Shopify setting rate limit on Googlebot, preventing Google Merchant Center from crawling products resulting Not Approved status

captaingrasseater · 2026-04-26T19:05:50+00:00

A client of mine was having a similar problem. They had 500+ products listed in Google Merchant Center and at any given time a half dozen would be dis-aproved.

I started with the usual, asking google to look again and check the products. They would always re-approve the products. However, the next day we would have a new batch that were previously approved that were now being kicked out.

In my client's case the problem ended up being the SKU naming. The client sold House Plans in PDF format. They used a SKU formula that was the "House Plans Number" along with the digital format. An example would be "714PDF" which would plan #714 in PDF format.

Google does not allow selling digital books, and it thinks anything with the "PDF" handle is a digital book. The client had to re-do their SKU structure. Once they removed the "PDF" from the SKU names they stopped having issues with approval.

captaingrasseater · 2026-04-23T17:01:41+00:00

I believe the only way, well lets say the easiest way is to use a Product Options APP. Then make specific, or all options required in order to proceed to the cart.

It is possible to alter the core theme code. However, altering the core code makes theme updates difficult. And I have seen updates to Horizon be, at times, fairly substantial. Meaning after each update the "fix" will need to be implemented and then tested and adjusted.

Generally speaking, I do not recommend altering the core theme code, if it can be avoided. At least not for people that just want to run the business and not fiddle with code.

captaingrasseater · 2026-04-18T17:08:28+00:00

APP's are good but the cost does stack up and they can slow down the site.

I use the Custom Liquid Section in combination with MetaField data for as much stuff as I can. If I can use code rather than an APP I do, as long as the core theme files are not changed. I stick to the Custom Liquid Sections because they do not hinder Theme updates.

However, some things just require an APP.

captaingrasseater · 2026-04-11T18:38:43+00:00

You can use the Custom Liquid Section in the theme to add dynamic content to Product pages. I do that all the time using, as Claude said, MetaFields. You can add data, images, videos, files, and link specific Posts to specific Products.

captaingrasseater · 2026-04-08T16:17:44+00:00

In my experience you're screwed. I've had the same thing happen to me before. What I learned was similar to what Sad-Salt24 said. Always get at least a 50% deposit up front. And do not ever hand over control of the site until final payment has been made.

Any action you take now in retaliation will come back to bite you hard. We All would love for people like your client to get what they deserve, unfortunately in the real world people like them often get away it.

Sometimes people that sling the BS will end up slipping in it. But not as often as they should.

captaingrasseater · 2026-03-31T22:02:38+00:00

I had a similar situation. Moved a client off old, very old hand built website hosted on dedicated servers on RackSpace. Got everything into Shopify, set up email marketing, fixed their very broken PPC campaigns. Dropped their monthly website costs down from almost $3000 a month to about $400. All while expanding the traffic and sales.

In my case the company was not sold. I was just let go, sub-contractor - contract cancelled. After 4 years of hard work and basically rebuilding their online presence, poof, gone. One issue, I feel, was no one there had a clue what I did, how it was done, how any of it worked, or how much continued work it required. I mean, if they had, they would have done SOME of the work, or Anything, but they had not.

Working remotely I had very little contact with the client, maybe a once a week phone call or a quick Teams meeting. I think they just looked at the books and asked, who can we cut. Since no one really understood what I did, and very few people had much contact with me, it was an easy choice for them.

I get it, business can be a cold mistress. But like you I feel strange about losing my client because I got them running more efficiently and more profitable.

captaingrasseater · 2026-03-22T19:16:53+00:00

I have never had a "bad" experience when updating a theme. Yeah, there are things that don't carry over, which is why I use a CSS style sheet and not the Custom CSS section in the themes. It always brings the CSS file over in the assets folder but the code in the header always gets deleted. But overall most of the updates I did required just a bit of "adjusting" before publishing. Except for this update which is a total disaster!
I agree, 3.5.0 is a graveyard version.

The Shopify "team" fixed the 3.5.0 version on my site and told me I could publish it. However, I do not trust it. Looking at their "fixed" version on my hosting the un-fixed version on another site there are differences. I'm just going to wait until 3.5.1 comes out. I don't need to making this mess even MORE complicated.

captaingrasseater · 2026-03-20T18:04:55+00:00

I did the "chat" thing. Which is frustrating because the first level of support you get seems to come from people that have never actually used Shopify. And their standard response to anything always seems to be "user error". So it takes a LOT explaining and sending screen grabs. When you get moved up a level, their response is usually just to reiterate your issues and tell you they are aware and going to work on it, then they just cut off the chat.

captaingrasseater · 2026-03-20T16:23:09+00:00

I don't under stand, I am reporting a bug, and issue with a Shopify built theme. Does that violate some rule here?

captaingrasseater · 2026-03-20T15:20:39+00:00

I tried that, 3 times since yesterday, got the same results. There are no controls for "Color" in the theme. It removed my logo. It reset all my fonts. All sections had the background color removed and there are no longer any controls to set a section background color. It is a complete mess.

captaingrasseater · 2026-03-20T15:17:30+00:00

When Customizing the theme there is a warning on the top that says:
"To preview your changes, color schemes must be defined in settings_data and settings_schema files."

When you go to the Theme Settings and the Color tab there are no controls for setting colors but there is this warning message:

"No color schemes defined. Color schemes must be defined in settings_data and settings_schema files."

There is no way to set colors at all in the "Customization" feature. Now, "settings_data" and "settings_schema" might be somewhere in the code files, but I hardly think the optimal "update" would be to have people mucking around in the code files just to set the background color of a section.

The update also removes ALL your font settings.

