Google will sunset and stop supporting the Showcase Shopping Ads it initially announced about two years ago. Google said "starting April 1, 2021, Showcase Shopping ad groups will be removed and will stop serving your ads. Performance data for removed ads and ad groups will still be available in account reports."
What were these shopping showcase ads? Google explained If you're a retailer, you can use Shopping campaigns to promote your online and local inventory, boost traffic to your website or local store, and find better qualified leads. To get started, you'll send us your product data with Merchant Center and create a campaign in Google Ads. Then we'll use your campaign to create ads on Google and around the web where potential customers can see what you're selling. We call these placements Shopping ads because they appear in a different, more visual format. In contrast to a text ad, which displays text only, Shopping ads show users a photo of your product, plus a title, price, store name, and more. These ads give users a strong sense of the product you're selling before they click the ad, which gives you more qualified leads.
Here is a screen shot of them:
Kirk Williams posted on Twitter a copy of the email Google sent to those advertisers using this feature:
Here is the official email from @GoogleAds on the deprecation of Showcase Shopping Ads. #ppcchat pic.twitter.com/j2t4KuU4qX
— Kirk Williams 💬 (@PPCKirk) February 24, 2021
Forum discussion at Twitter.
