Google Takes Ecommerce Global with Local Inventory Ads

With more than 1 billion unique monthly visitors, Google already provides ecommerce merchants with an unparalleled opportunity to be found by anyone in the world with an Internet connection.

Google provides another benefit to ecommerce merchants that a majority of 'Net professionals may not be fully aware of in Google Shopping, a feature that allows consumers to quickly find the product(s) they are looking for directly on the search results page. 

Google has announced they are bringing local inventory ads from their Google Shopping feature to the UK, France, Germany, Japan and Australia.

Through local inventory ads companies can advertise the price of the product at their store along with how far away the store is form their current location. When a consumer clicks on a local inventory ad they are taken to a local storefront where they can browse a selection of the store's inventory without having to actually visit the store. It is within the local storefront that consumers can find out whether the item they clicked on, or other related items in the store, are in stock.

"More and more people turn to search to plan their local shopping trips. In fact, 83 percent of shoppers would be more likely to visit a store if they could check the availability of an item online beforehand," states a post on Google's official AdWords blog. "Since we launched local inventory ads in the US last fall, many savvy retailers have taken advantage of the opportunity to promote their store items to nearby shoppers on Google. Now, we're excited to make these ads available in the UK, France, Germany, Japan and Australia."