Limited performance due to missing value: GTIN

What Google requires

A GTIN wherever the manufacturer issued one

Google expects the gtin attribute for every product that has a manufacturer barcode: the EAN on European packaging, the UPC on American, the ISBN on books. Where a product genuinely has none, a brand plus MPN pair is the documented fallback for most categories, and products with neither are declared with identifier_exists: no. The one thing the rules never allow is silence: a product in a category where barcodes are normal, submitted without one and without a declaration, is assumed to be incomplete data rather than a barcode-less product.

What happens if you do not

Reduced visibility rather than a refusal

Merchant Center files this under limited performance: the product stays approved but competes with listings that carry full identifiers, and Google matches it to fewer queries because it cannot join your row to its catalogue of known products. In practice that reads as impressions quietly missing rather than a red status, which is why this warning is so often left standing for months.

How to fix it by hand

Three cases, three different fixes

• The barcode exists and is in your systems: map it into the gtin column of the export. This is the common case for resellers of branded goods.
• The barcode exists but you never recorded it: it is printed on the packaging and usually available from the supplier's data. Collecting it is tedious and worth it, because identifier coverage affects every product, every day.
• The product has no barcode, own-brand or handmade goods for instance: supply brand plus mpn, or declare identifier_exists: no. Do not declare it when a brand and MPN are present, because the contradiction is itself a disapproval.

Which of our checks apply

6 checks apply, read from the scanner's registry

The scan separates the three cases for you: products where the fallback already satisfies the rule are not flagged as missing, and contradictions are reported before Google sees them.

• gtin_absentat risk
• gtin_absent_fallbackat risk
• brand_missingat risk
• brand_placeholderblocks
• identifier_exists_valueblocks
• identifier_exists_contradictionblocks

The quicker way

Let the scan find them

The scan reads every identifier field in one pass and tells you which products actually need a barcode, which are covered by the fallback, and which contradict themselves. The scan to identify errors is free and shows every finding before you pay anything. You only pay for the fix.

Scan your feed