How to Give Access to Google Merchant Center (and request access too!) in 2025

Google Merchant Center is a simple way to make your products visible to your customer when they make a Google search.

Besides getting extra visibility on Google search results, you'll also need to use Merchant Center if you want to sell through Google’s Shopping feature or run Google Shopping Ads.

Merchant Center is both free and relatively easy to use. And for business owners who are outsourcing account management, listing optimization, or paid ads to a marketing agency, we have more good news: It’s also easy to grant controlled access to your account to streamline campaign management. In this post, we’ll show you how.

What is Google Merchant Center?

Google Merchant Center is a centralized platform for retailers and ecommerce businesses to manage their product catalog and promote their business across multiple Google products such as:

• Google Search

• Google Shopping

• Google Images

• Google Maps

• YouTube

You only have to add and update your product catalog through Merchant Center and they will appear in various places where potential customers are looking to buy.

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How can businesses benefit from Google Merchant Center?

Google Merchant Center and Shopping Ads are useful for businesses selling physical goods and products; it’s not a fit for service-based businesses, who can use other types of paid ads instead. 

After setting up Google Merchant Center, you can:

• Manage and review your online inventory, including images, price, and product information.
• List all the products you sell online to show up through Google searches. 
• Gain insights through the analytics platform, which can help you optimize listings. 
• Create and manage listings with integrations from major eCommerce platforms like Shopify or WooCommerce. 
• Create listings that can be used for Shopping Ads so searchers see your product first for your chosen search term.

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Do I need Google Merchant Center to run Google Ads?

Yes. Merchant Center and Google Ads accounts are separate. You can run search, display, video, and other types of ads with just a Google Ads account. 

However, you will need to link your Google Ads and Merchant Center accounts to run Shopping Ads that appear when potential customers search for products in Google.

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Adding users and admins: types of roles

There are different roles available to delegate to team members, partners, freelancers, or marketing agencies: Roles allow you to control how much permissions each user has: 

• Super admin access: These are users from the Business Manager profile connected to the Merchant Center, and have the highest level of access. Super admins can add, revoke, and edit users' access at any time.
• Admin access: Administrators may add, remove, or edit people, apps, and stores. This access is often given to managerial-level people as admins can add, revoke, and edit users' access at any time.
• Standard access: These users can access listings and accoun data, but they won’t be able to manage other users. They cannot work with reports, view performance insights, or link Google Ad accounts. As a result, this is a good access level to grant marketing agencies who are running paid ads or marketing campaigns on your behalf. 
• Email-only access: These users only receive email reports and alerts.‍
• Performance and insights: These users can edit and delete custom reports and access predefined reports. You can give performance and insights access to agencies that are given standard access.

Learn more about Merchant Center roles and access.

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How to give access to Google Merchant Center

If you want to give access to someone to manage your Google Merchant Center, follow these steps: 

Step 1: Head over to Google Merchant Center and click on the cog (settings) in the top right hand corner.

Step 2: Select 'People and access' in the dropdown.

Step 3: Click on "Add person"

Step 4: Enter the email address of the person you want to invite and give access to, then click 'Next'.

Step 5: Select the role(s) you want to grant this user. You can choose multiple access levels, depending on their job scope and responsibilities.

Step 6: Click "Add user" at the bottom of the page.

Step 7:. The person you invited will receive an email; ask them to click 'Accept'. And that's all you need to add a new user or admin!

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Managing users and access

Someone left the team or you need to edit their access levels?

Step 1: Go to 'People and access' using this link to see who has access to your Merchant Center.

Step 2: Click on 'Manage' beside each person’s name to change their role or remove their access.

This includes changing roles, adding more access, or deleting a user.

💡 To remove someone's access, click 'Remove person' to revoke all access. 

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How to request access to Google Merchant Center

Are you a marketing agency or freelancer who needs access to your client’s Google Merchant Center account? 

To get access, you need to ask your client to add you as a user using the steps above. There is no way to "request access" within Google Merchant Center.

However, we've built Leadsie to automate access requests during client onboarding with our Google Merchant Center integration.

💻 Here's how Leadsie works: 

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The easiest way to get access to Google Merchant Center 

Making manual requests whenever you need client access is time-consuming and wastes your resources. 

Leadsie has a super simple solution: it allows you to request access to multiple Google accounts (13+ social platforms) at the same time.  

With Leadsie, you can send a personalised Leadsie request link to your client. The client clicks on the link, logs in to their Google account and grants you the access you’re requesting. 

If you manage multiple assets for your clients, you can also quickly request access to their Google Analytics, Tag Manager, And Business Profiles via Leadsie with one secure link.

Switch your marketing agency to automated access requests with a free 14-day trial—no credit card needed!
P.S. And you get to keep the account connections after the trial ends! 🙌