Product Feed Hygiene for AI Shopping Agents: A Google Merchant Center and Shopify Catalog Checklist

A clean product feed means every product has the required fields, titles that describe the item, correct GTINs, and price and stock that match your website. Google's Merchant Center requires id, title, description, link, image_link, price and availability, plus brand for new products. For AI shopping tools such as Gemini and AI Mode, Google says Merchant Center remains the hub for product data. This checklist is current as of 9 November 2026.

Which fields does Google require in a product feed?

Google's product data specification lists these as required:

For an Indian store the currency is INR, so a price reads like 1499.00 INR. Google says that for countries other than the US and Canada, the price must include VAT or GST. That means your feed price should be the price a buyer pays, GST included, and should match your checkout.

How do I write titles an AI assistant can use?

Google asks for a title that accurately describes the product and matches the landing page. It bans promotional text such as "free shipping", all capitals and gimmicky characters. So a good feed title for a kurta might be: brand, product type, fabric, colour, size or pack, in that order.

For example: "YourBrand Women Cotton Straight Kurta, Indigo Blue, Size M" is better than "BEST KURTA SALE!!! LOW PRICE". The first lets an assistant answer "indigo cotton kurta for women, medium". The second tells it nothing. This is our illustration, not a Google rule beyond what is cited.

Put the words buyers use early in the title, because only the opening is visible in many layouts. Google does not say how it weights title position, and we found no source that does, so do not treat this as a ranking rule.

How should I handle GTIN and brand?

Google says GTIN is recommended where a manufacturer has assigned one, and that products with missing or incorrect GTINs "may have limited visibility". Rules on the same page:

1. Submit only a GTIN you are sure is correct. Do not guess or make one up.
2. Valid lengths are 8, 12, 13 or 14 digits, and the check digit must be correct.
3. Restricted ranges, such as numbers starting 02, 04 or 2, are not allowed, and coupon ranges are not allowed either.
4. Private-label products with no GTIN do not need one.

For brand, Google asks for the name consumers recognise and bans placeholders like "N/A", "Generic" or "No brand". If you are a brand owner without barcodes, read our GTIN glossary entry and, for Amazon, the Amazon Brand Registry guide.

What must match between my feed and my website?

This is where most feeds fail. Google says price must match your landing page, structured data and checkout, and availability must match the landing page, checkout and structured data. Check these every week:

• Price. A sale price changed on the site but not in the feed.
• Stock. A product sold out on the site but "in_stock" in the feed.
• Images. Google says images must show the product and carry no promotional text, watermark or border.
• Pack size. The title says 500 g, the page says 450 g.
• Variants. Size and colour in the feed must map to the right product page.

An AI assistant that reads the feed and quotes a price your page does not honour creates a complaint. AI Mode shows real-time inventory, according to a report on Google's India launch, so stale stock data is visible to buyers.

What changes if I sell on Shopify?

Shopify says Catalog is "a global, structured dataset that agents can search and understand", and that merchants on Shopify with eligible products are in Catalog by default. It names ChatGPT, Copilot, AI Mode in Google Search, the Gemini app and Shop as channels, and says merchants can turn Catalog-based discovery and direct checkout on or off for each channel in the admin.

What the page does not give: the eligibility requirements, the supported countries, and any Indian-specific details. It links to requirements but does not list them. So for an Indian brand, open your Shopify admin and check which AI channels are actually offered to your store before you plan around them. Our Shopify agentic storefronts guide goes further.

Shopify's own claim that AI searches using Catalog convert at 2x the rate of scraped data is a Shopify statement, not independent evidence.

What if I sell only on Amazon, Flipkart or Meesho?

You do not control a Google feed. The marketplace listing is your feed. The fields that matter are the same ones: title, brand, GTIN, attributes, images, price and stock. Amazon says its Rufus shopping assistant answers using product information and information from across the web, and on product pages it uses listing details, customer reviews and community Q&As.

Run the checklist on your marketplace listings too, using our Rufus listing audit checklist and Amazon listing optimisation guide.

A weekly feed hygiene routine

1. Export the feed and sort by lowest-quality titles. Rewrite the worst ten.
2. Open Merchant Center diagnostics and clear every disapproved item.
3. Spot-check five products: price, stock, image and pack size on the live page against the feed.
4. Check that every product with a GTIN shows it, and that none shows a guessed one.
5. Remove promotional text from titles and images.
6. Note changes with a date, so you can trace a drop in visibility.

What is not confirmed?

• Google has not published how AI Mode ranks products, so no source gives a "feed score" that guarantees placement.
• Whether Merchant Center data is the only input to AI Mode shopping for Indian users. The India launch report does not explain how merchants supply data.
• Which AI channels Shopify offers to Indian stores.

FAQ

What is a product feed? It is a file or data connection that lists your products and their details, such as title, price, stock and image, for a shopping platform like Google Merchant Center. Google says Merchant Center is the hub for product data used in AI shopping.

Which fields are mandatory in Google Merchant Center? The required attributes are id, title, description, link, image_link, price and availability, and brand for new products. GTIN, MPN and condition depend on the product.

Do I need a GTIN for every product? No. Google recommends one where a manufacturer assigned it, and says private-label items without one do not need it. Never invent one.

Should the feed price include GST? For countries other than the US and Canada, Google says to include VAT or GST in the price. Match your checkout price.

Is Shopify Catalog on by default? Shopify says merchants with eligible products are in Catalog by default and can switch each AI channel on or off. Country coverage is not stated on that page.

How often should I update the feed? Google does not give a single required interval in the pages we read. Update whenever price or stock changes, because Google requires them to match your site.

Next step

Feed work is catalogue work: consistent titles, identifiers, images and prices wherever your product appears. Blooprint's catalogue and listing optimisation service audits this on Amazon, Flipkart, Myntra and quick commerce. Blooprint is a Bengaluru e-commerce agency and an Amazon SPN verified partner.