Screaming Frog – what is it?

Screaming Frog is nothing more than an advanced crawler that scans websites for a comprehensive analysis of their structures and elements affecting on-site SEO. The tool facilitates the work of auditors because it detects numerous irregularities in connection with meta tags, duplicate content, headers (H1-H6), 404 errors or even incorrectly implemented redirects.

Free version of Screaming Frog
The free version of Screaming Frog allows you to e.g. generating XML sitemaps, analyzing 500 random URLs from a selected website, as well as visualizing specific domains.

The paid version of Screaming Frog
The paid version of Screaming Frog offers much more and costs around $ 150 a year. At this price, we can, among others analyze any number of URLs, render JavaScript, integrate the tool with Google Analytics / Google Search Console, and even check spelling and grammar on the page.

Screaming Frog – how to use?

To start working with Screaming Frog, enter any URL that you want to be scanned by robots (Mode -> Spider / Mode -> List). Then, it is worth learning how to use the basic functionalities of this tool to facilitate the collection of information on the subject of the website, which are presented below.

Title tag and meta description, H1 / H2 headers
The tool provides us with information about duplicate or missing parameters, possibly not matching the Google guidelines. We can analyze this type of data by entering the target URL. In the SERP Snippet tab, we will check how individual tags are displayed in the search engine.

Verifying broken or redirected sites
This functionality is especially appreciated by Paraphrase-Online.com on-site specialists. Well, it allows you to find all broken pages within the site. That’s not all, because if we click a specific address – we will verify where the links to pages returning the 404 code came from.

Checking the loading time of domains
The third, very useful option of Screaming Frog is checking the loading time of domains. Just go to the Internal tab, then HTML, and then click “Response Time”. Then we will be able to sort the data based on the loading time and of course compare it with the GA (Google Analytics) report on the bounce rate.

Remember!
Pages that load much slower tend to have a higher bounce rate than sites that load faster.

Information on internal links that lead to specific pages
An important point for every SEO specialist specializing in link building. Well, thanks to the Screaming Frog tool, we will verify each URL address based on internal links leading to it, as well as text anchors. Just select the “Inlinks” tab at the bottom of the program to find out, among other things, what pages are the links coming from, are they dofollow / nofollow links and what anchor texts have been redirected to the site.

Additional “Tree” view facilitating the analysis of the website structure
ccording to Paraphrase-Online experts, the analysis of the website structure, using the additional “Tree” view, is very useful because it allows you to verify what the URL of each subpage looks like. Thanks to this, we will be able to eliminate incorrect navigation elements and implement the necessary structural changes.

Checking the correctness of the implementation of Google Analytics and Google Search Console
Screaming Frog also allows you to verify the implementation of GSC and GA tags on each of the subpages of the selected website. It is also worth knowing that the columns available in the program can be rotated and placed in the correct order. As we mentioned before, all information can be easily exported to Excel.

Create an XML Map
The functionalities of Screaming Frog allow you to instantly create a graphic sitemap and XML sitemap. If we want additional configuration – we will determine the frequency of visits to the site by the robot, which will be based on the place in the domain structure of a specific subpage.

Remember!
We can open the sitemap in Excel. This is very useful because we will verify that the specific addresses do not contain duplicate parameters. That’s not all, because for key URL links we can set the most important guidelines manually (e.g. frequency of changes, priority, and other values). After you finish working with the sitemap, save the file as XML.

It is also worth mentioning the possibility of verifying information in the context of website graphics (eg images exceeding 100 Kb, with a missing “alt” attribute or exceeding 100 characters). Screaming Frog SEO spider also allows you to check the correctness of URLs and list errors, e.g. URLs exceeding 115 characters, including underscores or uppercase letters.

How to speed up the analysis in Screaming Frog?

To speed up the analysis in Screaming Frog, you should divide your work into stages – then we will be able to initially verify selected information about a given website, and then use the additional functions of this tool. First of all, we recommend paying special attention to, among others:

– page size,
– the number of dofollow and nofollow links,
– number of internal and outbound links,
– page description (meta description),
– page title (meta title),
– keywords,
– status (there is 200 or 404), – page encoding (UTF),
– domain address.

