Historically, most marketers have equated search with general search engines like Google. But many of consumers’ most commercially oriented queries are entered directly on retail sites. And for the most part, that means Amazon.
For most internet users, Amazon has long served as a default starting point for at least some searches. According to the "State of Amazon 2016" report from retail experience firm Bloomreach, close to half of US internet users surveyed had named Amazon as the first channel they used to research products online in 2015—already ahead of the 34% who chose search engines. By September 2016, a majority of respondents (55%) chose Amazon as their first stop.
Since then, research has varied somewhat, likely depending on methodological factors, including question wording. For example, in May 2018, ecommerce tech provider Adeptmind asked US internet users about the first place they would go when digitally searching for an item and found a plurality chose Amazon (46.7%), ahead of second-place Google (34.6%) and a different search engine (4.7%).
But when cloud retail provider Kibo Commerce and customer experience firm Watermelon Research asked US digital shoppers in January 2018 about where they researched brands, products or services, more selected search engines (69%) than Amazon (61%).
One of the most recent and largest surveys on this subject to date comes from CivicScience. In June 2019, US internet users ages 13 and older were asked where they “typically start” when shopping for a product online. Just under half of respondents said they went to Amazon, and among those who normally shopped online, the share starting on Amazon was about 58%.