A new study by marketing data firm Searchmetrics has discovered that Google Shopping has effectively ceased trying to increase competition after Brexit.

Five years after the EU commission fined Google 2.4 billion euros (£2bn) and ordered it to open its Google Shopping service in Europe to external competition, data has found that around 53% of ads on the UK platform still originate from Google itself.

This is around a 49% increase on the numbers collected in 2019, with Searchmetrics research indicating that after Brexit, Google has stopped actively trying to increase competition.

Additionally, the research suggests that most of the external participants on Google Shopping are not providers of genuine comparison-shopping services which Google’s action was intended to benefit. Many are marketing agencies that have emerged after Google’s fine.

The EU ruled in its 2017 antitrust suit that Google was giving itself an ‘unfair advantage’ by promoting its own ads on the platform over those from rival comparison shopping websites which help consumers compare different products and prices to make informed purchasing decisions.

Searchmetrics researchers reviewed over one million Google Shopping ad units across the UK and Germany to analyse how the tech giant is complying with the EU’s call to introduce greater competition onto the platform.

By comparing the results to its previous studies, Searchmetrics concludes that Google had to some extent initially attempted to increase external participation in the UK. But since Brexit its efforts seem to be declining.

Data showed that, of the 47% of Shopping ads in the UK which are not placed directly through Google, only 19% come from rival price comparison websites who were the intended beneficiaries of the EU’s action.

The rest, around 28%, are mainly from performance marketing agencies that sell ads on the shopping platform’s auction system giving Google a margin.

Commenting on the data, Lillian Haase, CMO of Searchmetrics, said: “Our data suggests that Google’s share of UK shopping ads was around 68% in 2018. And in line with the EU’s call to increase competition this was brought down to 51% by 2019.

“However, since Brexit happened, Google’s share of ads in the UK has started to rise again, reaching 53% in 2022 so far.

“The trend clearly shows that after Brexit, the EU Commission’s demand for more competition no longer applies to UK search results.”

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Google’s solution to addressing the lack of competition, has been to open-up participation to Comparison Shopping Services (CSS) who can take part in the online auction by bidding against Google for advertising positions on the shopping platform.

These external providers can accept bids for ads from online merchants who want to appear in Google Shopping.

But according to Searchmetrics, while some CSS providers are genuine comparison websites, most are performance marketing agencies who offer comparison shopping services in name only.

Many were formed after the Google fine in 2017. And while they may run comparison shopping portals, they only list the products sold by merchants whose bids they manage on the Google Shopping auction system.

This means they are otherwise largely irrelevant for genuine comparison shopping. Their only function is for Google to demonstrate that Shopping ads are shown from other publishers than itself.

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