Google & YouTube

Update 12/5/2019: Shopify support reached out to me directly after I posted this review. They did a complimentary review of my setup and let me know that everything was set correctly on my end. They said it takes 14 full days for Google to "learn" your products and to figure out the best placement for conversions. Seeing no activity during this period is normal.

We are now 21 days into the campaign and we're starting to see activity from it (sessions, adds to cart, etc). It appears that it was working correctly this whole time which really goes to emphasise the importance of improving the user interface. I made a few suggestions to the support that reached out to me and he said he would pass them on to the developers. I really hope they do because this is a valuable marketing channel and could be a great tool if it were more user friendly.

For example, there is nothing telling the user that this learning period is underway. It just says "active" and "running" which is not accurate. Adding to the frustration is the fact that you have to dedicate a portion of your marketing budget to it- In my case $5/day (or $150/mo) which is not a small amount.

I am updating this review from 1 star to 3 stars because it does work.. The user interface is just severely lacking.

Original review:
I really hate leaving negative reviews but I think this app needs to be completely overhauled. I fumbled through the setup and after some trial and error got most of my products to get accepted by google (48 out of 51). After this, I tried setting up a paid campaign with a starting budget of $5 a day. The campaign has been "active" and apparently running since November 14th and in these 7 days, there has been zero activity and I'm honestly not even sure if they're actually running. I have had really good success on Google adwords campaigns as well as Facebook campaigns but really zero activity in 7 days? It seems like something is wrong with the campaign but there is no way for me to diagnose it inside the app. Everything just says active, accepted, and running. This app lacks intuitiveness and navigating through the setup and maintenance is very cumbersome. Most of these positive reviews look fake if you read through them, so I'm not sure if the developers even care to improve it. Sad because this would be a great marketing tool if it worked!

I use this app to help me do Shopify. I really like. It would be nice if it did my business better.

It works good. I have no complaints. Does all of the navigation for you basically..just follow the prompts

I am just adding at this time. I can't say if it is good thing or not so good thing. But the app add was clean and eficiant. Now to see results. This survey question could be after the next step.

Hello! I would love to use this app but Slovenia is not listed as a market. Is there any chance this will change in the near future?
Thanks for your reply!

Hello

Don´t have much experience, if there is an error please let me know by email.

Would like to choose currency even though use Euro I am also targeting Iceland market, Europe all.

It was quick, but first time did it there was some error I did not understand.

Have a nice day,

Best Regards
Gudbjorg

Reykjavik Iceland

www.pelikani.is on Shopify

I installed Google channel and it automated a Smart Shopping campaign for me and it was working beautifully for about two weeks, but then Google Ads Manager prompted me to upgrade my campaign to Performance Max, indicating that ALL Smart Shopping campaigns would be switched to PM in July and that I should do it early to reap greater results sooner. So, as there was not an option to do this in the Google sales channel, I did it directly in Google Ads manager. Now, the old Smart Shopping campaign was disabled and the new PM is not getting as many sales. And, both Google Merchant Center and Ads Manager appear to have completely disconnected from Shopify. Conversions, budget, cost not updating in Shopify at all. When I go to the Merchant center, it tells me the I should connect Shopify's Google channel to advertise, but I'm already advertising! I'm concerned that my conversions are being missed, and that when I update or create new products in Shopify they will no longer sync automatically with Merchant Center or Ads but I have searched high and low for tutorials on how to fix this problem, as it's new. If google is forcing all Smart Shopping campaigns to switch over to PM, then surely this is going to be a big problem for everyone using Google Channel? PLEASE HELP! Thank you.

This app is acting up within the choppily platform. Still trying to understand it let alone get into the actual app LOL it won't let me

Ik hou van de werking van de app, enkel is het jammer dat er geen knop is om alle producten ineens in de app te plaatsen. Dit zou zeer veel tijd en werk besparen om al onze producten erin te steken. Idem met een algemene instelling voor opvolgen van stock.

App is good way to get started but if you are a more advanced ppc user it is frustrating as you cannot optimize your campaign within Google Adwords. You have no way to see what terms are converting, optimize bids, ad negative keywords etc. Great for getting your feet wet but not good if you want any control over your campaign.