After a thorough analysis of the above factors, let’s check the side functions of the program, that is: all internal and external links, meta robots, duplicate domains, etc. Below are the other Screaming Frog options:

– page depth level,
– file size,
– inlinks,
– outlinks,
– XML Sitemap Generator,
– pictures,
– cannonical,
– 301 or 302 redirects,
– User-Agent Switcher,
– flaws with urls,
– Anchor text.

It is also worth mentioning the possibility of analyzing file sizes, errors (e.g. 4xx, 5xx), headers, as well as problems with URLs, which include, for example, underlines, capital letters or even the lack of ASCII characters.

We can significantly speed up the work in Screaming Frog by performing actions in the right order, taking into account individual assumptions specified in the initial SEO strategy. If we want a comprehensive on-site website optimization – this tool will turn out to be perfect, however, we have to buy the premium version, because the free version is too limited to perform a meticulous domain analysis.

How to crawl problematic sites with Screaming Frog?

Crawling problematic sites doesn’t have to be difficult. All you have to do is go to the “Advanced” tab, and then change the settings of several important options, including “Always follow redirects”, “response timeout” as well as “max redirects to follow”.

Always follow redirects
After selecting this option, Screaming Frog will pay attention to 3XX redirect directives, and what’s more – he will ignore the so-called crawl depth. The above functionality is very useful when we intend to strongly change the structure of the website or migrate to other URLs.

Remember!
Thanks to the “always follow redirects” option, we will verify multiple redirects and the redirect loop much more accurately than in the default settings. This is because SF often does not identify all “deep redirects”.

If, however, we want to check incorrect redirections within the website – we recommend downloading the “Redirect Chains” report from the Reports tab. We will then check the URLs redirected more than twice (single redirects are not visible here).

Response timeout
In the event that we have a free domain, but we want to obtain as much relevant data as possible about it, we should increase the waiting time by Screaming Frog for an HTTP response. We recommend that you change the value beyond the default of 20 seconds.

Max redirects to follow
An interesting option that allows you to direct Screaming Frog robots to determine the length of the redirect path that they are to present in the summary. As a standard, crawlers follow 5 consecutive redirections.

This tab offers one more additional function – extracting images with the srcset attribute. The use of this option is very useful when we want to place the same image in different resolutions – for example in responsive websites.

Summary

Screaming Frog, developed in 2010 (founder: Dan Sharp), is used all over the world by the vast majority of SEO specialists. It has many useful functions, and its main operation is based on reliable scanning of websites, so that you can later verify their dysfunctions and effectively fix them. At Paraphrase-Online, we use Screaming Frog primarily to improve on-site SEO audits and we believe that in this aspect it is an absolute leader!

FAQ

Here are the answers to the most frequently asked questions about Screaming Frog SEO spider!

When is it worth analyzing the website?
The analysis of the website is very useful when we see that it is not working properly, its position does not increase according to the assumptions made, and the traffic from SERPs has definitely decreased. It is then worth verifying meta tags, headers, internal and external links, as well as other on-site factors available in Screaming Frog, which may be a potential cause of irregularities.

What is the price of Screaming Frog?
Screaming Frog is priced at $ 149 annually. The premium version is free, but it has many limitations (e.g. no possibility of integration with Google Search Console and Google Analytics).

Even a hundred years ago, there were many white spots on the maps of the world. Territories of which only stories circulated – and always second-hand – tempted and enticed. Riches surrounded by nimbus, filled with dangerous “savages” and adventures. Everyone dreamed about getting it – ranging from the mythical Marco Polo to Joseph Conrad, who floated up the Congo River, who later explained to us in the Heart of Darkness the pernicious influence of the original on the human psyche.

It is our nature to develop new areas. New always means progress. And who dares first, has the chance to gain fame, wealth or recognition.

Influencer marketing is still unknown in the area of advertising. Everyone has heard of fabulous collaboration between the brand and celebrity. How much income they bring to the latter, and how everyone over the age of perfumer wants to record movies, shoot focuses and make money from it.

Relax. The purpose of this text is to fill in white spots related to influencer marketing. When it makes sense, how does the brand carry it, what does model cooperation look like, how much does it cost and how to measure it?

