ChatGPT Is Now Processing 50 Million Shopping Queries Daily

Missed Tuesday’s webinar? Watch the recording to learn how to unlock cheaper shipping, cleaner metrics, and stronger profitability on Walmart. In this session, the Walmart team joins Goflow to show how Ship with Walmart (SWW) cuts label costs, improves delivery performance, and protects margins—backed by real data and real examples.

OpenAI's "ChatGPT Shopping Research" is now processing 50 million queries daily. This shift marks the emergence of a new structured discovery channel that favors detailed product data and third-party reviews over traditional SEO keywords. Notably, Amazon is currently excluded from this ecosystem, creating a unique opening for DTC brands. → via Dataslayer

Salesforce data reveals that AI influenced $73 billion, or 22%, of global sales during the "Turkey Five" period. From personalized recommendations to chatbot interactions, AI is no longer a backend tool—it is now a primary driver of conversion at scale. → via Altoona Mirror

Despite processing $14.6 billion in sales over the holiday weekend, Shopify leadership has faced backlash for a lack of accountability regarding the Cyber Monday outage. While the platform touted its record numbers, merchants expressed frustration over the silence regarding the downtime that locked them out of admin panels during peak hours. → via X

Amazon is aggressively targeting Instacart and Walmart+, expanding its Same-Day Delivery for perishable groceries to over 2,300 U.S. cities. With perishable sales jumping 30-fold since January, Amazon is rapidly building the cold-chain infrastructure to own the weekly shop, not just the holiday gift. → via TechCrunch

Amazon has announced it will eliminate commingling practices effective March 31, 2026. The change will require resellers to apply Amazon barcode stickers to products with manufacturer barcodes, ending the era of pooled inventory. While brand owners in the Brand Registry are exempt, this move forces a significant operational overhaul for resellers to ensure authenticity. → via Seller Central

Amazon has committed an additional $35 billion investment in India by 2030, bringing its total planned spending to $75 billion. The massive capital injection aims to digitize 15 million small businesses and bolster its logistics network, signaling that India remains Amazon's most critical international battleground. → via TechCrunch

Amazon has launched new Canva templates specifically for creating Shoppable Videos. The integration allows sellers to produce high-quality video content in bulk, directly addressing the algorithm's increasing preference for video over static images on product detail pages. → via Seller Central

Google has expanded its AI-powered "Virtual Apparel Try-On" tool to the UK and India. The feature allows shoppers to visualize clothing on a diverse range of models (or themselves), directly addressing the high return rates that plague the online apparel category. → via Google Blog

Faire, the B2B wholesale marketplace, has reached a $5.2 billion valuation following a new investment round. The funding will accelerate its push into AI-driven commerce and a consolidated shipping model, further digitizing the wholesale procurement process for independent retailers. → via Digital Commerce 360

Live shopping is officially a U.S. juggernaut. TikTok Shop generated over $500 million in sales during the Black Friday-Cyber Monday period, while Whatnot surpassed $75 million in a single day. These figures confirm that livestreaming has moved from a niche experiment to a massive revenue driver. → via Modern Retail

Walmart is piloting a new integration with Pinterest that adds a "Shop Ingredients" button to recipe content. The feature allows users to add all ingredients from a recipe directly to their Walmart cart, streamlining the path from inspiration to purchase for the platform's massive food-focused audience. → via Digital Commerce 360

Amazon's in-house logistics network handled 6.3 billion packages in 2024, nearly matching the USPS's 6.9 billion. As Amazon and Walmart increasingly bring delivery corridors in-house to control costs, the reliance on traditional carriers is rapidly diminishing. → via PYMNTS

U.S. cargo imports are projected to remain weak into 2026, with December volumes expected to drop 12.7% year-over-year to 1.86 million TEU. The decline is driven by ongoing tariff uncertainties, signaling a potential slowdown in inventory stocking as sellers wait for policy clarity. → via Retail Insight Network

Speed is still the ultimate currency. A new survey finds that 68% of online shoppers are willing to pay a premium for 24-hour delivery during peak seasons. Conversely, nearly 50% will abandon a purchase entirely if delivery options don't meet their expectations. → via Supply Chain Dive

When you sell on Walmart, shipping is more than a cost center—it’s the bridge between your operation and your customer promise. This article pulls together the biggest insights from our live session with the Walmart team on cutting shipping costs and protecting margins with Ship With Walmart.

The live shopping boom is just getting started. Analysts project the global live commerce market will surge from $65 billion to nearly $2 trillion by 2030, with the U.S. and Europe contributing $1.2 trillion. If you aren't experimenting with video commerce yet, you are missing the next decade's biggest growth engine. → via Axios

Despite tariff fears, the advertising market is bullish. Analysts have raised their 2025 growth forecasts for global ad spending to 8.8% (up from 6%), driven by the expansion of AI-driven ad platforms and a stabilizing trade policy outlook. → via Axios

It turns out nostalgia has a price tag. Cracker Barrel is continuing to see a sales slump following its controversial logo redesign. The backlash hasn't just been noise on social media—it's actively dragging down earnings, proving that for heritage brands, alienating your core customer base over a design refresh can have real financial consequences. → via Axios