By Carson Cobb. Data collected November 2026.
A common worry for direct to consumer brands: AI will answer the shopper’s question and then send them to Amazon. If that were true, being recommended by AI would mostly help marketplaces.
So I recorded every link Google AI Mode put in its answers to 72 buyer questions, sorted each one by type, and compared it with the sources ChatGPT showed for the same questions.
The short version
- Brand websites got the most links. 39% of AI Mode’s links went to brand websites, against 6% to retailers.
- Amazon was rare. It appeared in 5 of 48 answers.
- Specific questions sent even more traffic to brands. For long, specific questions, brand websites got 49% of links and appeared in 22 of 24 answers.
- Reddit and YouTube are everywhere. Reddit appeared in 19 of 48 answers and YouTube in 18.
- When AI Mode named a brand, it linked to that brand’s own site 42% of the time. For growing Shopify brands it was 47%.
- ChatGPT leans on publishers. It showed more review site and magazine sources than brand store links.
Where Google AI Mode’s links go
| Link type | Short questions (48) | Long, specific questions (24) |
|---|---|---|
| Brand websites | 39% | 49% |
| Editorial and review sites | 29% | 16% |
| Community (Reddit, YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, Substack) | 18% | 20% |
| Health and expert sources | 7% | 5% |
| Retailers and marketplaces | 6% | 10% |
| Total links | 341 | 146 |
| Answers that included at least one link to | Short questions (48) | Long questions (24) |
|---|---|---|
| A brand website | 35 | 22 |
| An editorial or review site | 40 | 12 |
| A community source | 34 | 14 |
| A retailer | 15 | 7 |
Two things stand out.
AI Mode sends shoppers to brands more than to stores that sell many brands. For every link to a retailer, there were about six to a brand’s own website. This doesn’t count the shopping cards AI Mode shows with prices and merchants, which come from Google Shopping. Those cards mix brand sites and retailers.
The more specific the question, the more AI Mode relies on your own site. When shoppers describe their situation, editorial roundups matter less (29% to 16% of links) and brand websites matter more (39% to 49%). A roundup can tell AI which products are popular. Only your product page can tell it whether your product suits someone with sensitive skin or a dog that pulls. See how question wording changes AI recommendations.
Does the brand AI names get the click?
| Brands named by AI Mode | Own website linked in the same answer |
|---|---|
| All brands | 42% (103 of 245) |
| Growing Shopify brands from my dataset | 47% (27 of 57) |
When AI Mode recommended a brand, it linked that brand’s own site a little under half the time. Growing Shopify brands did slightly better than average. The rest of the time the shopper got a review, a Reddit thread, a video or a product card instead.
Food and apparel brands were linked most. In food and beverage questions, 63% of links went to brand websites, often to the exact product or collection page. Supplements were the exception: 17% of links went to brands, and 28% to health and expert sources like medical sites and testing organizations.
| Product type | Brand websites | Editorial | Community | Health and expert | Retailers |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Food and beverage | 63% | 23% | 10% | 1% | 3% |
| Apparel | 56% | 21% | 23% | 0% | 0% |
| Pet | 34% | 20% | 18% | 7% | 20% |
| Home | 30% | 48% | 19% | 0% | 3% |
| Beauty and skincare | 28% | 26% | 30% | 9% | 7% |
| Supplements | 17% | 33% | 12% | 28% | 10% |
Pet was the one area where retailers took a real share (20%), spread across large pet retailers, online pet pharmacies and Amazon.
Reddit and YouTube
Reddit appeared in 19 of 48 AI Mode answers and YouTube in 18. In beauty and skincare, community sources were the largest share of links (30%), ahead of brand sites and magazines.
These are places a brand doesn’t control, but can take part in: answering questions in the subreddits where your product comes up, and making or supporting honest video reviews and demos of how the product works.
How ChatGPT compares
ChatGPT shows its sources differently, as labeled source pills and product links inside the answer. Across the same 48 short questions:
| ChatGPT | Count |
|---|---|
| Source labels from publishers and review sites | 79 |
| Links to brand stores | 57 |
| Answers showing at least one source | 44 of 48 |
| Answers with a brand store link | 14 of 48 |
ChatGPT leaned more on editorial sources than AI Mode did, and Reddit showed up as a visible source only once. See the sources ChatGPT cites.
Gemini showed almost no clickable links in its answers, 9 links across 2 of 48 answers, and named its sources as short labels instead.
What this means for a Shopify brand
- Your product page is a destination, not just a listing. AI Mode links straight to brand sites more than anywhere else. The page it lands on has to confirm the recommendation fast.
- Answer the specific question on the page. Specific questions sent half of all links to brand websites. That’s where your product page earns the click.
- Earn the roundups and the threads. Editorial and community sources still made up almost half the links on short questions. The review sites and Reddit threads in your space decide whether you’re in the answer at all.
- Keep your Google Shopping data clean. The product cards AI Mode shows come from Google’s shopping data, separate from the links in the answer.
- Measure AI traffic by landing page. More than half of AI referred sessions on Shopify start on a product page, according to Shopify’s own data. Watch conversion on the pages AI sends people to.
Which sources recommend your competitors but not you, and where AI sends your shoppers, are both part of my AI Search and Conversion Audit. For a quick start, run the free AI Visibility Check.
How this was done
- Questions: the 48 short buyer questions from Who ChatGPT recommends and 24 long versions of those questions, across apparel, beauty and skincare, food and beverage, home, pet and supplements.
- Google AI Mode: each question asked in a new thread on November 5, 2026, signed in with no apps connected. Every link in the answer was recorded, excluding Google’s own links. Links in the source previews below the answer were included. The product cards Google shows with prices and merchants were not counted, because their merchants depend on the shopper’s location.
- Link types: each linked domain was classified by hand as a brand website (a brand selling its own products), a retailer or marketplace, an editorial or review site, a community site, or a health and expert source.
- ChatGPT: source labels and brand store links recorded from the answers to the same 48 questions on November 4, 2026, in temporary chats on a paid plan.
- “Own website linked”: the brand’s own domain appeared among the links in the same answer.
- Shopify data: from Shopify’s May 2026 report on AI search, which found that more than half of AI referred sessions begin on a product page.
No store or brand is named in this report.