What is influencer marketing?                     

The essence of influencer marketing is to use the influence of popular network users (influencers) on decisions made by other people. Repeatedly conducted research clearly shows that the recommendation and information received from the influencer are one of the most important sources of shopping impulse.

Influencers are people running blogs and vlogs, accounts on Instagram or other similar platforms – channels that are distinguished by high viewership. They are usually experts in a given field, sharing knowledge about specific products etc. Although they have a lot in common with the so-called brand ambassadors belong to the group of opinion leaders.

What distinguishes influencers from other network users – apart from the range, of course – is the relatively high trust of recipients. This is due to a simple fact: Internet users treat them as equals. At the same time, they are considered as completely objective persons whose purpose is to present the actual characteristics of a given product, and not to maximize their own profits.

It is worth emphasizing that influencers are not only celebrities. They are also “ordinary” people who – thanks to valuable content posted regularly – managed to build a large audience.

Influencer marketing is very popular – especially due to the results obtained. According to the Influencer Marketing Hub study, as many as 84% of marketers believe that influencer marketing activities are effective. However, for people who are just entering this advertising channel, many topics may be unclear.

Advantages of influencer marketing

The ability to precisely reach the target group
The effectiveness of marketing activities largely depends on reaching the right group of users. Influencers make it easier because their blogs or vlogs are watched by people interested in a specific topic in which your brand can at least indirectly target.

If the target group is women expecting a child or those who have recently welcomed a child in the world, it is easy to find them on a channel dedicated to parenting topics. If you want to reach photography enthusiasts, work with a photographic expert or someone who has created a fascinated community around your photos.

These are examples that arise in the first place and are effective strictly in terms of sales, but of course, cooperation can be much more sophisticated and focused on resonance in perception. I will use my favorite example – cooperation of a well-known car brand with a well-known novel author.

On the Internet, our writer can be successfully called an influencer. For many it is a navigational fear, it is read, heard and discussed. With his novels he opens new threads or even wounds. Still, it offers moderate views, but are strongly expressed. On his social media accounts he often expresses his fascination with motoring – mainly what emotions are behind driving a car. Is a representative of the intelligence and one of the new wave of writers. In a word – it is cultural, and at the same time it is “some”, and in the group of its fans there are (I shoot) 30-50 year olds from larger cities, with higher incomes than average.

And all this is neatly combined with a well-known car brand, automatically earning everything that our writer has built up over the years with his narrative among a group that partly overlaps with the brand’s target. This cooperation was mainly communicated on the Internet and there was a lot of controversy like “but how? writer and advertisement? he sold himself! ” To be honest, I would not be surprised if it turns out that these controversies were also generated by the known car brand, because thanks to this cooperation not only the fans of the brand and the author learned, but also the whole world. Well, we will probably never find out.

Potentially attractive cost of cooperation
Influencer marketing often turns out to be much cheaper than other reach forms of brand promotion. One specific amount cannot be indicated here, because everything is an individual matter. However, several factors determining the price can be mentioned. These include range, cooperation channel, scope of activities, industry. The influencer’s recognition is not without significance.

Usually, the settlement takes the form of a specific rate. Sometimes, however, influencers operate on the basis of affiliate programs or barter exchange. It all depends on the company’s internal policy and the influencer itself.

Greater punching force
The spread of the Internet has led to significant changes on the brand-consumer line. While many years ago all advertising messages were one-sided, a lot has changed in this respect. People want to know who is behind a given message, they want to interact, etc. Therefore, influencer marketing has much more clout and impact than traditional marketing messages. What’s more, product or service recommendations are often not associated by paying viewers as paid, but mere recommendations. Of course, customer awareness is getting better and they are becoming more and more sensitive to unnatural movements by influencers.

Influencer marketing and SEO
Influencer marketing is also worth considering because of the impact on SEO. Cooperation with influencers not only has a positive impact on the brand image and contributes to the promotion of products. A good strategy allows you to get much better positions in search results. Why?

