AI-powered search engine Perplexity is moving into e-commerce. The company on Monday debuted new shopping features for paying customers in the U.S., offering shopping recommendations within Perplexity search results and the ability to place orders without visiting a retailer's website.
With this move, Perplexity aims to take on Google and Amazon and capture a slice of shopping search results.
For shopping-related search queries, the tool presents users with a visual card that includes product details, pricing, seller information, a short description, and the pros and cons of the product in question. Users can click or tap a card to read more information, including reviews and details on key features.
Image credit: Perplexity
Consumers can also save their address and credit card details in Perplexity for easy checkout. The company says taxes are calculated based on your address and you can purchase items with just one click. The company says Pro subscribers will receive free shipping on items purchased through its one-click checkout system. For now, Perplexity points out that the search engine's recommendations are “unbiased” as there are no sponsored slots.
The new search experience is powered by integration with merchant sites, including Shopify's sites. The latter unlocks information about all sellers who use Shopify to ship products within the United States.
This feature also provides a way for users to search by adding a photo of the product they want along with their query. This is similar to Google, which offers different versions of its product that allow you to combine images and text in the search box.
Alongside the launch of its shopping tools, Perplexity is introducing a seller program.
When sellers sign up for this program, the index includes more complete information and is more likely to be recommended. You can also purchase products from the company's retail partners using one-click checkout, the company said.
Merchants will now have free API access to perform powerful searches on their own websites as well, which could help Perplexity gain market share in this space. The company said it does not currently receive affiliate shares from users' purchases. Additionally, the company clarified that the shopping feature is separate from the advertising product introduced last week.
Apart from Big Tech, startups like Daydream, Deft, and Remark have also raised millions of dollars from venture capitalists to build AI-powered shopping search.
Amazon debuted its AI-powered assistant Rufus in the U.S. earlier this year and expanded it to other countries late last month. After its Prime Day sales event in July, the company said Rufus had helped “millions” of customers find the right product. Google also introduced AI to its Shopping tab in October to deliver better search results.
With the advent of large-scale language models, companies in the e-commerce industry are able to parse user queries and match catalog items using organized and unorganized data. I realized there was an opportunity to suggest a better option.
The promise of this new wave of search is that e-commerce searches have been bad for years, but now you can write long sentences to describe the products you need and AI will do the work for you. That's it.
These companies are also betting on the fact that AI will help them find products quickly, eliminating the need to spend a lot of time looking for them. However, this assumption comes with an implicit caveat. You should trust the limited search results provided by AI tools. To build trust, companies providing these tools need to ensure that implicit bias and preferential treatment are removed before regulators intervene.