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Free listings

Free listings are unpaid product results that Google builds from Merchant Center data and can show on the Shopping tab, in Search, on YouTube and elsewhere.

How it works

A product in Merchant Center can reach shoppers on Google as an ad that a campaign pays for, or as a free listing that needs no campaign. For most accounts, free listings are on by default. They show product pages, not category or home pages.

With no bids, the product data decides: Google matches products to searches by what the feed says. In Czechia, Slovakia, Poland and 27 other countries, Google also requires shipping settings or shipping costs. You can keep one product out of free listings with the excluded destination attribute and leave it in ads.

Our guide to Google free listings for online stores covers setup. Free listings vs Shopping ads explains what they add for a store that already advertises.

Where you see it

  • Merchant Center: under Marketing → Marketing methods, the Free listings card shows whether they are on. The Performance page, filtered for free listings, shows their results.
  • Merchant API: the product performance report splits results into ORGANIC (free listings and free local listings) and ADS. It reports conversions for free traffic only.

Example

Example store, not client data.

In a month the tableware shop gets 8,000 clicks from Shopping ads and 1,200 from free listings. Free listings bring 1,200 ÷ (8,000 + 1,200) = 13% of its product clicks from Google. With 36 orders from them, their conversion rate is 36 ÷ 1,200 = 3%.

Not to be confused with

  • Shopping campaign — paid listings in ad slots, charged per click. The Shopping tab shows both.
  • Organic traffic — every unpaid visit, regular search results included. Free listings are one of its sources.

Right and wrong readings

  • Wrong: “The product is approved, so it shows in free listings.” Right: Google says the setting gives permission to show, not a guarantee.
  • Wrong: “Turning free listings off takes our products out of Google’s free results.” Right: Google may still show products it found by crawling the store’s site.

Sources