Guidance to get you going on Google

Google Ads is Google’s online advertising programme. With Google Ads, you can create online ads to promote your business, help sell your products or services, raise your brand awareness, and increase traffic to your website.

Google Ads is a pay-per-click advertising platform, meaning that you only pay when someone clicks on your ad. The cost of your ads will depend on a number of factors, including your industry, your target audience, and the keywords you choose. To learn more about budgeting, visit the Google Ads Cost page.

To get started with Google Ads, you’ll need a Google Ads account, a budget, and a website. You’ll also need to choose your campaign goals, ad type, and keywords. Once you’ve set up your account and campaign, you can start running your ads.

To set up a Google Ads account, first click the “Start now” button on our website. Then, enter your business information like your website URL. After that, choose your campaign goals, upload your creative assets and set your budget. Finally, enter your payment method. Once your account is set up, you can start creating and managing your ads.

To contact a Google Ads expert, schedule a call, or chat live, visit the Google Ads Expert Support page.

To find out even more details about the Google Ads product, please visit Google Ads Help Center.

Merchant Center is a free tool that helps millions of shoppers on Google discover, explore and buy your products. With a Merchant Center account, you can upload and manage your product data so that your products appear across Google Search, Maps, YouTube and more.

Creating a Merchant Center account and showing your products on Google is free of cost. You can add and manage your product listings directly from Merchant Center.

When you’re ready, you can supplement your organic listings with paid advertising. Paid product ads show up more prominently and can reach even more potential customers. With our Performance Max campaigns, you choose the goals that you want to achieve, and you’ll never pay more than your monthly budget cap.

You need to be a retailer selling products through a website, in a physical shop or both. To sign up, you’ll need a Google Account. If you don’t have one yet, you can create one for free here. Then go to Merchant Center to tell us about your business, choose where your customers will check out (on your website or at your local shop) and add your products. If you are in the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom or Switzerland, your Merchant Center account must be associated with a Comparison Shopping Service (CSS).

Our beginner’s guide to Merchant Center can teach you more about getting started and how to manage your presence across Google’s platforms.

Once your products are added and confirmed as eligible, they can show up across different Google surfaces, such as Google Search, Google Maps, YouTube, and Google Images.

Learn more about where products show and the requirements.

Merchant Center is a free tool that enables retailers to add product information and data so that their products can appear across Google surfaces.

After you add your products, you can use your Merchant Center account to manage your product inventory across Google and get personalised reports and insights on product performance, trends and competitor benchmarks.

If you use Shopify, Woo, PrestaShop or another supported e-commerce platform, you can automatically add your products to Google when you link your e-commerce shop to your Merchant Center account. Any future changes that you make to products are automatically synced to Google.

If you don’t use a supported platform, Google can automatically add products from your website or you can manually add your product offerings via a file or spreadsheet, or by entering individual products.

No. Google helps customers find your products and your shop. When they are interested in buying from you, they visit your website and go through your checkout process like any other website visitor. You decide how to deliver the products.

When you’re ready, you can promote your products with Performance Max, our paid advertising campaigns that use Google AI to reach the right customers at the right time. You stay in full control of your budget and only pay when someone engages with your ad.

Troubleshoot with ease by visiting Google Merchant Center Help. Fix common issues, understand how to measure your results, and more.

As the next generation of Smart Shopping and Local campaigns, Performance Max is a goal-based campaign type that helps you access all of Google Ads inventory from a single campaign. It’s designed to help you find more converting customers across all of Google’s channels like Search, YouTube, Display, Discover, Gmail, and Maps.

Performance Max campaigns can be run directly from Merchant Center. For additional functionality, you can manage your campaign in Google Ads.

If you use an e-commerce platform like Shopify, Woo, WIX, or PrestaShop, you can easily sync your products and run Performance Max campaigns directly from your e-commerce platform.

In the European Economic Area, the United Kingdom or Switzerland, Performance Max campaigns can be used with any Comparison Shopping Service (CSS) you work with. The ads will show on general search results pages and on any other surfaces the CSS has opted in to.

