How Google is Partnering with Shopify to Expand Online Shopping Experience
In May 2021, Google announced its plans for partnering with Shopify. This collaboration will allow the e-commerce platform's 1.75 million merchants to reach customers through the search giant's tools.
The straightforward integration will help online retailers demonstrate their products on Google Maps, Search, Shopping, Image Search, and YouTube. The new partnership benefits both the merchants and the search engine, which has been trying for a long time to become more than a research destination for consumers.
How Google is Turning toward E-Commerce
For many years, Google has been searching for options to become a demanded marketplace for shoppers. Many consumers go to Google and YouTube to research products but end up buying them somewhere else like Amazon.
When the pandemic struck, and e-commerce took a huge leap forward, Google seized the moment and brought free listings to the Shopping search results in order to compete against Amazon. A few months later, Buy on Google went commission-free.
After eliminating fees, Google noticed a 70% increase in the product catalogue size and an 80% increase in merchants.
These changes helped the search giant achieve its goal of becoming a highly accessible marketplace and outdoing some of the competition.
The Shopify integration is the next step toward turning Google into a powerful shopping resource.
Shopify and Other Platforms
While Google is trying to achieve its goals of becoming a preferred marketplace for consumers, Shopify isn't playing favourites. Besides Google, it's integrated with other platforms like Facebook and TikTok.
For the past year, it has been collaborating with Walmart Online Marketplace, making it accessible to Shopify merchants. Just like Google, Walmart is using this partnership to outdo Amazon.
Over the past years, Shopify has been turning into a major player in the e-commerce sector. According to The Wall Street Journal, the majority of Shopify's merchants are first-time entrepreneurs. In 2020, thanks to the pandemic, sales grew by over 90%.
Overall, Shopify's effort to expand and help anyone become an entrepreneur is backed by the recent partnership with Google. However, the company is always open to new collaboration opportunities.
Google's Shopping Graph
Shopify merchants can now reap the impressive benefits of Shopify's partnership with Google thanks to the new functionality called Shopping Graph.
This AI-powered model can show consumers relevant product listings and information based on their searching and shopping experience. According to Google, the Shopping Graph plans to connect consumers with over 24 billion listings from a variety of merchants across the web.
By partnering with Shopify, Google links merchants' listings to this graph, allowing consumers to enjoy a more immersive shopping experience. Meanwhile, retailers will benefit from a tremendous exposure to billions of Google users.
Other Features
To make the offer even more appealing to both Shopify merchants and consumers, Google introduced several more features including:
Chrome additions — browser now has the functionality to help consumers track their shopping carts. Whenever users stop shopping because they are distracted by other websites, they can always come back and continue shopping where they left off.
Lens — the feature allows consumers to use a screenshot of an item to search for it on the web. This is extremely useful for consumers who make screenshots with the goal of buying something later but then forget where they've seen the product. When a user views a screenshot with Google Photos, the program will suggest searching the photo with Lens.
While these new features improve user experience, they help merchants drive sales through without incurring extra expenses.
Benefits of Google-Shopify Partnership for E-Commerce Players
Even if it means helping the search giant achieve its competitive goals, Google integration comes with a variety of benefits for Shopify merchants. The partnership offers SMBs that use Shopify:
An easier way to showcase their products on Google Shopping and take advantage of the free listing service.
An opportunity to enjoy Shop Pay's extension to Google. The faster and simpler checkouts create a better buying experience for consumers, thus decreasing the percentage of abandoned carts.
An option to appear on Google's Maps, Lens, and image search thanks to Google's Shopping Graph.
The benefits of the new partnership for merchants are overwhelming. They don't need to make an extra effort to demonstrate their products to consumers that search for them on Google. With just a few clicks, retailers' products become a part of Google's Shopping Graph effort.
Merchants who try to avoid selling on Amazon due to its complex partnership terms will definitely benefit from the new collaboration. It's basically a free gift for Shopify users to help them:
Reach a larger audience — with Shopping Graph at work, consumers will gain access to more relevant products from Shopify merchants, thus bringing sales up.
Improve user experience — consumers can enjoy a better experience by checking out relevant listings without extensive research.
Explore new opportunities — in its race to keep searchers from leaving Google for their shopping needs, the search giant is constantly coming up with new and useful features that benefit both merchants and consumers.
Better visibility — since Shopify merchants will be listed on Google Maps, they will become more visible to local shoppers, thus driving traffic to their brick-and-mortar stores and improving their e-commerce marketing strategy.
Shopify and Google make it easy for merchants to send their products and related information to Google. Synchronization requires only a few clicks.
Taking Advantage of New Opportunities
The Shopify-Google partnership is beneficial for both giants. It allows them to take new steps toward outrunning the competition while improving the experience for merchants and consumers.
A simple integration makes it easy for merchants to showcase their products to Google users. Meanwhile, consumers gain access to useful shopping tools that simplify their shopping process.
At This Side Up, we monitor the latest updates in the e-commerce realm in order to take full advantage of them when designing marketing campaigns. If you'd like to learn more about the Shopify-Google partnership and how it can benefit your e-commerce business, we’re here to help.