Cooperation with influencers gives you the opportunity to get good quality links leading to e.g. an online store. They come out of blogs or other external websites that enjoy a high reputation and popularity among Internet users. influencer marketing – by the way, can support the positioning of your website or store.

Access to unique content
Influencers create high-quality content in which they present a specific product or brand. These actions are welcome from Google’s point of view, therefore access to unique texts may increase the position in search results and the reputation of the website itself.

The possibility of increasing website traffic
There are quite a lot of opinions about whether website traffic is one of the ranking elements. Either way, the influencer helps in getting traffic by recommending specific products and posting links to the site. Those interested will click and go to the brand page, etc.

Multi-channel
Influensers reach their recipients through various channels. Before starting cooperation, it is worth checking in which advertising environments they operate. Influencers have already learned that, of course – they can be known from one advertising channel, but they cannot afford to stay in that one channel only. Therefore, it is worth establishing cooperation with people who act in many ways.

Involvement
Influencers care about the quality of their content and other formats, taking active part in discussions, respond to comments and are able to defend the brand skillfully in case of crises.

It is worth remembering, however, that the above-mentioned advantages apply to model campaigns with experienced and quality-tested influencers. Each such type of cooperation requires in-depth attention and verification from various angles. The advantages of a given cooperation also depend on our goals, indicators or product matching. The methodology for selecting the appropriate influencers is explained in the relevant chapter.

Disadvantages of influencer marketing

No control over the influencer’s image
A problem that has more than once manifested itself with all its might. By linking a brand to a person, you have very limited influence on how you manage your next days, weeks or months of life. Unfortunately, influencers are also people – they have their weaknesses and passions, and sometimes they make mistakes that affect not only their image, but also the image of their business partners. The easiest way to illustrate this is with specific examples.

The latest – and at the same time the most spectacular example – is a celebrity. By creating her own brand, she wanted to associate it with her popularity. The brand was supposed to sew and offer high quality products.

Unfortunately, some fans and customers noticed that the shirts probably came from China and came out of the production line of the company that offers the same shirts (without prints), for a few or several dollars. Never mind the price, but the brand and the celebrity provided information misleading consumers.

Unfortunately – despite the vast experience in communicating with their fans – there was also no sign in managing this crisis. As reported by virtual media:

After disclosing this information, the website removed the information that the clothes were sewn on their own. The celebrity has blocked fans from commenting on all their Instagram accounts. The internet is full of comments criticizing the blogger. Disgruntled fans wrote that they felt cheated because the influencer was building the brand from the beginning on independent sewing and premium quality (clothes prices were also translated).

This example shows how brand dependence on influencer and influencer marketing itself can actually bury it. In addition, it is also worth noting that social media love charismatic personalities – in some sense borderline. The pressure to still be “some” means that even the most experienced influencer can simply swim.

Costs
In the case of small influencers, the costs of cooperation are usually time spent and shipping products or small fees.

However, cooperation with the largest influencers means considerable costs. This is not just because the influencer’s “gage” is large. Such cooperation only makes sense when it is long-term. If we already pay 100 or even 300 thousand dollars for a given cooperation, then it would be a shame not to consume the image in as many ways as possible. Thus, we also need to invest in a sensible photo session in a stylish antholog with a view, for example, on Facebook banners or in display or outdoor advertising. You should also record a few or a dozen or so video materials with a view to advertising on Youtube or Facebook, or even television (which powerfully pushes up costs). Therefore, if a given brand decides to enter into a long-term contract with a given influencer, then usually the said fee can constitute only between ⅓ and ⅕ the actual costs of preparing such a campaign. Remember that this is not only a financial investment, but also absorbing human resources within a given company. Your employees’ time also costs, as does pushing other projects to the side track.

That is why – as a rule – the largest combine with the largest. First, they want to strengthen their “brandies” with strong names that somehow correlate with the image they are building. Secondly, they can simply afford it capital. Thirdly – unfortunately – GREAT companies very rarely have everything counted from A to Z – as a result, they allow themselves to wide and reachable cooperation, which is not necessarily well targeted, but at the same time build universal recognition. Something for something.