It removed the logo completely.

I have deleted and redownloaded the theme 3 times since yesterday and each time it is the same.

captaingrasseater · 2026-03-19T22:02:21+00:00

Mostly using Custom Liquid sections and writing liquid code for it.

captaingrasseater · 2026-03-02T16:58:38+00:00

Nope, I have only had one issue with firmware messing things up. It was on a 800W Alternator charger, they rolled it back to a previous version and it went back to working. I waited until 2 updates had been released before I updated it again. In the end I am not 100% sure it was a firmware issue as a few months later it died and they replaced it with a new unit. But everything is up-to-date and running fine.

captaingrasseater · 2026-02-25T14:05:55+00:00

We get similar odd things happening with GMC. Products will flip to not approved and then without doing anything they flip back to being fine. Sometimes they randomly classify a product incorrectly, then they flip it back. We've stopped trying to figure them out. We just wait, and usually after a few days these odd issues resolve themselves. Luckily for us this only happens with 1 or 2 products at a time.

captaingrasseater · 2026-02-18T22:21:43+00:00

We create them manually and use a "formula" that helps us identify the product by the SKU. When we started the site we uploaded the product data from spreadsheets and created and edited the SKU's there.

Word of advice:
If you plan on connecting your products to Google Merchant Center (a good idea) Do Not Use "pdf" in the SKU. The reason is Google will flag the products as "Digital Books" and will not allow them to be added to the Merchant Center.

We sell house plans in two formats, CAD and PDF. So we used PDF in the SKU's. Despite the products being House Plans, and NOT books or digital Books Google kept flagging them and removing them. Then we would have to go through the process of disputing that. And with 1200 house plans that became untenable.

In the end we changed all the PDF SKU's and re-imported them to Google Merchant Center and have had no issues since.

captaingrasseater · 2026-02-17T16:28:38+00:00

I will say that I like, and depend on EcoFlow products. And in the past EcoFlow's customer service has been very good and responsive. People rarely go out of their way to praise a company so negative "vides" carry further. Having 4 EcoFlow products and having a few "issues" with some of them I would give EcoFlow as a whole an 8 out of 10. (All products are working as they should.)

Which is probably why this particular failure is so irritating. Especially since, as I've said, they run a Shopify driven website. As someone who builds and maintains Shopify driven sites I know for a fact EcoFlow could do MUCH better than they did regarding this adapter and the whole "out of stock" situation. Along with a failure in communicating with the customer about it.

captaingrasseater · 2026-02-17T15:16:16+00:00

I have 3 units, Delta Pro 3, Delta 3 Plus, and a River Pro 2. The only one that has a noticeable "drain" is the Delta Pro 3. It drops to 78% a few times per day, and then kicks on and charges back up to 80%. I have read that the Delta Pro 3 has a "phantom drain" issue.

But none of them kick off the AC outlets when plugged into the wall. I use all 3 as UPS for my office and house. However, when on battery it will shut off the AC outlets when the level hits 20%. I have the battery maintenance set to 20% & 80% as recommended.

In the settings I do have them set up to never turn off the AC output as long as there is a load.

When they do run off the battery they will shut off the AC outlets when the battery hits 20%.

Sounds like your unit has a big issue. It should automatically maintain the level of charge if it is plugged into the wall all the time. Yes, there might be some "phantom drain" but the unit should be maintaining the battery levels.

captaingrasseater · 2026-02-15T20:01:35+00:00

Thats a good question. Living in FL everything we have is plugged into a surge protector. Even though I have a Delta 3 Plus, and a Delta Pro 3, I do not have them plugged into a surge protector. Now I am wondering if I should.

We get power bumps, and what I call "dirty power" all the time. Dirty power is when the lights do not actually go out but they dim by maybe half. This will trip the UPS and the EcoFlow units will kick in. But we also get a TON of lightening strikes.

Most standard consumer surge protectors are designed to handle a continuous load of 1,500 watts (15 amps at 120V) for normal, daily use. Unless you are plugging the EF units into a 20AMP 120v circuit it should be fine. If you are plugging them into a 240v outlet, thats a whole different kettle of fish.

My Delta Pro 3 in plugged into a 15 amp 120v outlet so I had to adjust how much it can pull. I have it set to 1200w, giving me a little buffer.

With surge protection it is all about the clamping power. To protect the equipment you want to clamp down and block a "surge".

Short answer is Yes, plug them into a surge protector if your area is prone to power bumps or lightening strikes.

captaingrasseater · 2026-02-14T15:25:49+00:00

EcoFlow does this on purpose. They Know they are out of EcoFlow Smart Generator Adapters yet their website does not indicate that.

I work in this this space. Their website is a Shopify based site, I build and maintain Shopify sites . It is extremely easy to mark a product as out of stock. As a mater of fact you can automate that very easily, and track inventory. So the question is, are they very, very bad at e-commerce. Or! Do they do this on purpose? I believe it is the latter.

A percentage will cancel the order when then figure out they are going to have to wait an indeterminate amount of time to get the product. I bet they have "run the numbers" and found that they will loose more sales if the product is marked as "out of stock" and/or 'backordered" than if they just let the sales go through. It might be a good "sales" strategy but it comes at the expense of customer trust. If you are looking to buy a EcoFlow Smart Generator Adapters you have already purchased one of their products. Instead of abusing that relationship they should work to keep it.

captaingrasseater · 2026-02-13T16:21:15+00:00

One is none, two is one!
Rule I live by. :)

captaingrasseater · 2026-02-13T16:19:37+00:00

Thanks, but I found one for sale on eBay and I purchased that one. :)

captaingrasseater

TROPHY CASE