Google Shopping free listings let your products appear in Google’s Shopping results and other Google surfaces without paying for ads. You need a store on your own domain, a free Google Merchant Center account, and product data that matches your pages. New Merchant Center accounts are opted in to free listings by default, according to Google’s free listings help page.
For a used or surplus parts seller, the hard part isn’t the setup. It’s that most of your items are one of a kind, have no barcode, and sell without warning. A few fields and a daily refresh decide whether those parts stay approved. Here’s how to get them right. For the wider picture of a store beside eBay, see our page for eBay and surplus sellers.
How free listings work
You send Merchant Center a list of products, called a data source. It can be a file, a Google Sheet, a file Google fetches on a schedule, or data sent through Google’s Merchant API. Google may also find products on your site by crawling. Each product links to its own product page, not your home page or a category page.
Three rules shape everything after that:
- Your data has to match your page. Google checks prices, availability and condition on the landing page against what you sent.
- Products expire. Google’s product management page says all products expire 30 days after the last refresh.
- Nothing is guaranteed. Google decides when and where a product shows. Free listings are a chance to appear, not a placement you buy.
Before you start
Your store needs a few things in place first. Google’s landing page requirements ask for a working page with the price shown clearly, a buy button, and a condition that matches your data. They also say to link only to the domain in your Merchant Center account. That rules out sending shoppers to your eBay listings: each part needs a page on your own store. If you don’t have that store yet, that’s what our e-commerce website development work builds.
Then, in Merchant Center:
- Verify and claim your website.
- Set up shipping. Shipping costs are required for free listings in the US, and Google’s shipping page recommends account shipping settings over per-product shipping data.
- Add your return policy. Google’s free listings page asks for it on your website and recommends adding it in Merchant Center too.
The fields that matter for one-off used parts
The product data specification lists every field. Google’s free listings page names the required ones for all products: id, title, link, image link, price, description and availability. These are the ones that trip up parts sellers.
Condition
Google accepts three values: new, refurbished and used. Its condition page makes the field required for every used or refurbished product. eBay uses more names, so map them once:
| eBay condition | Google value |
|---|---|
| New | new |
| New other (see details), New open box | used |
| Remanufactured, Seller refurbished, Certified refurbished | refurbished, only with a warranty; otherwise used |
| Used | used |
| For parts or not working | used, with “for parts or repair” in the title and description |
Two of those rows need a word. Google’s definition of used includes items with opened or missing packaging, which is why “New other” maps to used. And Google says to use refurbished only if the item comes with a warranty. If you’d rather not field questions about non-working parts, leave them out of the feed.
Brand
Google’s brand page makes brand required when a product has a clearly associated maker. It also says, “When in doubt don’t provide a brand.” Don’t put your store’s name in this field for parts made by someone else.
MPN
The MPN is the manufacturer’s part number, 1 to 70 characters. It’s required when there’s no GTIN. Your own stock number doesn’t count, and Google again says to leave it out when in doubt. For many used parts, the MPN stamped on the tag is the most useful thing in the feed.
GTIN and identifier_exists
A GTIN is the barcode number (UPC or EAN). Most used and surplus parts don’t come with one you can confirm. Google’s GTIN page says to submit one only when you’re sure it’s correct and never to guess. So leave it blank on parts without a known barcode.
The identifier_exists field tells Google a product has no unique identifiers. Google’s page recommends it for products without a GTIN, MPN or brand, and warns that products marked no when there is evidence of an identifier will get a warning. Our rule for parts: if the part has a brand and an MPN, send those and leave identifier_exists out. Set it to no only when there’s no GTIN and no brand or MPN you can stand behind.
Price and availability
Price has to match the product page, and so does availability. Google’s availability page accepts in_stock, out_of_stock, preorder and backorder. It also says permanently discontinued products should be deleted from the data source. A one-off part that sold fits that case: take it out of the feed.
Title and images
Use the same title pattern as your store: brand, part number, part type, key detail, condition. Our guide to organizing a large parts catalog explains why. For photos, Google’s image page rules out watermarks, borders, promotional text and placeholder images. Real photos of the actual part are what you want anyway.
A feed checklist for used and surplus parts
Run through this before you connect the feed:
- Every part has its own product page on your domain, with price, condition and a buy button.
- Each feed row’s
linkpoints to that page, and theidmatches your SKU. conditionis set on every row, using your eBay mapping.brandandmpnare filled in only when you’re sure of them.gtinis blank unless the maker assigned one you can confirm.identifier_existsisnoonly for parts with no brand or MPN.- Price and availability come from the same data as the product page.
- Shipping and returns are set in Merchant Center.
- Images are real photos with no watermarks or text.
- Sold parts are removed from the feed in the same run that marks them sold.
Keep the feed fresh every day
One-off parts sell at any hour, so a feed that updates weekly will advertise sold items. Google’s scheduled update page offers daily, weekly or monthly fetches. Pick daily. For more than one update a day, Google points to the Merchant API.
The cleanest setup builds the feed from the same data as your inventory sync. If you sell on eBay too, the run that hides a part sold on eBay also takes it out of the feed. Then nothing depends on someone remembering.
Two Google features help between runs:
- Automatic item updates. Google’s automatic updates page says Merchant Center can correct price, availability and condition from your product pages’ structured data. The markup has to be in the HTML your server sends, not added by JavaScript after the page loads. Google calls this a supplement to regular updates, not a replacement.
- Removal timing. Google says a removal can take 24 to 48 hours to reach free listings. So mark a sold part as sold on its page right away, and don’t take the page down until the product has left Merchant Center. A deleted page with a live listing is a disapproval waiting to happen.
Common disapprovals and how to fix them
Check the Needs attention list in Merchant Center’s Products section each week. These are the issues the fields above lead to when something slips:
- Mismatched value for price or availability. The page and the feed disagree, usually because the feed is older than the page. Refresh daily and turn on automatic item updates.
- Missing or incorrect GTIN. Add the GTIN if the maker assigned one. If not, make sure brand and MPN are filled in.
- A warning on identifier_exists. You marked a part
nobut Google found a brand or part number. Send the identifiers instead. - Missing condition. A used part was sent without a condition. Check your mapping covers every eBay condition name.
- Landing page not working. The part’s page was deleted while the listing was still live. Remove the product from the feed first.
- Missing shipping. Set up account shipping in Merchant Center.
After a fix, Google re-checks the product. Its availability mismatch page says that crawl usually finishes within 24 to 48 hours.
How we can help
If you already have a store, start with the checklist and your condition mapping. That’s most of the work. If you don’t, or your feed and inventory keep drifting apart, we build online stores for eBay and parts sellers that stay in step with eBay through a daily sync. Read more on our eBay and surplus sellers page, or send us your store or eBay link through the contact page.