Measurability of actions

Measurability is a relatively big problem in influencer marketing. And not because it is impossible to implement, but because many times influencer marketing specialists lack skills in analytical tools. This is a very underrated area among marketing professionals. They often leave analytics in the area of e-commerce and performance campaigns. Thus, they have a big problem showing the effectiveness of their actions.

That is why it is so important to understand at least the basic functions in Google Analytics that will prove or negate the effectiveness of some advertising channels. Tracking traffic inside your site will also help you find places where, for example, a surprisingly large outflow of users occurs. In general, even basic analytics can significantly improve not only our marketing messages, but also typically UX issues.

Regardless of whether the cooperation takes place on a blog, Instagram, Facebook, ticker course or anywhere else – make sure that once the given creator links to e.g. a product card, he uses the link you have defined. You can extend it with the name of a given campaign and a specific source. The best tool to do this for free is Campaign URL Builder from a good Google uncle.

By using this tool you will be sure that by analyzing a given campaign in Google Analytics you will not escape any user from a given link.

However, there are places with limited linking options. Then a certain analytical method is to add to the movie e.g. a rebate code, which will be communicated only on this channel. This is not a perfect method and many times marketers do not want to create a dozen or several dozen discount codes for one campaign. Nevertheless, better than nothing.

Why measure at all?

Example
John, known in the book industry under the nickname “cardboard”, is designed to boost sales of the new book. His greatest friend Tom once had a spectacular success selling 100 instances of the steam cleaner on Instagram. The said Tom suggested John this path and he was already beginning to rub his hands.

He sent 20 books to industry instagram accounts and blogs and then waited for results. After two weeks, he recorded a total of 200 book purchases. Because he did not carry out other advertising activities, he decided that this happened thanks to Tom’s divine intervention and advertising on Insta. Sounds logical.

But John was not tempted to give his creators a dedicated link and he doesn’t know what analytics is.

Meanwhile, in the headquarters of the publishing house that published the book, a newsletter was sent in the same period, which went to those interested in news. In the case of this book, it was linked to John’s store, of which he was completely unaware.

What’s more, the publishing house took care of the analytics of its mailing and knows that over 700 people found their way to John’s store, only from this link.

At the next opportunity, John will be convinced that this time it would be good to send books to the same influencers and after the fact he would wonder … why this time it did not work out. It didn’t work out, because it didn’t work out the first time, which it just doesn’t know about.

Aggregates or individual cooperation?

A few years ago, several agencies – aggregates – were created to group influencers under their wings. Some of them were founded by the creators themselves, who wanted to professionalize relations between the brand and creator on the one hand, and partly monopolize access to some reach accounts on the other, which would dictate rates.

Like everything, cooperation with an influencer agency has pros and cons. The organization of work is definitely a plus. You complete the brief, set goals, industry and budget. In return, you can get an estimate of the ranges, creators proposed for cooperation and even a strategy of action with the preferred message that correlates with the given message.

Agencies of this type have taught the brand that it is worth leaving creators a lot of freedom in their actions. They are the ones who know their community best and know what will resonate well among their fans. The problem of influencer marketing for a long time was the instrumental treatment of creators by brandy. They were given a rigid framework of cooperation to blend in with corporate standards. It was a mistake which, fortunately, is not often repeated nowadays.

However, the downside of the agency is that of course you have to pay extra for these services. Commissions depend on the budget and, of course, the higher the amounts, the smaller their percentage share. It is also often the case that, apart from a given agency, you cannot collaborate with a given creator. However, if you have a choice – which option should you choose?

It all depends on the goals – the wider the campaign, the more justified the decision to lead it through an agency that coordinates all emissions, messages and selects the right people for your project. Then your function will be reduced to the role of coordinator. It’s convenient, but also more expensive.

However, if you want to run a “more intimate” action – in terms of coverage or budget – then choose a more economical version, in which you leave everything – from signing the contracts to setting publication dates and their subsequent verification.

Terms of Cooperation
A separate category is what terms of cooperation both parties to a given agreement can agree to. The last thing you can afford is any understatements and areas for interpretation under a given contract.

