Troubleshooting: Product Reviews in Google Shopping

You expected Lipscore product reviews to display in your Google Shopping ads, and yet they are not there? Take a look at the most common reasons for product reviews not showing in the Google Shopping ads and verify if you completed all the required steps.

How to display Lipscore product reviews in Google Shopping ads

Please refer to the article about Uploading Lipscore XML feed to Google Merchant Center for step-by-step instructions.

Common reasons why product reviews do not show in the Google Shopping ads

1. The file has not been uploaded to the Google Merchant Center

If you have not uploaded the file to your GMC account yet, please follow the steps described in Uploading Lipscore XML feed to Google Merchant Center.

2. GTIN numbers are not sent to Lipscore via integration

The data that is sent to Lipscore needs to contain GTIN numbers (Global Trade Identification Numbers). GTINs have different names in different parts of the world or for specific product types: UPC in the US, EAN in Europe, JAN in Japan, ISBN for books.

Include a valid GTIN wherever possible, or provide alternative identifiers such as SKU or Brand + MPN. Google requires a product URL and relies on these identifiers to accurately match reviews to products. A feed may still be accepted without strong product identifiers, but this can reduce the number of reviews Google is able to successfully match.

In the native Lipscore apps for Shopify, Woocommerce and Magento, this functionality can be activated upon app configuration. However, not all other partner apps allow it. If you integrated Lipscore via API, the integration needs to be updated so that products[][gtin] value is added (see API documentation). 

3. There are no Product URLs in data sent to Lipscore

The fully qualified URL of the product details page in your webshop (including https://) is yet another requirement for displaying product reviews on Google Shopping. The domain in <product_url> must match the domain in Merchant Center. These URLs need to be fully qualified product URLs – homepage URL won’t do and products lacking fully qualified URL will be rejected from Lipscore XML feed.

4. You have less than 50 reviews

Google requires the XML feed to contain at least 50 reviews in total across your product catalog to be eligible for Product Ratings. If your feed contains fewer than 50 reviews, you’ll need to collect additional reviews or wait for more products and their reviews to be included in the feed.

The 50-review requirement applies to the feed as a whole, not to each individual product. Whether Google displays product stars for a specific product depends on factors such as the available review volume and Google’s ability to match those reviews to the product. Google does not publish a specific minimum number of reviews required for stars to appear on an individual product.

5. You have not implemented the Rating widget on your product pages

Each time a product page is visited by your shopper, Rating widget is triggered and information about all ratings and reviews for this product are sent to the XML feed (the file is updated every day at c. 5 am). Without the Rating widget, Lipscore will not receive the page-view data and the feed will not be updated. Also, it is in the Rating widget where Schema.org markup is contained and only if this widget is implemented, stars have a chance to show in Google organic search.

The Rating widget does not have to be visible on your product pages – but it has to be there in the page code. You will find the Rating widget code snippet in the Widgets page and once it is implemented, you can hide the rating widget hide using CSS in the Lipscore account (Settings > General > There Settings).

6. Your products have not been viewed within the last 2 months

Google XML Feed only contains reviews for products that have been viewed in the last 2 months.

Google validates all URLs in the XML feed and checks if the product actually exist and is available in the webshop. If the URLs do not exist, the feed will not be approved, and no ratings or reviews will appear in Google Shopping.

Each time a product page is visited by your shopper, information about all ratings and reviews for this product will be sent to the XML feed (the file is updated every day at c. 5 am). Please note, that the prerequisite here is that the Rating widget is installed on the page. Without it, Lipscore will not receive the page-view data and the feed will not be updated.

By removing products that have not been viewed in the last 2 months from the feed, we reduce the chance of including products that are no longer for sale, that might cause the file to fail.

7. You have not waited long enough

After the XML feed is uploaded to Google Merchant Center, it can take 2–4 weeks for the initial feed to be processed and for your reviews to go live. During the onboarding process, the Product Ratings eligibility status in Merchant Center may show as “inactive.” Once your store has been onboarded and is active in the Product Ratings program, the status will change to “active.” Google notes that it can take an additional 7–10 days for the eligibility status to update.

8. Product Ratings Onboarding and Processing Times

Even with a correctly uploaded and approved feed, Google ultimately decides when and where to display product reviews. Display depends on factors such as review quality, data accuracy, and Google’s matching algorithms, and therefore visibility in Shopping ads cannot be guaranteed by Lipscore.

Lipscore reviews in Google Shopping – examples

Despite Google’s mysteries, we have had a lot of success displaying the shoppers’ feedback in our customers’ Google Shopping ads, and here are a few examples. Please note, that star ratings represent the aggregated rating for the product, compiled from multiple sources including merchants, review aggregators, review sites, and Google users. Examples of reviews coming from Lipscore are marked green.

Devold.no

Apotek1.no

Mimmis.no

Davoy.no

Make sure to complete all the steps of Uploading Lipscore XML feed to Google Merchant Center instructions and contact your Google Merchant Center consultant if the ratings and reviews are not displayed, despite the feed approval.