‘Buy on Google‘: Google Makes Commission Fees Free For Retailers

Recently, Google has decided to permanently waive the commission fees on items sold via the ‘Buy on Google’ checkout option. 

In aid to help businesses reach more consumers and help people find the best products, prices and places to buy online, Google is making several significant changes over the past few months. They had made it free for retailers to list products on Google shopping in the U.S and free listings on Google Search too. Waiving the commission fees for ‘Buy on Google’ is another latest step taken by Google. 

Buy on Google

 

‘Buy on Google’ is a payment option that lets customers place orders from participating stores directly on Google.com or through voice via Assistant. One of the greatest advantages of ‘Buy on Google’ over other payment options is its streamlined buying process. It allows customers to buy products without leaving Google search results. When a customer clicks on shopping listings in search results, the option to purchase products directly on Google is made available to them.

Seen in free listings and shopping ads, eligible products for ‘Buy on Google’ feature a blue “Add to cart” button with an accompanying shopping cart icon in the four Google colors.

0% Commission Free Now for ‘Buy on Google’

Google has always charged a commission fee for sales made through its platform- like any other online payment providers. But to make it easier for retailers to sell on Google, the search giant company is now charging zero commission fees when customers make purchases via ‘Buy on Google’ option. That is, retailers who participate in the ‘Buy on Google’ checkout option will no longer have to pay Google a commission fee.

Even though marketers have several options for driving traffic to their website with free listings or with Shopping ads, many also use ‘Buy on Google’ to give shoppers a convenient way to buy something right away when they see it. With the company’s announcement, ‘Buy on Google’ not only became a convenient option for customers, it has also become one of the most affordable ways for businesses to sell products online.

Merits and Demerits of this Feature

In exchange for zero commissions, both Google and Retailers can reap benefits. That is,

1. With zero commission, it helps to keep a user in Google search results for long. If someone stays longer inside the Google Search page, the more money Google can make by serving ads and collecting data.

2. Similarly, retailers can also earn more revenue from Google sales as a result of zero commission fees.

But on the other hand, whenever a customer makes a sale directly from Google, they will not visit the retailer’s website, which in turn can be bad for them. Because retailers will miss out on valuable lead generation opportunities that are unique to on-site sales pages such as memberships or mailing lists, which are key for customer loyalty.

So before getting persuaded on zero commission, businesses – be it small or large- need to consider this point very carefully. 

How to Migrate Your Account to 0% Commission

Google says that if a retailer’s store is already live on the platform, then they will be invited to migrate their account to the new version with 0% commission over the next few weeks. And if a retailer is new to selling on Google through Shopping Actions, then they will be invited to onboard directly to this new 0% commission version of the program. 

To know more, check out Google Merchant Center Help.

Few Other Updates On Google Shopping

In addition to Commission-Free Sales, Google is also effectively shaking up the e-commerce world in a number of distinct ways, such as 

1. Giving retailers the ability to choose their preferred services: Considering many retailers wish for having the ability to choose their preferred services for payment processing, inventory, and order management, Google is opening their platform to more commerce providers starting with PayPal and Shopify.

Google uses Shopify for inventory and order management and PayPal and Shopify for payment processing. This helps retailers who want to sell directly on Google, to get started even faster and continue using the tools and services that already work for their business. It also helps retailers who are new in selling online to choose from multiple options when they sign up in Google’s Merchant Center.

2. Enabling commonly-used product feed formats: With this, retailers can connect their inventory without having to reformat their data.

3. New option to add product information:  It will let retailers add product information- like images or technical specs – by pulling from Google’s existing database.

4. Planning to add a new small business filter: Google has witnessed a significant increase in demand to buy from and support small businesses. So to help people discover these smaller retailers, Google plans to add a new small business filter on the Google Shopping tab. 

All these features will be rolled out first in the US, with international launches expected later this year and in 2021.