When it comes to settling accounts with influencers, we usually come across two forms:
A. Barter – in exchange for sending products or using services, a given creator shares his opinion / review on a given topic. This is of course a favorable form of settlement for the brand from a financial point of view. Such accounts are usually interested in smaller influencers or medium-sized ones operating on topics priced by advertisers below. Repeatedly, cooperation for barter means less control over the message, form and content because it is not bound by a contract. This, of course, has its pros and cons. Such cooperation takes place much faster and is freer because you do not have to consult it with lawyers, wait for contract signatures by the boss, etc. The creator usually also has much greater freedom in expressing the view on a given product or service, which may be good, but sometimes problematic.
B. Salary – the other often accepted form of settlement (no surprise there) is regular financial compensation for reviewing or reviewing a given product or service. This form is usually tightened by contractual provisions.

Of course, it also happens that in the case of cooperation we are dealing with a mix of both of the above – i.e. barter / financial cooperation. Influencer marketing is quite flexible in this context.

What is worth remembering in the contract from a brand perspective?
– If the creator also prepares the material for use in YOUR advertising channels, then list all possible fields of exploitation. Do not leave room for interpretation, but name them all separately.
– Include in the contract the schedule and individual cut-off dates for the next stages of the campaign.
– Specify the amounts.
– Specify exactly what the creator undertakes to do in a given collaboration.
– You can specify in the contract even a specific link to appear in the posts or materials related to the campaign. However, remember that such technical things can easily be set outside the contract.

What is worth remembering in the contract from the perspective of the creator?
– Specify whether the brand can freely manipulate the given movie or any other format you are preparing (this is about using quotes, cutting scenes from movies, etc.).
– The issue of using materials created by the creator in brand advertising materials.
– Specify exactly what the brand undertakes under the cooperation (e.g. delivery of the product, accompanying materials, descriptions, etc.).
– Brand consent to add cooperation information.

Summary

It’s time to finish this extensive entry. I hope that you have clarified the issues related to influencer marketing a bit and set out with this knowledge to hunt your first creators. If you have any questions, feel free to write and give me a maximum of 48 hours to respond.

General Definition

The general definition defines plagiarism as “The process of copying data from the Internet or using someone’s idea and appropriating it as one’s own.“

This is a highly inadvisable act, which is treated as a fraud, immoral in nature, containing elements of theft and lies. Applying these practices has led to a multitude of anti-plagiarism programs. The main purpose of using this type of practice is scanning text for copied content. The duplicate web content detector not only checks if the text contains stolen fragments, but also reveals the sources they come from.

How to avoid plagiarism?

If you are a student, writer or author of articles for a magazine, you certainly want your work to be unique and one of a kind. Some of the anti-plagiarism systems simply check your text once and give the overall result for the whole. There are also free online plagiarism detection programs that check every sentence of your work in a very intelligent way, focusing on every word. For photos, use the image feedback search tool to check that the image or photo has not been copied from somewhere, and add appropriate sources to prevent image-related plagiarism.

Check every article you publish for plagiarism

Some bloggers believe that a site with unique content mixed with copied content will gain high positioning. Nothing could be more wrong. New algorithms used by Google approach each site individually. In practice, the page containing the copied content will not pass positive verification for plagiarism, which means that it will not be able to advance among search results. Creating unique content for your website or blog is not easy for you?

We encourage you to use our text paraphrase tool, and in the blink of an eye you will generate the right material.

Types of Anti-Plagiarism Scanners

To a large extent, this type of anti-plagiarism programs consists of a window into which fragments of text or entire paragraphs are pasted to check for plagiarism. Parts of the content that have been copied are underlined in red and their frequency is expressed as a percentage. Such software is most often used by students who, in order to preserve the originality of their content, remove repeated parts of the text. Teachers checking works do the same. SEO managers, expecting 100% uniqueness from their employees, commonly use this kind of tools. Publishing copied content is a serious offense, and thus, most websites check their content before posting it on their own sites.

How are plagiarism checked on websites?

This is usually a few steps:
A. If the sentence that is currently being checked is already somewhere on the Internet, a red warning will appear and the content will be marked as plagiarism.
B. However, if your content is unique, a green notification will be displayed. After a full scan, an overall result will appear, displaying the extent to which the article is original.
C. Thickness of Key Phrases: Counts the number of keywords contained in your content and gives the result for One, Two and Three words.

