What are Seller Ratings and Should You Use it in Your Google Ads Campaign?
You might be searching for something in Google and saw a seller rating pop up in search results. Basically, Seller ratings can be seen in search and shopping ads that shows one to five star rating of products.
And as an advertiser, you might be thinking of implementing this right away in your campaign, unfortunately though not everyone is eligible to use seller ratings.
Additionally, according to Google ads, you don’t need to have a Shopping Campaign or have a Google Merchant Center account for your ads or listings to be eligible for seller ratings extensions on the Search Network.
So lets take a look at Seller Ratings in Google ads and from there, you can decide if you should use it or not in your campaigns.
First off, what do Seller Ratings look like?
What you can see on a Seller rating:
- A rating out of 5 stars.
- The number of ratings the business has received (in parentheses).
- A qualifier (example: average delivery time) that highlights why you got the rating (if data is available).
First example:
Second example:
These examples are from Google search results. And as you can see in the second example, the products are rated 4.7.
So how does Google does this? What Google does is they gather these ratings from reputable sources that aggregates product or business reviews such as TrustPilot and even Google Customer Reviews.
It is An Automated Extension
Which means you have no control over when and how often you would like Google to include them in your ads. However, you can entirely opt out for this extension if you wanted to.
Seller ratings are an automated extension, so you have no control over when and how often Google will include them with your ads.
It is, however, free of charge, the only time you’ll get charged is when someone clicks on your ad with seller ratings on it.
Criteria to Meet for Seller Ratings to Appear
The question now is, what criteria should you met for it to appear. According to Google Ads, Seller Ratings appear in Search Network Campaigns and they will only serve in a country when one of the following criteria are met by the advertiser:
- Google has gathered enough unique reviews for the country within the last 12 months across Google Customer Reviews or third party review partners to confidently calculate and give a seller rating. There are no exact numbers needed since it will vary from business to business. But most merchants are able to get seller ratings after gathering 100 or more eligible reviews of their products or business.
- Google and/or its partners have completed a research evaluation of your site
And it doesn’t stop there, you need to meet the additional criteria:
- Average rating of 3.5 or more stars for Text Ads
- Currently, Google can show seller ratings if the average rating is less than 3.5 stars. Below that rating, Google won’t show seller ratings.
- The ad’s visible URL domain must match the domain for which they have the ratings
Moreover, they won’t be showing any feedback/reviews to an ad that is unrelated to what is advertised in a specific ad.
So Here’s The Catch…
As mentioned before, Seller Ratings are free of charge, the only time you’ll get charged is if someone clicks on your ad which is Google Ads usual policy.
But we imagine that It’s challenging for some advertisers to meet Google Ads criteria of gathering a minimum of 100 reviews in the past 12 months. Plus, Google will include their own Google Customer Reviews on the count. We’re sure that it won’t be sufficient number.
So here’s where third-party vendors comes into play for advertisers to reach those customer review criteria set by Google Ads. You can pay for these services which mostly run on monthly fees that can add up to your advertising expenses.
And adding more costs to your campaigns will be a pain, especially for advertisers running on a tight budget.
If you decide to work with Third-Party providers, do take all of their promises with a grain of salt and choose wisely since you’re going to add another cost to your expenses.
That Said, Should I Use It?
The answer is, it really depends. If you have already met the criteria for it, then feel free to do so as it will be another tool for your marketing. Also, TEST, if it adds benefits to your campaigns in terms of CTR and conversion. Remember that yes, it is free, but you will still get charged as usual when someone clicks on your ad.
If you don’t meet the Criteria, you should assess if you’re willing to invest for Third-Party services for your seller ratings. If you can sustain the costs for it since it will be subscription based.
Another thing to consider is that is if you’re in retail space, chances are your competitors are already using it, so you better get on board as well as to not get behind. If you’re in a space where none of your competitors are using it, then take this opportunity to stand out as you will benefit greatly from it.