Google Debuts Generative AI Tools Aimed to Help Merchants
November 3, 2023
Google is rolling out a suite of AI-powered marketing tools designed to help small businesses make the most of the holiday sales season. Merchants can add a “small business” attribute to their Search and Maps results and generate advertising and promotional materials using something called Product Studio. “Eighty-four percent of people say supporting local and/or small businesses is important to them, so we’re making it easier to find them on Google,” the company writes. Products and businesses with the “small business” label “will make it easier for shoppers to narrow down their searches and be intentional about shopping.”
Using the new, AI-powered Product Studio, U.S. merchants and advertisers “will be able to leverage text-to-image AI capabilities to create new product imagery for free, simply by typing in a prompt of the image they want to use,” TechCrunch reports. The announcement follows Amazon’s unveiling of generative AI for advertisers last week.
The feature “can be used for simple tasks, like changing the color of the background behind the product images or making the background a solid color. Or it could be used for something more advanced, like requesting a product be shown in a particular scene,” TechCrunch writes, providing as example a product showcased with fruit and summer colors changed to a winter image dressed with pine cones and snow.
The generative AI model “can also remove distracting backgrounds or improve resolution on your product images in one click,” Google VP and GM of Merchant Shopping Matt Madrigal explains in a blog post.
In addition, “small merchants using Merchant Center or Business Profile in the U.S., including those using the Google and YouTube app on Shopify, can add the attribute to their account,” Madrigal writes, adding that Google will “automatically add the ‘small business’ attribute to some merchants’ listings based on factors like how many products they offer, the number of locations they have or how much web traffic they get.”
The designation can be removed by the merchant at any time.
Madrigal told The Verge that “the ‘largest businesses’ will not have the option to display the small business attribute and that the company is relying on businesses to self-identify.”
“Only the merchant or someone authorized to manage their Merchant Center account or Business Profile on Google can enable the setting,” Madrigal told The Verge, which notes that he “did not mention if there are protections to prevent the ‘small business’ label from being abused by drop shippers or others that don’t fit the spirit of the term.”
No Comments Yet
You can be the first to comment!
Leave a comment
You must be logged in to post a comment.