Google updates Search Console with new merchant reports
3 mins read

Google updates Search Console with new merchant reports

Google announced an update to the Search Console that gives retailers the ability to accurately measure the search performance of their product listings and product snippets.

The Search Console has two new ways to see the SEO impact in the SERPs by providing impression and click data from the two different search appearances.

Google Search Console search appearance reportScreenshot from Google, adapted to the website by the author

The official Google Search Central Twitter account tweeted:

“Today we’re adding the ability to measure the impact of the merchant listing by splitting the look and feel of the product result search into two parts:

Dealer listings and product excerpts.

Based on these appearances, you can see how many impressions and clicks you get from these experiences.

The new search views for merchant listings and product snippets can be viewed in two places in Search Console:

  • Merchant listings and product snippets reports as an overlay on the report charts
  • Performance report on the Search Appearance tab or via a filter”
Screenshot of the Dealer Locator Appearance ReportScreenshot from Google, adapted to the website by the author

Extended permission product snippets search appearances

The Product Snippets search appearances is a feature made available to all merchants using Product Structured Data markup on their websites without having to submit a product feed.

In September 2022, Google announced expanded permissions for improved product experiences in search.

The September 2022 announcement stated:

“For some time now, Google has offered shoppers rich product experiences in search results. To make these experiences more accessible for website owners, Google has extended permission for websites that implement structured data. There are two broad categories of experiences for website owners:

Experiences with merchant listings for websites that allow buyers to purchase a product on the website.
Product snippets for a broader range of product information websites (including sites that sell products, post product reviews, and/or aggregate information from other websites).”

The update announced today means that merchants will now be able to track the impact of both of these types of merchant locator experiences.

I asked Adam J. Humphreys, founder of Founder at Making 8 Digital Marketing Consulting, what he thought of the improvements to Search Console.

Adam was happy with the changes.

He commented:

“The ability to show product results in the search view report with clicks/impressions helps businesses understand where they stand and where they can improve.

I would like to see the average ranking so owners know where their product is and for which searches it was seen the most.

Product snippets are nice because they show formatting issues.

Think of ecommerce like schema markup where you have tons of fields like GTIN etc.

Google uses these search filters to sort merchant products.

This encourages business owners and developers to improve their often unoccupied fields.

Unfortunately, unfilled fields are a problem even for some of the biggest brands.”

Traders are encouraged to log into Search Console and explore the new reports.

Featured image from Shutterstock/NaMong Productions