In Google Merchant Center, Performance Max campaigns optimise for online sales. If you manage your campaign in Google Ads, you can optimise to one or more goals, such as online and in-store conversions, from a single Performance Max campaign. As a best practice, track the value for all your conversion goals. By doing this, Performance Max will maximise conversion value for your budget.

If you have a Merchant Center feed, your product images, pricing, and other details will be used to develop engaging creative for Performance Max campaigns.

If you are using Google Ads to manage campaigns, we strongly recommend providing additional assets. The more high-quality creative assets you provide for text, images and video, the more ad formats Performance Max can create and the more inventory your ad can appear on to maximise your results.

Get the most out of your campaign by following the best practices found on this page.

Your Business Profile is a free tool that allows you to take charge of the way your business appears on Google Search and Maps. With your Business Profile, you can connect with customers, post updates, list your products and services, share your menu, and more. Learn more about how Google sources information about your business on the Google Business Profile help page.

Creating a Business Profile and listing your business on Google is free of cost. You can claim and manage your business directly from Google Search and Maps to start reaching more customers.

You can use the Google Maps app to manage your Business Profile on your mobile device. On your desktop, you can manage your profile directly from Google Search in the browser. Learn more about managing your profile on the Manage your Business Profile help page.

Yes, you can have a profile if your business doesn’t have a physical address as long as you make in-person contact with customers. You can also have a profile if you’re a hybrid business that serves customers at your business address and visits or delivers directly to customers. You may also have a profile if you’re a service-area business that visits or delivers to customers directly, but doesn’t serve customers at its business address, like a plumber or cleaning service. Learn how to claim and verify your profile if you’re a service-area business on the Google Business Profile help page.

You can add your business on Google Search and Maps by creating a Business Profile. With a profile you can add and manage how your business information shows up across Google. Create and manage your profile now.

You can now update your Business Profile directly from Google Search and Maps. To start, sign in with the Google account used to verify your business. On Google Maps, tap your profile picture on the top right corner of the mobile app and select “Your Business Profile” to access these tools. On Google Search, look up your business by name or search “my business” to update your profile. Learn more about managing your profile from the Manage your Business Profile help page.

Yes, your free Business Profile complements your website by adding more visibility to your current business website on Google Search and Google Maps.

Most businesses verify their profile ownership via phone, SMS, or by requesting and receiving a postcard to their address from Google. Learn more about verifying your business on the Google Business Profile help page.

Verification allows us to confirm that you are the rightful owner of the business, so that you have permission to manage your Business Profile. Your security is important to us and we don’t want anyone else but you or your approved managers making updates to your profile.

You can respond to reviews for your business if you manage and are signed into your Business Profile account on Google. When you reply to a review, your response appears below the customer’s review on Google Search and Maps under the label “Response from the owner”. Learn more about responding to reviews on the Read & reply to reviews on Google help page.

You can update your business hours on Google with a Business Profile, directly from Google Search and Maps. If your business provides specific services with different times (e.g. senior hours, delivery, takeout) you can set “More hours” instead of special hours. Learn how to set business hours on the Edit your business hours help page.

Yes. Business Profile has replaced Google My Business, Google Places for Business, Google Listings, and Google+ Business Pages.

Yes. Our featured Partners Programme highlights partners who provide valuable services to the broader Business Profile merchant community. Learn more about our featured partners.

Yes. If you’re looking for additional guidance, schedule 1-on-1 time with a specially-trained Google Advisor to get recommendations for your Business Profile and more. Learn more by visiting the Small Business Advisors website.

You can use Google Ads to reach more customers. Google Ads drives people to your business, no matter what you sell. Learn more about the reach of Google Ads and see what you can achieve with the right campaign on the Google Ads homepage.

Google Analytics (GA) is a measurement tool that businesses can use to better understand visitor behaviour on their websites and/or apps. For example, GA reports can show what type of online behaviour leads to purchases and how to optimise your website.

