Google Shopping & feed optimisation
for UK e-commerce
In Search you bid on keywords. In Shopping and Performance Max you don't - the feed is your targeting. Product titles, attributes, structure and price are what decide which queries you show for and what you pay to be there. Most accounts treat the feed as a plumbing job and leave the single biggest lever untouched.
This is the hub for getting the feed right - structured for profit, not just approved by Merchant Centre. Start with the checklist, work through the deep dives, and book a call if you want a second pair of eyes on yours.
The short answer
Shopping feed optimisation is the practice of structuring your product data so Google shows your products for the right queries - at a price that protects your margin.
Because Shopping and Performance Max have no keywords, the feed does the targeting. When I optimise it means more than passing Merchant Centre checks: it's writing product titles around how people actually search, filling every relevant attribute (GTIN, brand, product type, colour, size), fixing price competitiveness issues, and segmenting products with custom labels so you can bid by margin, not just by category.
A clean feed isn't the goal - a profitable one is. The accounts that partner with me and win in Shopping and Performance Max are the ones where the feed is built to segment and achieve different objectives with specific SKUs - contribution margin, new season stock, warehouse clearances, gateway products.
Optimising the feed, piece by piece
Supporting guidesThe 5 Shopping feed mistakes in 9 of 10 accounts
The errors I find in almost every account I audit - from lazy titles to missing identifiers - and the order to fix them in. Start here before anything clever.
Shopping price comparison: are you losing on price?
Google quietly factors competitor pricing into who it shows and what they pay. How to read the price competitiveness report and decide where it's worth matching - and where it isn't.
Custom labels: how to actually use them
Everyone says use custom labels - few explain how. Tagging products by margin, bestseller status and stock so you can steer budget by profit instead of lumping the catalogue together.
Performance Max: how to take control
PMax hands more to the algorithm, which makes the feed one of the few levers left. How to structure and label it so PMax chases profitable products rather than easy, low-margin sales.
Supplemental feeds: the free way to fix your feed
How to overwrite your Shopping feed data through Merchant Center without touching the raw feed - and without paying for a feed management tool to do it.
CSS partners: why every UK advertiser needs one
Google quietly keeps 20p of every pound bid through its own Shopping service. What a CSS partner actually is, and why switching is close to free money once you're spending seriously.
Free tool
The Google Shopping Feed Checklist
Every check that matters - titles, attributes, GTINs, price competitiveness and custom labels - in the order I'd work through them on a new account. Run your feed against it before you touch a single bid.
Free tool
Merchant Centre Error Health Checklist
Six errors. The bulk of every disapproval. These are the issues quietly excluding products from the auction before a single bid is placed. Tick what is clean, flag what is broken, and close the leaks costing you Shopping reach.
Common questions
Shopping feed optimisation, answered
Shopping and Performance Max have no keywords - Google decides which queries to show you for based on your product data. Your titles, attributes and feed structure are the targeting. Bids and budgets only steer what the feed has already made you eligible for.
One written for how people search, not how your store exports. Front-load the attributes that matter for the product - brand, type, key spec, size or colour - within the first 70 characters, and drop the marketing fluff. The title is the single highest-leverage field in the whole feed.
Yes. Missing GTINs and sparse attributes limit which queries you're eligible for and weaken Google's understanding of the product. Full, accurate attributes (GTIN, brand, product type, colour, size, material) widen your reach and improve match quality - it's free performance most accounts leave on the table.
Segmentation. Custom labels let you tag products by anything Google doesn't natively know - margin band, bestseller status, season, stock level - so you can structure campaigns and steer budget by profitability rather than lumping everything together. They're how you make Shopping profit-first.
Google knows what competitors charge for the same product and quietly factors it in. If you're priced well above the benchmark, you'll get fewer impressions and pay more for them.
More than ever. PMax hands even more control to the algorithm, so the feed is one of the few levers you keep. A well-structured, well-labelled feed is how you guide PMax toward profitable products instead of letting it chase easy, low-margin sales.
Work with Kiezo Growth
Most new clients start with an audit - the lowest-risk way to see exactly how your account is performing against your P&L before committing to anything ongoing.
Audit
Account & Feed Audit
One-off · From £2,500
- Find exactly where your account is leaking profit vs. just showing poor platform metrics
- SKU-level analysis - which products drive real margin vs. burning budget
- Full GMC feed review: attribute coverage, alignment to search behaviour, tailored for business needs
- Delivered with prioritised fixes, not a long list of observations
- No obligation to continue - you own the audit
Account Management
Ongoing Account Management
Monthly retainer · From £3K · 3-month initial term, then rolling
- Audit included
- Senior specialist managing your account - not passed off to a junior focusing on ROAS
- Contribution margin and NCAC as the actual north stars, tied to your P&L
- Flat fee means I'm incentivised to grow your profit, not your spend
- Daily Slack comms. Weekly performance updates. QBRs in person if requested.
- You always own the account and the data.
All services are flat fee. No percentage of ad spend. No markup on budget. No kickbacks off growing your spend. That's not a policy - it's a structural commitment to alignment.