(Content edited in January 2025)

Smart Shopping was introduced by Google in 2018 signifying another step towards automated and machine-learning focused advertising. Tested and developed under the universal shopping beta banner, this new feature made its debut in Google’s goal-optimised portfolio on 8^th May 2018.

So, how does Smart Shopping differ from its hugely successful predecessor, Google Shopping? And is it right for your digital advertising objectives? Conversion Science has garnered some insights over the past couple of months and before you pause all your regular Shopping campaigns and embrace Smart Shopping 100%, we suggest that you weigh up the pros, cons and limitations pretty carefully.

A brief overview of smart shopping…

This feature combines the visual attractiveness of Google Shopping with the dynamic flexibility of responsive remarketing in a campaign. Google claims that your ads will reach a wider audience across the Search Network, Display Network, YouTube, and even Gmail.  A number of appropriate ad variants are produced by combining your existing product feed and assets with machine learning. The strategy, which includes automatic bidding, ad placement, and continual testing of text and image combinations, is designed to offer you with the highest potential conversion value for any given budget.

Smart shopping has many pros…

If you’ve ever had to specify campaign priorities, product groups, bids, and negative keywords in a standard shopping campaign, you’ll understand why this new low-maintenance, self-driving campaign subtype is so appealing. Smaller businesses with restricted resources can now qualify for unparalleled reach and maximised conversion technologies through automated bidding.

It’s a great tool for vendors to reach upper funnel users. During this stage of intent, brands are explored, discovered, and introduced. Google Smart Shopping allows you to group products together and expose them to users, as well as showcase a catalogue of related items. These showcase ads will appear for broader/generic phrases such as “T-Shirt” and are an effective format to use when attempting to influence brand consideration higher up in the conversion funnel. With maximum CPE (Cost Per Engagement) bidding, you are only charged when someone expands your ad, spends 10 seconds with it, or clicks on a product or link. The first click on your advertisement is basically free. Ideal for start-up businesses!

Plus, Smart Shopping is simple to use!

Simply set your campaign budget. Set a target. Allow Google automation and machine learning to handle the rest for you.

There are a few requirements before you get started:

• You must have a Google Ads and Merchant Centre Account
• Your product feed should be uploaded and approved on your Merchant Centre Account
• You must be tracking transaction specific conversion values (allowing the algorithm to optimise towards return on ad spend)
• Ensure that you have a remarketing global site tag on your website
• A minimum of 20 conversions in a period of 45 days across existing shopping campaigns is required
• You must have an audience list comprising more than 100 users

And, finally, adhere to the Google personalised advertising policy. 

Right, sounds easy enough. So, what’s the catch?

Well, as with any Smart type tools, there are a couple of drawbacks.

Expect to sacrifice some of the granular control that you have grown accustomed to – after all Smart Shopping is part of the bigger drive toward an automated (read labour-free) solution. The promise? You can sit back and focus on other high-level tasks. The caveat? You have to let Google do much of the driving.

• You can’t segment by placement to discover which networks are performing better, therefore you can’t tell whether your shopping component is outperforming your display component.
• Columns that are not available include search impression share, click share, search lost (budget), and search lost (rank).

Targeting restrictions are:

• No settings available for negative keyword control.
• Location targeting is limited to country of sale but region or even city exclusion cannot be specified.
• The Ad schedule feature is not available.
• One cannot target specific devices.
• You do not have control over the target audience.

Moreover:

• Shared budgets are not available.
• To date, Smart shopping campaigns are not supported by Google AdWords Editor.

Keep in mind that any machine learning requires time to optimise. Allow a new campaign to run for at least 15 days before you assess its performance. Furthermore, the bidding strategy needs time to settle and adapt. Accrue enough data to ensure that your reports are meaningful. Google suggests 2-3 weeks of data.

Remember to focus on conversion value and not on clicks. As the bid strategy allocates budget towards clicks that maximise conversion value, you may see an initial decline in click volumes.

Note that it is crucial that conversion delays are adjusted for in any data analysis.

In conclusion…

Smart Campaigns would appear to be a bit of a mixed blessing.

On the upside, you’re handing over control.

In the smart world of automation, time-consuming and laborious tasks typical of managing a full-sized Google Shopping Campaign are a thing of the past. Smart Shopping frees you up to undertake the strategic stuff.

On the downside? You’re handing over control.

As an account manager, you will probably miss those tweaks like prioritising certain products within a single campaign or those cost-mitigating tricks of the trade like preventing your ads from showing up in tandem with low-intent queries.

With Smart Campaigns you lose the ability to fine tune aspects which would have previously given a campaign the competitive edge.

It’s early days yet but let’s face it, ultimately, Google automation and machine learning in any form challenges the micro manager in every one of us!