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If you’re selling physical products online, especially in the wellness or home goods space, visibility is everything. But when your product listings aren’t being approved by Google Merchant Center (GMC), you’re invisible to potential customers and lose sales every day.
That’s exactly where Branch Basics found themselves. Despite having an incredible product line of human-safe cleaning solutions, only a fraction of their merchant listings were indexed via Google. After digging in, we discovered that simple yet impactful changes to product titles and descriptions could make a massive difference.
In this case study, we’ll show you how thoughtful optimizations to Branch Basics’ GMC listings led to a 459% increase in valid products, unlocking major visibility and revenue potential.
The Challenge: Incomplete Listings Led to Limited Visibility
If you’re managing an e-commerce store and investing in Google Shopping Ads, it’s frustrating to see your listings disapproved or worse, never appear at all. Before our optimizations, Branch Basics had only 32 valid products showing in Google Merchant Center. That meant most of their products weren’t reaching potential customers searching for human-safe cleaning solutions.
This situation is all too common:
- You might have strong brand awareness but poor Shopping visibility
- You’re unsure why Google’s disapproving listings
- You’re losing revenue from products that technically exist, but don’t show up
For Branch Basics, this was a huge opportunity we didn’t want to let go untapped.
Step 1: Audit GMC Feed for Title & Description Issues
The first thing we did was take a deep dive into Branch Basics’ GMC feed. Many of their products had clean, simple descriptions—but not ones optimized for Google’s strict content guidelines.
Tip: Think like Google when writing your product titles and descriptions.
We identified several key areas for improvement:
- Titles were too short or vague (e.g., “Concentrate” instead of “Human-Safe Cleaning Concentrate - Refillable & Biodegradable”)
- Descriptions lacked important attributes like size, use case, and benefits
Some listings were missing required fields altogether
Step 2: Rewrite & Enrich Product Content Strategically
Once we had our findings, we rolled up our sleeves and rewrote product titles and descriptions to be:
- Keyword-rich, but natural
- Detailed and benefit-oriented
- Structured in a way that satisfies Google’s product data requirements
This included:
- Adding brand and product use cases to titles
- Including key attributes like scent, refill info, and packaging details
- Ensuring consistency across the feed
Step 3: Submit Optimized Feed & Monitor Approval Rate
With the refreshed content ready to go, we submitted the feed back into Google Merchant Center and tracked approvals closely.
Result: In just weeks, Branch Basics went from 32 valid listings to 179—a 459% increase in valid product listings.
That’s not just more products showing up, it’s more potential clicks, conversions, and revenue from high-intent Shopping traffic.
In addition to an increase in valid listings, there has also been a 61% increase in branded traffic and a 79% increase in non-branded traffic.
Turn Small Fixes into Growth Opportunities
If you’re struggling with limited visibility in Google Merchant Center, you’re not alone. Even amazing products can get buried due to small content issues.
With Branch Basics, we didn’t overhaul their product line or invest in a flashy new ad campaign. We simply made their existing listings work smarter. By identifying content gaps and aligning with Google’s best practices, we helped unlock a 459% increase in valid GMC listings and open the door to significantly more Shopping visibility and sales.
If your products aren’t showing up where they should, chances are the fix is more straightforward than you think. Want to unlock more revenue from your existing product catalog? Let’s talk →
