Amazon product search integrated with Snapchat social app

Wednesday, September 26, 2018 - 09:08 by Mike Price

Snapchat has been up against the ropes for the past few months, but new functionality which allows users to search for items they see while out and about within Amazon’s e-commerce platform could help to improve its fortunes.

Internet Retailing report that the fresh augmentation to the Snapchat app is capable of detecting the precise product that a user points their smartphone’s camera towards, using this to pull up the information and price so that it is then simpler to buy via safe shopping online.

The service is not just suitable for purely visual searches, but will also work with barcodes, which is a sensible move since not every object will be identifiable by sight alone.

All of this is intended to make safe shopping online as frictionless and painless as possible, although the one question that remains is whether or not this is a function that Snapchat’s predominantly young user base will actually be willing to get their teeth into.

This is also not the first time that a retailer has harnessed visual search technology to improve the ease with which random items consumers encounter in the real world can be identified and purchased. Earlier this year a similar capability was introduced by auction giant eBay, freeing users from the need to know the specific brand or the right keyword to search for when shopping.

E-commerce integration with social apps is also on the rise, with image-oriented platforms like Instagram also attempting to get a bigger slice of the pie and generate revenues by pointing users in the direction of retail sites, or even allowing in-app transactions to take place.

Snapchat’s success in the long term does not necessarily rest solely on this Amazon integration, but it is still a significant addition.