As retailers prepare for an unusually short holiday shopping season, Google has announced several new AI-powered features for its advertising and merchant tools.
With Black Friday falling later this year, the period between Thanksgiving and New Year’s is compressed compared to recent years.
At its annual Think Retail event, Google unveiled updates to its Merchant Center and Google Ads platforms. These changes include:
- AI-generated shopping trend insights
- Automated performance summaries for merchants
- Custom data report generation using natural language prompts
- Streamlined process for syncing local inventory data
- New customer acquisition goals for ad campaigns
- Profit-based optimization options for certain campaign types (in beta)
Jeff Harrell, Senior Director of Merchant Shopping at Google, stated that the new features aim to help businesses “stay agile and turn data into decisions quickly” during the shortened season.
Why This Matters
The compressed 2024 holiday shopping timeline – with only 26 days between Black Friday and Christmas compared to 32 in 2023 – presents challenges for retailers. Some analysts predict this may lead to earlier and more aggressive promotional activity.
Google’s updates appear designed to assist businesses in adapting to rapidly changing consumer behavior during this crucial sales period. However, it remains to be seen how effective these new tools will be in practice.
How This Can Help You
For retailers and advertisers:
- Access to real-time trend data to inform inventory and marketing decisions
- Automated insights to quickly identify performance issues or opportunities
- Easier management of local inventory ads
- New tools to target and acquire new customers
- Options to optimize campaigns based on profit rather than just revenue
For consumers:
- More accurate product availability information, especially for local stores
- Potentially better-timed and more relevant promotions from retailers
- Improved shopping experience with up-to-date inventory across online and offline channels
Looking Ahead
These updates come as Google faces increasing competition in e-commerce from platforms like Amazon and social media sites. The new features attempt to solidify Google’s position as a starting point for online shopping.
It remains to be seen if Google’s AI-powered tools can drive revenue during a shortened shopping season.
