All You Need to Know about Google Shopping Reviews

May 5, 2021

Google is the number two stop for searches about products (after Amazon). It offers free tools to ensure shoppers know your customer satisfaction right away.

It is easy to get started with Google Shopping reviews, but many businesses still do not use them. Take this advantage and learn how you can leverage reviews to drive more traffic to your ads and increase sales in this article.

Table of Contents

What are Google Shopping Reviews?

Google shopping reviews (also known as Google Shopping ratings) are divided into two categories: product rating and seller rating. Both programs aggregate customer feedback and star ratings for you.

Example of Google Shopping review placements

The star rating is shown on Google Shopping listings, Google text ads (for seller ratings), and Google Shopping Ads (for product ratings).

How Google Shopping Reviews Can Benefit Your Business?

Over and over, data shows a strong relationship between positive reviews and sales. 94% of online purchases are products with an average four- to five-star rating. Although, most shoppers seem to trust products with an under-average five-star rating.

The two factors that seem to matter most to shoppers are the quantity and quality of reviews.

Since Google Shopping shows many products from different sellers, reviews have an even more impact. Positive product ratings make both your product listing and promotion stand out from the competition.

Also, the impact of this attention is crucial for advertising with Google Shopping.

3 Google Shopping Rating Programs You Should Start Using

Google Product Rating

Product ratings show the product's starred reviews on both the Google Shopping comparison shopping engine and the Google Shopping Ads.

In both cases, Google displays the number and average star rating for the product. These ratings are taken from three central sources: your website, third-party review aggregators, and Google Customer Reviews (more on this later).

  • You need to add reviews from your website to the Google Shopping product feed to show product ratings. All you need to do is create a review feed in Google Product Review Feed.
  • Google syncs with many popular review aggregators, making it much easier to update your product ratings on Google Shopping. In such case, you can use Ryviu. This  review platform helps you create a featured review page and display your reviews attractively on your shop page, and show online ratings and reviews on Google.

Also, if you sell a product that other sellers also sell, your product ratings will appear alongside those sellers. Google populates reviews based on globally unique product identifiers found in your product feed, such as an ISBN for a book.

Google Seller Rating

While product ratings focus on the quality of an item, Google store reviews refer to the overall customer experience with your business, such as:

  • The purchasing process
  • Shipping/delivery speed
  • Product quality
  • Customer support,
  • Etc.

Google Shopping seller ratings do not appear in product ads but appear in two other main places: Google Shopping seller comparisons and text ads.

  • Google text ads have a seller rating ad extension that you can easily pop in with a few clicks. Buyers will see a star rating for your store, on-time delivery details, and the number of reviews on these ads.
Google Seller Rating displayed on a text ad
  • Google Shopping product listing includes seller rating in the "price comparison from # store" section. Suppose you are unable to offer the lowest price for a product. In that case, the positive feedbacks provide a much-needed competitive advantage.
Seller ratings on Google Shopping product listings

To be eligible to show these ratings, you will need at least 100 seller reviews in the past 12 months. This condition ensures that the Google Seller Reviews provide an actual picture of the seller.

Google Shopping Customer Reviews

This free service will prompt customers automatically to review their experience with you after your product has been delivered.

After confirming the delivery, Google will email the customer and ask to rate their experience with your business.

What Are Google Customer Reviews?

Customers who click on this email can choose to give a star rating only or add a comment about their experience with your business.

You can also customize the review requests to solicit product-specific feedbacks.

Google will then analyze the reviews and automatically add them to your Google merchant ratings and/or product ratings.

Google's trust and recognition add weight to review requests, and the simplicity of the response process is hard to beat.

There is no doubt that Google Shopping Customer Reviews are a free and easy way to add more value to your business.

To get started, opt into this program in your Merchant Center account. It is under the Growth tab.

How to set up Google Customer Reviews for your small business

3 Ways to Have Better Google Shopping Ratings

Ask Customers for Reviews

Customers who have had bad experiences with your company are more likely to leave reviews than customers with good experiences. Happy customers tend to just continue their lives.

To avoid an unfair rate of negative and positive reviews, you need to seek feedback from all of your customers. The best way to do this is by sending an email after the products have been delivered.

It is best to use personal, conversational, and branded messaging. With Ryviu, you can easily create request review emails that match all of these factors. Plus, it will send an email automatically after a customer has received your products.

Respond to All of Your Product Reviews

The reason for this is quite simple. When you respond to reviews, you show both shoppers and customers that you care about their experiences.

Responding quickly, attentively to negative feedback gives you the chance to do the right thing for the client in question and show prospects that you are committed to the quality of your services.

How to Respond to Google My Business Reviews (with Examples) | LOCALiQ

In some cases, customers will change their reviews after receiving feedback from the seller.

However, do not just respond to people with problems. Every shopper wants to see a company interact with its customers.

How to Respond to Positive & Negative Google Reviews | Widewail

Responding to positive reviews shows shoppers the human side of your business. It also helps establish confidence in you as a seller.

Focus on Providing Outstanding Customer Service

Ultimately, the quality of your Google Shopping Reviews depends on the quality of your products and services.

Therefore, when you increase your Google store ratings and Google Shopping product reviews, do not forget what is most important.

Final words

It takes time to build up a large number of positive reviews. However, this effort will deliver a long-term advantage for your business.

So remember to test ways to encourage reviews (in guidelines of Google Shopping Reviews) and interact with customers' reviews.

And if you take customers' feedback into account, you will find many ways to improve your products and encourage even more positive reviews.

Alice Pham

Writer and Blogger about Technology and Marketing. I also share my knowledge of Shopify, WordPress, and WooCommerce. Contact me via email: thuyphuong082@gmail.com or alicepham8295@gmail.com

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