Google Analytics is free of charge. Google also offers a paid version called Google Analytics 360, which offers higher data limits and more advanced support options.

To create a Google Analytics account, you must be logged into a Google account. If you don’t yet have a Google account, you can learn how to create one on How do I create a new Google Account help page. To create a Google Analytics account, visit the Google Analytics website. If you have previously set up a Google Analytics account, you can create a new account by going to Admin (on the bottom left), clicking Create, and then clicking Account. To help you set up your Google Analytics account at your own pace and customize it to your own needs, follow the steps listed on the Set up Analytics for a website and/or app help page.

To get Google Analytics training and support, explore the Google Analytics 4 account training and support guide.

A Google Analytics account provides access to your Analytics properties. You can have one or more Analytics accounts (up to a 100). Each account can contain up to 2,000 properties. Although an account can include multiple properties and property types, a property can belong to only one Analytics account. A Google Analytics property represents a website and/or app, and it is the container for your reports based on the data you collect. Analytics processes data at the property level and properties can integrate with other Google products, such as Google Ads. For more information, visit the Google Analytics hierarchy help page.

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is the next generation of Google Analytics, designed to provide businesses with a more comprehensive understanding of their customers’ behaviour across devices and platforms. If you create a new Google Analytics account today, it will be a Google Analytics 4 property.

Universal Analytics (UA) refers to the previous generation of Analytics. This was the default property type for websites prior to October 14, 2020 and is no longer available.

Google Analytics 360 is a paid version of Google Analytics that offers advanced support and increased data limits for large businesses. It includes all the features of standard Google Analytics, learn more about the functionality and features on the Analytics 360 website.

YouTube Ads can work for almost any budget, and how much you spend is always up to you. You also have the option to set your account to bill automatically or manually. Learn more about cost on the Know your billing options help page. Ads pricing depends on the format you choose. Learn about pricing across ad formats.

Yes. Google Ads helps businesses run ads across the entire Google advertising platform, which includes YouTube. That means you’ll set up, run, and manage your YouTube Ads campaign with a Google Ads account. If you don’t have an account yet, you can sign up for one on the Google Ads sign up page.

Your ad can show in different ways, depending on the format you decide to run. For example, some ad formats run before, during, or after a viewer’s video has played, while others appear on the YouTube home feed. Learn about YouTube ad formats for awareness, consideration, and action.

When you start a campaign, you’ll get access to free tools that can help you measure how it’s doing.

Absolutely. When you set up a YouTube Ads campaign, you’ll choose the people you want to see your ad based on age, location, interests, and more. Learn how you can use video ads to reach the right people on the Find your audience YouTube page.

Yes, you’ll need to upload your video ad to your YouTube channel before you set up a campaign. Learn how to create a channel and upload a video on the Create a YouTube channel help page.

There are free YouTube creative tools you can use to make your own video ad. If you need more help, our trusted creative partners can work with you to edit existing videos and images into an ad or create one from scratch.

YouTube Live is a great way to engage with your audience in real time with a video feed, chat, and more. To start live streaming from your computer, go to YouTube and from the top right, click Create, Go Live. If you haven’t already, follow the prompts to verify your channel. Enabling your first live stream may take up to 24 hours. Once enabled, you can live stream instantly. Learn more about live streams on the Get started with live streaming help page.

Video promotions are currently available for all channels which meet conditions for Advanced features on YT and have >1k subs. Learn more about advanced features on the Access to YouTube tools & features help page.

Advertising is just one of many tools creators can leverage for audience growth and engagement. For best practises on getting more views/subscribers for your channel, visit the Promote your videos help page.

To enable an easier ads buying experience, creators are able to create simple ad campaigns for their videos within the new Promotions tab without being redirected to Google Ads. If you need more ad formats or advanced targeting options, consider creating your campaign in Google Ads.

Only in-feed video ads are supported. In-stream ads are not supported. Users need to engage with the ad in order to reach the watch page or subscribe. Learn more about how to create and manage promotions.