Announced at Amazon Accelerate 2023, are 5 new search and discovery features making it easier to buy when, where, and how you want. This might not be immediately a benefit to sellers, but if buyers start shopping more often when, where, and how they want that can only be a good thing for conversion rates putting more cash in small businesses accounts.
As Amazon’s selection has grown, they have continuously launched improvements to product search and discovery experiences to ensure shoppers can find what you’re looking for.
As soon as you click on the search bar, Amazon show your recent searches, as well as trending searches that may be of interest to you. They have also made improvements to autocomplete suggestions, spelling corrections, and suggestions for related searches that sometimes appear at the bottom of search results, to help you easily fine-tune your search queries.
Amazon are always testing new features and honing existing ones to see what works best to help customers in every phase of their shopping journey. Below are just a few of the recent ways they have improved the search and discovery experience on Amazon.
The 5 ways Amazon are making it easier to buy
1) Searching with a combination of images and text
One of the most complex scenarios Amazon encounter is helping a customer find what they want when they don’t know what they are looking for. For example, you need a replacement part for a home appliance, but don’t know the name of the part. To help you navigate this situation, Amazon offer the ability to tap the camera icon in the search bar and snap a picture, and their visual search algorithms will find the best possible matches across the vast selection.
Amazon recently added a new feature to our visual search tool that enables you to add text to your visual search queries. When you perform a visual search, you’ll see the search bar with the thumbnail of the image you captured, along with a prompt (“+ Add text”) to add any text to help narrow your search results. For example, if you’re looking to order a replacement part for your dishwasher, you can now snap a photo of the part and type the brand of appliance (e.g., “Frigidaire”) to narrow your search results.
2) Visualizing products on tables and countertops
When making a purchase for home items, such as a sofa, espresso maker, or smart TV, you want to know whether the product will fit in your room and look good in your space.
Amazon recently extended their View in Your Room feature—which enables you to see exactly how a piece of furniture or décor will look in your space—to include tabletop items, such as lamps, home décor, and small appliances like toaster ovens and coffee makers.
The new mobile experience uses augmented reality to place the products you’re searching for on a tabletop surface in your home. Not sure if that coffee maker will fit on your kitchen countertop? Now, using View in Your Room, you can easily visualize how it will look in your space and make a more confident purchase decision
You can move the products from one surface to another to better evaluate how these products fit in your environment. To get started, click the “View in Your Room” button under the product image on the mobile product detail page.
3) Discovering popular products with sales trend information
Amazon know that what customers search for and purchase changes over time and are always adding new products to the Amazon store. They recently started showing sales trend data (e.g., “10K+ bought in past month”) in search results and on product detail pages, to provide more information about the products you’re searching for.
Now, in addition to seeing whether an item has thousands of five-star reviews or is a Best Seller, you also have an indicator of the product’s recent popularity.
4) Searching with the sharing feature on mobile
Amazon know you often see products you like when checking email, browsing social media, or engaging in an online conversation, and want to search for them in Amazon’s Store. Now you can, with Find-on-Amazon.
If you spot a product you like anywhere online, tap the “Share” button, choose the Amazon Shopping app, and click “Find products on Amazon.” You’ll be taken straight to the Amazon Shopping app, where you’ll see similar products. You don’t even need to know what the product is called, or how to describe it. With Find-on-Amazon, finding what you want has never been easier.
5) Making it easier to reorder previous purchases
Amazon know that many shoppers search for previously purchased items, so they have made it even easier to find them.
Once Amazon recognize that you are searching for a previously purchased item, they’ll present the item at the top of search results with the date of the last purchase. In cases where it is a frequently reordered item, they will also show a thumbnail image of the item in the search bar, making it easy to click to the product detail page and complete the purchase.
