Google Merchant Center - Website or online store needs improvement

[sunvalleysupply]

Hi all,

After setting up our store at https://sunvalley.supply we've received this message in Google Merchant Center saying our 'Website or online store needs improvement'. The detail is as follows:

There was a problem identified with your website. Update your entire website to provide a useful and transparent shopping experience for customers.

Make sure your website meets the following requirements

• Your website should have a domain name that matches the uploaded domain name
• Your entire website shouldn’t have any broken links
• Your website shouldn’t contain any placeholder images or text
• The product details and categories should match those that you provide in your product data
• Your website shouldn’t contain generic information and shouldn’t miss crucial information about products

--

We're using the Shopify 'Ride' theme and have checked to ensure we haven't left any templated or placeholder content. We haven't found any broken links. Our product details are automatically synced to Google so it should match. We also assume we've got all the crucial information on our products listed as each has detailed product pages with photos, specs etc.

Annoyingly the detail is quite vague and we've looked through our website at length to see where we might have missed one of the requirements listed but cannot see what we've done wrong.

Has anyone had any experience here? Does anyone know if Google provides the exact issue that it's found with a site??

Thanks for your help!

[EmmanuelFlossie · Accepted solution]

For example using two different contact pages in the footer.

Make sure your contact page has a physical address (not virtual or po box), email address, social links, business hours.

Policies in the footer are all over the place. Make sure all footer links are together.

Missing availability status on product landing page

Missing hsipping policy in the the checkout.

You may hav emore issues, so make sure to re-check everything.

[sunvalleysupply]

Thanks so much Emmanuel. I made the above changes and requested a review and within a few minutes got notification the issue had been resolved. 😀

[EmmanuelFlossie]

Congratulations!

[anchorfinds]

We are in a similar position for our store with the same vague messaging. Anchorfinds.com.  I emailed them a couple weeks back and an employee responded that part of our problem was our website not rendering in some locations such as VA and CA.  Since then its now only not rendering in CA. Which is odd as I am located in California and it is working fine for me.  The third party site they used was Geopeeker.com.   Any insight would be greatly appreciated.  I am currently on a hold from being able to appeal until the 14th of March.  Thanks!

[EmmanuelFlossie]

I myself use geopeeker to check if parts of the site renders or not. But I only use it, because a lot of merchants have reported that Google uses geopeeker.com to check if the site renders the same and completely in different locations.

I feel it's silly, as it's not a very reliable tool. But nothing can be done, if Google says they use this tool and it has to work, then it has to work.

Usually failed renders have to do with slow responsive websites. Best to check with your theme developer.

[EmmanuelFlossie]

I already replied to your other thread.

[Lianneruth]

Hi Emmanuel,

We are currently having the same issue after over coming misrepresentation. Could you please see if there is anything you notice as we cannot see any issues from our end. The website is www.kcathome.co.uk

Thanks in advance 🙂 

Lianne 

[EmmanuelFlossie]

Having multiple websites is your issue, Google does not allow this.

https://www.kitchencollection.co.uk/

https://kitchensinksandtaps.co.uk/

[yamkoo]

Hello Emmanuel,

Can you shed any light on what is wrong with the site - gifts4allofus.com.   We have been getting the message about the website needing improvement and cannot pinpoint the main issue.

[EmmanuelFlossie]

For example, you can not force personalization, this must only be an optional feature.

You may have more issues, so make sure to check:

https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/6150127?hl=en
https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/6363310/follow-the-merchant-center-guidelines
https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/7052112
https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/4752265
https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/13693865

[IvannaS]

Hi Emmanuel,

We received issue - misspresentation and website needs improvement, corrected everything we found. We filed an appeal - the restriction was lifted from us, but they returned it back a few hours later. Can you tell me what we need to do? https://best4my.pet/

[EmmanuelFlossie]

@IvannaS 

For example missing contact details in the footer of all pages.

I recommend having a look at all the links in the previous post to find more issues. As most likely you have more issues.