Inquiry about country validation conditions for Google Product Category

[Nishant Pandey]

Hey API Team,

I am reaching out to inquire about the validation conditions for the Google Product Category in relation to shopping campaigns. I understand that the Google Product Category is supported for some specific countries like US, AU, BR, etc.

Previously, the support for Google Product Category was depended on the “Country of Sale” setting in campaign settings. However, with the removal of this setting, it is unclear now, how the support for the same is now determined ? as the Country of sale has been replaced by the feed label.

I would like to know how to check whether the Google Product Category is supported in a particular country or not, and what are the new validation conditions that need to be met in order for a product to be listed in a specific category on Google Shopping.

I appreciate any guidance or resources you can provide to help me understand these changes.
Thank you for your assistance.

Sincerely,
Nishant

[Google Ads API Forum Advisor]

Hi Nishant,

Thanks for reaching out to Google Ads API Support.

Please note that our team can only provide support to Google Ads API related concerns and technical implementations. 

With regards to your concern, can you confirm if you are using the Google Ads API or the Google Ads UI directly to perform the following implementation? If you are using the Google Ads API, then you may refer to this link (https://developers.google.com/google-ads/api/docs/shopping-ads/create-campaign). You may also check the required fields for the Shopping setting such as the feed_label field which accepts country codes. 

However, if you are using the Google Ads UI, then you may refer to the product support article below to know how to create a Smart Shopping campaign. If you are not able to find a resolution there, then I recommend reaching out to the Google Ads Product Support Team for further assistance. They can assist you more appropriately regarding these kinds of inquiries.

Links included in this email:

• Google Ads API - https://developers.google.com/google-ads/api/docs/start
• Required - https://developers.google.com/google-ads/api/docs/shopping-ads/create-campaign#required 
•  Create a Smart Shopping campaign - https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/7674740?hl=en 
• Google Ads product support - https://support.google.com/google-ads/gethelp 

Regards,

Google Ads API Team

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[Nishant Pandey]

Hi Team!

Thanks for your reply. I believe there has been a misunderstanding here. Let me try to be a little more specific.

I am trying to create some shopping campaigns using the Google Ads API.
The campaign I'm creating contains product groups that will be split by Google Product Category. Since creating campaigns by Google Product Category is only allowed for a few selected countries, as mentioned here, I am unable to verify the country.

Now, I want to understand how I can validate whether the country is valid because earlier, products needed to have the right “Country of Sale” field defined for the products in the merchant center. Only products which have the “Country of Sale” same as a country for which using Google Product Category is allowed, would be eligible for the campaign.

However, since “Country of Sale” field in Google Merchant Center is deprecated now, can you tell us the conditions which need to be met to split product groups by Google Product Category using the Google Ads API?

[Google Ads API Forum Advisor]

Hi Nishant, 

Thank you for coming back to us. I hope you are doing well today.

With regards to your concern, please note that Sales country targeting has changed in Google Ads. See Country targeting in Shopping Ads campaigns is changing in August 2022 for more information. Please follow the guidelines and let us know how it goes in your end.

For full information in Google Ads APi perspective, please see the Shopping Ads documentation and guidelines.

Reference links:

• Country targeting in Shopping Ads campaigns is changing in August 2022 - https://ads-developers.googleblog.com/2022/08/country-targeting-in-shopping-ads.html
• Google Ads API: Shopping Ads - https://developers.google.com/google-ads/api/docs/shopping-ads/overview

Have a great day.

This message is in relation to case "ref:_00D1U1174p._5004Q2lHmUK:ref"

Thanks,

 

Google Ads API Team

[Nishant Pandey]

Hi there,

Thanks for your reply. I'm doing good. Thanks! How about you?

Thanks for sharing the above information. However, that doesn't really answer my question.
I understand that the Country Targeting has changed, and therefore, I am inquiring about how we should now validate whether Google Category is allowed for the country or not, as it is only allowed for a few selected countries mentioned here.

Before the Country Targeting changed, we would check if the Country of Sale defined for the products is within the list of countries that are allowed for Google Category. However, since now Country of Sale is not mandatory and the Feed_Label (which replaced country of sale) can be a random string and is not restricted to the two-character country code, how do we ensure that the product in the merchant center is allowed to use Google Category for creating the product groups?

Hope this explains my question. Let me know if you need anything else

[Google Ads API Forum Advisor]

Hi Nishant, 

Thank you for returning to our team. I hope you are doing well today.

Please note that our team provides support to API implementation only. In addition to that, note that Google Ads API mirrors Google Ads UI and not the Merchant platform, and it is less likely that all the merchant center details are supported in the Ads API. Since you are looking to get particular data in the API, could you confirm if this is already seen / present in the Ads UI? If yes, could you please provide us the complete screenshot showing the data so that we can provide a more accurate reference to your concern?

You may then send the requested logs via the Reply privately to author option. If this option is not available, you may send the details directly to our googleadsa...@google.com alias instead.

Furthermore, if you are generally looking for specific country data from merchant center to Google Ads, then I would suggest reaching out to the Google Ads Product support team (https://support.google.com/google-ads/gethelp) as they are better equipped to provide assistance to this matter. Also, for this type of request in the future, please use this link to file your issue directly: https://developers.google.com/google-ads/api/support.