Save up to 45% on your Google Shopping budget
The last few weeks have been very eventful in the Search market in Europe. Following a major move by Google regarding the integration of Comparison Shopping Services (CSS), new opportunities have opened up for advertisers, allowing them to achieve significant savings. Analysis and opportunities…
Context
In June 2017, the European Commission ordered Google to pay a fine of €2.4 billion for giving preferential – and deemed unfair – placement to its Google Shopping product within its search engine.
Following this ruling, Google was forced to open up to competition the placements allocated to Google Shopping on its search engine results pages.
This opening has been effective since the beginning of 2018: in addition to merchant offers proposed by Google Shopping, the Google search engine now also displays offers proposed by other CSS providers:
In order to create fairer competition under this new configuration,
- Google Shopping has become a fully independent legal entity in Europe, with an obligation to be profitable. Therefore, when you purchase a €1 click via Google Ads (formerly Adwords), €0.20 is retained by the Google Shopping company, while €0.80 is allocated to the Google Ads auction itself.
- Third-party CSS providers are free to apply the margin they choose. On a €1 click purchase, you do not know how much has actually been allocated to the Google Ads auction.
To stimulate the market, Google has also offered CSS providers the opportunity to benefit from a “free advertising credit” of up to 30% of their investments (capped at €32k per month and per merchant website).
During the latest discussions between the European Commission and Google in March 2018, the Commission nevertheless considered Google’s efforts insufficient and instructed the company to rapidly increase the CSS share of voice.
Since this summer, Google has therefore been opening its CSS integration program to new players, encouraging the emergence of innovative purchasing channels for your Shopping campaigns.
In practice
July 2018: Feed Manager (Labelium Group) launches its own price comparison service and obtains Google CSS Partner Premium certification.
Breaking with existing models, Feed Manager chooses to pass on all CSS benefits to its Clients:
- Shopping click purchases at -20% (compared with a traditional purchase via Google Ads),
- Collection of the Google “advertising credit”, paid directly into your Google Ads account (up to 30% of investments, capped at €32k / month per merchant website).
The Client only pays reduced technical fees for access to the Feed Price platform, giving them access to the purchasing channel reserved by Google for CSS providers.
Once the configuration is complete, the Client or their Agency can transparently resume managing their Shopping campaigns in Google Ads as before… while paying less for the same thing!
How do I launch my campaigns?
We have already integrated more than 100 merchants into our CSS across Europe and would be delighted to discuss your integration with you.
To launch your campaigns via our CSS Feed Price, go to this form or contact us at +33 5 32 09 06 13.
