New starter kit: Comparison Shopping Services (CSS)

CSS Center

The CSS Center is a platform to manage your participation in the CSS program. Core CSS Center features allow you to do the following:

Administration:
- Manage your participation in CSS program opportunities
- Manage your Logo that is shown on Google
- Prove your CSS eligibility
- Apply CSS-specific user management, including setting access rights to associated Merchant Center accounts
Manage your merchants’ portfolio:
- Grow your portfolio with self-service merchants’ onboarding feature (switching MC accounts)
- Get your portfolio organized via labels and filters
- Gain a holistic overview of participating CSS domains, as well as all associated Merchant Center (MC) accounts
- Provide a single point of entry for all associated MC accounts
- Manage your merchants’ issues and growth at scale via aggregated diagnostics, tips and best practices
Manage your CSS product pages:
- Understand issues that do not allow your CSS product pages to be shown across Google
- See all CSS product pages and their performance

You can find an overview of all features in the CSS educational hub and in the CSS Center Help Center.

CSS Newsletter

The CSS Newsletter is an official communication sent to all CSSs on a weekly basis to share any important information that involves:

Product updates
New betas
Important change

To sign up for the newsletter, fill out this form.

The Education Hub is a platform designed for CSSs where you can access all relevant Shopping Ads resources (Product formats, campaign basics, insights, trends, etc.) to best manage your business and help merchants grow.

Process to sign up

To have full access to the Education Hub, complete this form to register interest and start the NDA application process.

Once the form has been submitted you’ll receive an email from css-nda-request@google.com to complete the process.

Note: To have full access to the Education Hub you’ll need to sign this NDA, regardless of any previous NDAs you may have signed with Google.

Get familiar with support paths

Depending on your issue, different Google teams can help you move forward.

Use this support link for any queries related to:

Account switches
Campaign implementation and modification
CSS Marketplace request
Feed audits
Feed implementation
Feed optimization
Onboarding support
Parallel tracking exemption & opt-ins
Troubleshooting for CSSs
Update your “By CSS” links

For all troubleshooting queries including Billing & Invoicing, Google Analytics, Merchant Center, and Policy & Ad Review, speak to a customer support agent by accessing live chat and email.

FAQs

How can I increase the offer limit for a merchant or for an MCA?

Use this form (Section Admin support) to request an offer limit increase.

How can I turn on parallel tracking or be exempted from parallel tracking?

Request it through this form (Section Parallel tracking exemption & opt-ins).

To know more about Parallel tracking for CSSs, click here.

What are Comparison Listing Ads?

Comparison Listing Ads (CLA) are launched in all 21 (EEA+CH) countries, but we need a minimum of 3 CSSs competing in an auction to be able to show ads. When choosing a country, note that not all countries may have the minimum of 3 CSSs competing at the moment. You can ask your CSS Google account manager for more details.

To know more about CLA, refer to this deck and this help center article.

If you’re interested in running CLA, contact your CSS Google account manager to be allowlisted.

How can I opt-in or opt-out of Display remarketing or Shopping ads beyond general search?

By default, a CSS is able to place products only in the Shopping unit on Google’s general search results pages.

To opt-in for:

Display remarketing
Shopping ads beyond general search (including the Shopping tab, Image Search, and YouTube)

Use this form (Section Parallel tracking exemption & opt-ins).

How can I switch a merchant from CSS A to my CSS?

If you’re the admin of a CSS account, you can request the merchant to switch from a different CSS to your CSS through the product self-service option. Learn more about switching merchant accounts between Comparison Shopping Services.

CSS Partner Program information

CSS Portal: We have a dedicated portal for Comparison Shopping Services. You'll be able to:

Discover what the CSS program is about
Check out the benefits of becoming a Partner or Premium Partner
Read success stories of merchants working with CSSs

To access the CSS portal, click here.

CSS Program: Our Comparison Shopping Partner program is designed to benefit both CSSs and merchants. Comparison Shopping Partners are specially trained to help grow your business by making the most of Shopping ads.

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