Google Merchant Center Local Inventory Ads Guide

Local Inventory Ads display your products to shoppers who are physically near your store. When someone searches for a product and you have it in stock nearby, your ad can show with "In store" or "Nearby" labels and the store address. This drives foot traffic from people who want the product today rather than waiting for delivery.

Who Should Use Local Inventory Ads

Local Inventory Ads make sense for retailers with physical store locations who carry stock that shoppers also search for online. Electronics, sporting goods, home improvement, and apparel are strong categories. They are less useful for categories where online shoppers specifically prefer delivery (heavy furniture, bulk items) or where in-store browsing is not a buying trigger.

Setup Requirements

You need a standard product feed (already submitted to Merchant Center), a local product inventory feed that lists which products are at which stores and in what quantity, and a business profile on Google (Google Business Profile, formerly Google My Business). Each store location must be verified in both Merchant Center and Business Profile.

The Local Product Inventory Feed

The local inventory feed is a separate file from your main product feed. For each product at each location, it requires: store code (matching your Business Profile), item ID (matching your main feed), quantity, and price (in case local price differs from online). Submit this feed as frequently as your inventory changes, ideally daily.

Performance Measurement

Local Inventory Ads generate Store Visits conversions in Google Ads, which use anonymized location data to estimate how many ad clicks led to an in-store visit. Enable Store Visits measurement in your Google Ads account to see the full impact. ROAS calculations should account for both online transactions and attributed store visits.