Google Challenges Amazon With New Native Checkout, Rolls Out AI Ad ‘Explainers’

Google is standing up infrastructure that lets consumers shop from countless merchants without leaving its properties, whether they’re watching videos on YouTube, browsing on Search, or querying the Gemini app. The native checkout feature strengthens Google’s commerce position against Amazon by keeping consumers on its platforms rather than clicking out to other sites. In conjunction with that change, Google is also introducing new ad formats within its AI Mode search interface and rolling out an AI agent designed to operate as an orchestration layer across Google’s various marketing functions and platforms. The announcements were made Wednesday at the tech company’s annual marketing summit, Google Marketing Live, in Mountain View, California, and follow the announcement of a historic overhaul of the Google search bar. “2026 is the year I see us fully transitioning from AI's potential into its everyday reality,” said Dan Taylor, the company’s vice president of global ads, on a call with press. With Gemini underpinning all of the company’s flagship tools and new commerce capabilities enabled by the recent establishment of the technical standard Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP), Taylor added, “we're moving from marketing automation to marketing intelligence.” Native checkout fortifies Google's walled garden On the commerce front, Google’s new native checkout feature, Universal Cart, acts as a single shopping cart that works across merchants and Google surfaces. A consumer can add makeup from Sephora to their cart from within the Gemini app, then add home cleaning products from Target through Google Search, and a pair of shoes from Nike via a YouTube video—and check out together. The tool is enabled by UCP, enabling Google’s systems to communicate directly with the merchants’ systems on the backend. Retailer launch partners include Sephora, Target, Nike, Ulta Beauty, Walmart, Wayfair, and Shopify, and these merchants will still legally own the transactions completed via Universal Cart. The push heightens the walls around Google’s garden, incentivizing consumers to browse and shop entirely within Google’s ecosystem by eliminating the need to click out to a merchant’s website (though that option remains available). In this way, the development acts as a direct challenge to Amazon. Even so, the company’s Ashish Gupta, vice president and general manager of merchant shopping, insisted Google is not becoming a marketplace unto itself. "We see ourselves as a matchmaker, connecting shoppers directly with businesses,” he said. “We are not a retailer, we are not a marketplace, and that approach continues to guide us in this agentic era as well.” Google is also encouraging advertisers to adopt UCP. By integrating the standard, brands will enable consumers to buy products directly from the ads they see across Google-owned platforms. AI Mode gets new ad formats—and a Gemini-backed ads overlord In tandem with its commerce upgrades, Google is also launching novel ad formats in AI Mode, its Gemini-powered search interface. AI Mode got its first ads last spring. Among the new formats are what Google dubs “Conversational Discovery” units that act as direct responses to user queries. If, for example, a user is searching easy ways to make their home smell like a spa, Taylor explained, Gemini will evaluate the context of that prompt to then generate a custom ad creative from a brand with a potential solution. AI Mode users may also soon encounter “Highlighted Answers” ads, in which sponsored placements appear within a list of recommendations generated by the AI engine. Perhaps the most disruptive update to Google’s AI ad product, however, is the introduction of a Gemini-powered “explainer” feature that will pop up as part of the ad experience within AI Mode. The tool synthesizes information about the service or product and is meant to provide additional context. Google positions the feature as a way to enhance user trust. It is “rethinking,” Taylor said, “the value [ads in AI] provide, because, ultimately, the best ads are just answers.” Of course, the insertion of Google’s voice in the ad experience raises the question of who really controls the narrative. And whether advertisers and consumers will feel confident in the accuracy of the explainer is another unknown. In the coming months, Google will introduce additional AI-backed ad units, including an ad format with a built-in brand agent that users can chat with, as well as AI-powered Shopping ads that pop up in some searches. Agentic orchestration comes to Google's marketing products Google is also looking to streamline the experience for marketers working across its ad stack and various platforms. It’s introducing an AI-powered user experience layer called Ask Advisor, which works across products like Google Ads, Google Marketing Platforms, Google Analytics, and soon, Google’s Merchant Center, to help marketers manage workflows and even orchestrate various agents living across platforms. Ask Advisor, which is in beta, can be used to automatically set up a campaign designed to target a new audience segment or generate an on-demand performance report. Other key announcements from Google Marketing Live Wednesday include the ability to create video ads for YouTube within Asset Studio, the debut of Demand Gen campaigns in Google Maps, and the rollout of a fresh reporting metric, Qualified Future Conversions, that aims to tie actions like brand-specific searches to future sales. Google has told some media buyers it will bring ads directly to its Gemini chatbot this year, as ADWEEK previously reported, but no such plans have yet been publicized.

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Google Challenges Amazon With New Native Checkout, Rolls Out AI Ad ‘Explainers’

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