11 Indispensable Google Terms Every Advertiser Should Know

By Tinuiti Team

Feb 17 2014

Here are some major Google terms marketers, advertisers, and retail search managers should be intimately familiar with.

Google Search Glossary

Product Listing Ads (PLAs): Product Listing Ads are paid display ads within Google search. These ads are managed within AdWords and charge a CPC rate. Following Google’s recent Shopping Campaigns PLA update, you may also hear PLAs referred to as Google Shopping campaigns.

More on PLAs– Learn more about what product Listing Ads are, and how to manage them here.

More on Shopping Campaigns– For details on Google Shopping Campaigns, check out this PLA tutorial.

Google Shopping: Google Shopping is a comparison shopping site within the Google network. PLAs are the display ads on Google Shopping, but can also be referred to as Google Shopping ads or simply Google Shopping.

*Google Shopping, PLA, and Product Listing Ads will be often be referred to interchangeably.

Google Paid Ads: Google ads are ads Ads which merchants pay a cost per click (CPC) for each time they are click on in search.

Ad Group: Google ad groups are one or more products that you have segmented into an ad through AdWords. You can have an ad group with one SKU, or an ad group which contains all of your products. Merchants create ad groups for PLAs based on product information.

Product group: A product group is just another way to say ad group, and is a term associated with the new PLA campaign structure.

AdWords Ads: Product Listing Ads are managed within the AdWords login, but there is a different type of Google ad which you also manage there, and appears on Google search. AdWords ads are text ads which are PPC, use the Google data feed and managed through AdWords, but do not feature images or appear in Google Shopping page major results.

Display Ad: Ads which feature a product or merchant image.

Paid Ad: Ads which merchants are charged for.

Google Trusted Stores: Google Trusted Stores is a review system on Google search, which allows merchants to develop trust ratings and display a trust badge to increase conversions.

Google Organic Search Results- These are the unpaid search results on Google Shopping. Organic results appear below paid ads, and are determined by Google’s relevancy algorithm. Fewer of these results are appearing over time as they get crowded out by PLAs and other sponsored ads.

SERP (Search Engine Result Page)- SERP is a common abbreviation for a Google result page.