping configuration tool.
This tool can help you configure accurate shipping rates for products by providing:
- Shipping rules: Select from an expanded list of shipping methods, including customizable methods based on a hierarchical set of rules.
- Multiple shipping methods: Differentiate between various shipping methods, such as ground versus express, for the same country, so Google can display the lowest possible price to the user.
- Customization based on location: Configure rates based on shipping destination using countries, states, or cities.
- Simplified exclusion options: Indicate when products do not ship to certain regions.
- Reusable shared library: Create a repository of shipping methods you can reuse across various custom configurations.
In addition to the new tool in Merchant Center, we have also added a
new shipping attribute to assign a shipping label to specific products. You can configure shipping rates based on this label. For example, you could apply a label like “perishable” or “bulky” to a group of products requiring special shipping rates or a label specific for promotional items. After adding this attribute to a group of items, you may manage or configure the custom rate in shipping settings in Merchant Center.
We’ve migrated your current shipping settings to this new tool. They do not require any update. We encourage you to check out the new features to review whether they can help you simplify or improve your shipping rate configuration on Google Shopping. Both current and newly created shipping methods will be subject to review with our
existing shipping policy.
Join us for a Hangout on Air on September 16th as we walk through the tool and cover best practices for setting up shipping rates in Merchant Center.
Sign up for the event.
Posted by Angelika Rohrer and Sven Herschel, Google Shopping Team.
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