Key stat: Search is the primary way 34% of US shoppers navigate retailer websites, well ahead of promotions and deals at 23%, according to an April survey from Profitero.

Beyond the chart:

• That search bar increasingly catches demand created somewhere else. Consumers run about six prompts in an AI chat before jumping to an ecommerce site to buy, and when Adidas got mentioned in those conversations, branded search activity rose 7%, according to Verve.
• Meanwhile, the two search paths are pulling apart. Just 1.28% of products on Google's traditional results pages also showed up in AI Mode for the same query on the same day, per Productrise, and when the same product appeared in both, AI Mode carried the higher price 68% of the time.

Use this chart: Drop this in your onsite merchandising review to defend search investment over homepage real estate. Show it to teams building AI assistants on a nine-percent base. Use it to benchmark your own site analytics against how shoppers say they actually move through a retailer's pages.

Related EMARKETER reports:

• US Ecommerce 2026 (EMARKETER subscription required)
• Retail Media's Untapped Social Media Opportunity (EMARKETER subscription required)

Methodology: Data is from the July 2026 Profitero report "Digitally Influenced Shopper Report 2026 - US." 1,000 US shoppers ages 18+ were surveyed during April 2026. Respondents were a nationally representative sample of US primary or joint household purchase decision-makers.