Google Shopping – what’s that?

The Google Shopping platform, and more specifically the Product Listing Ads (PLA) service, i.e. product ads that began to appear on the right of the search results. The photo, store name and price were displayed, and after clicking the selected ad the user was redirected to the product page. This service could be compared to a price comparison site, which was now available in Google search. Currently, the user has access to the entire Google Shopping tab, and there are definitely more products in the ads. You can filter or sort them by price.

A condition of implementing product advertising is conducting a shopping campaign in Google Ads. The promotion is targeted based on the attributes from the data file in the Merchant Center, and the photos are added to the advertisement from the prepared database. Product advertising is paid on a CPC (Cost Per Click) basis, i.e. when the user clicks on it.

Product advertising – for whom?

This type of advertising is designed for online stores from almost every industry. Thanks to it, it is possible to promote not only physical but also intangible products, such as software. It is worth remembering that, as in the case of other Google Ads campaigns, advertising of alcohol or medicines is prohibited here. A full list of prohibited content can be found on the Google support website.

Shopping campaign benefits

A properly configured shopping campaign is currently one of the most effective methods of generating sales for online stores. Thanks to the graphic form, it stands out from the background of text ads and, as a result, is attractive to Internet users. Viewing a photo and product prices from the search engine level significantly saves time searching the range in stores – the advertisement is always up-to-date, so it displays only available products.

The Google Shopping campaign allows reaching users who are already at the final stage of the purchasing process, because by entering a specific product name in the search engine they count on finding places where they will be able to buy it. The advertisement directs them directly to the product card, which contains the details of the offer and from which they can complete the purchase.

Integration with Google Merchant Center allows you to launch dynamic remarketing, which by displaying product data on banners reminds users of products that have recently been viewed in the advertiser’s store.

Google Shopping – Not For Everyone?

The Google Shopping campaign convinces online store owners for many reasons. It seems particularly attractive mainly because it allows you to present the product in the photo from the search engine. The statistics of our campaigns also show that the results achieved by these campaigns, as well as the confidence of online stores in this advertisement, are increasing.

However, before you decide to launch your Google Shopping campaign, there are a few important things to consider.

The first important issue is price competition. If you are not the only distributor of the product, check whether the price you offer is attractive compared to other online stores, and if it is higher, you can explain it somehow. However, the price is displayed right next to the product in the Google Shopping advertisement and gives you the opportunity to compare, without having to look at the pages of individual stores. If the customer enters the specific product name they are looking for in the search engine, naturally, the offer with the lower price will arouse the most interest.

The second important thing is the inability to match your audience to your ad using keywords. In the case of a shopping campaign, Google decides when and for which Internet queries the ad will be displayed. Before launching the campaign, it is necessary to send a file with information about products – their names, prices, individual parameters, etc. Based on this information, Google selects from among our products and products of other stores belonging to the same category the one that will be advertised. Therefore, the Advertiser has no influence on which queries of Internet users his product will be displayed (only after it is displayed in response to a query entered in the search engine is able to see it), as well as in the environment of which products it will be displayed.

And the last important issue is the problem of displaying products from different shelves side by side. If the customer enters the search query: leather men’s shoes, the results may include both designer shoes from the designer and those from a regular chain store. The visible at first glance difference will of course be the price, which in product ads has the most significant impact on customers’ purchasing decisions. Therefore, if you offer unique products, you must be aware that in the case of Google Shopping campaigns, their value may not be noticed and they will be compared with mass products.

Considering the above, you certainly understand how IMPORTANT ISSUE is the optimization and proper management of the product file from which Google derives information about products. You should not be afraid of all this – a properly built product file, combined with a budget sensible for a given campaign, will succeed.

Google Shopping – summary

A properly created and constantly optimized product advertisement will bring satisfying results to both small stores and large stores with an extensive range. Finally, the Paraphrase-Online.com team would like to mention a slightly different but related issue. If you use product advertising, your products are displayed via CSS – i.e. price comparison websites. Not so long ago, the only comparison website that had access to the Google advertising environment was the Google comparison site.