Why is my non-stick pan sticking? High temperatures can damage most nonstick pans. That's why I love this bad boy from our place. This is temperature save up to 1,000° and it's virtually indestructible. We sh run. Good morning. I'm Sarah Engel. Look at all of you up this morning on day three in Vegas. Um, we're glad to have you here. I'm so thrilled to be here with Sean Scott, the general manager of Google Shopping. We've had a fantastic time. Your team is fantastic wherever they are. Just really getting to know how you see the future of shopping, how you see consumer behavior shifts. So, we're going to start with you've been at Google for about a year. um from your years at UT if we have any Longhorns in the audience. Hook them. None. Hook them. Anybody? No. Hook them. Okay. Um we tried um to you know Amazon for years and now at Google Shopping. So um I would love to just kind of hear what has surprised you most. You know what you thought was going to happen versus you know how things really are. What's what's surprised you most? Yeah. So, I'm the GM of Google Shopping and it's my job to help customers find the products they're looking for, discover new brands or just to answer simple product questions and so been at Google a little over a year and uh full disclosure, I was a big Google fanboy prior to coming to Google. I was I think the early days of search, early Gmail, I'm very proud of my Gmail uh personal address. Uh given when you get in on a bait on something, you can pick really cool email addresses. It does lead to a little bit of spam now, but uh as everybody tries to stick to it, it's worth it. Totally worth it. Uh but you know, all the great products over the years, even had my Google glasses in 2013. And I think it's really because, you know, Google has this great ability to take a product and really redefine and reimagine what's possible. You look at something like mail and then you look at what Gmail did. You look at the browser and what Chrome did or Google Maps, YouTube, all these products have just such an amazing track record. And so, you know, when I got the opportunity to come to Google, of course, I was pretty excited to join Google because it was a, you know, such a fan for so many years and I can honestly say it's lived up to my high expectations. So many smart people that I get to work with every day. So, I'm, you know, truly humbling to work with some of the smartest people, literally the smartest people on the planet, solving some of the hardest problems in the world. And it's a it's a really special time. And if I, you know, take a step back and look at last year, what a what a year. I mean, it's every day it seems like there's some big major announcement either from Google or from industry. And it's changing everything. It's changing the way we shop. It's changing the way we live. It's changing the way we work. And so, I can't think of a better place to be right now than at Google at this this period of time. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I think um you know most folks here today they want to hear your perspective and Google's perspective on what is really shifting about consumer behavior. You know kind of what's the hype and what you're really seeing. So talk to us a little bit about the biggest consumer behavior shifts that you think really matter right now for shopping. Yeah, consumer behavior has changed forever and we're really seeing four key shopping behaviors define the modern shopping journey and that's streaming, scrolling, searching and the reason we're all here is shopping. And this shopping journey is predictably unpredictable. You know, we see eight and 10 purchase journeys involve multiple touch points. And so, uh, if you think about, you know, all this that's happening, it's a it's a pretty different pretty place that we're in compared to where we were a few years ago. Now, the good news is that means there's countless opportunities to influence customers. You know, if I look at my own personal behavior, I'm constantly screenshotting interesting products I find on a daily basis. And I use these products for gifts. So, maybe it's for Christmas or maybe it's for a birthday. And if I look at the diversity in the range of these products, it's all over the board. It's from not only the types of products like everything from your think of like your little stocking stuffers of toys and video games to electronics to even more expensive items like handbags and sunglasses and jewelry. And it just I think it really shows you that inspiration is everywhere uh throughout this journey. But pro tip, if you're going to follow my strategy of, you know, taking screenshots, don't buy until you're ready to give because not every retailer, you know who you are, have those generous six-month return windows. But really do yourself, you know, take a step back and think about some of your recent purchases and you know, how many touch points did you go through before you actually made the purchase? and then put your marketing hat on and really think about, okay, how are we going to influence shoppers across all these different stages and really get in front of the customer. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I think um a lot of folks I've had a lot of conversations here actually are asking behind the scenes asking the question like is my conversion journey is longer my, you know, I'm seeing so many more touch points. Is it just us? Is it something wrong with our site? Is it something wrong with the way that we're going about search? Um how do you look at the shopper journey right now in terms of, you know, from discovery all the way through purchase? Yeah, you really have to look at that the entire flow. It's not just good enough to look at a a part. You really have to be everywhere the customer is. And so really thinking about, you know, what are we going to do at the upper funnel? What are we going to do at midfunnel? What are we going to do kind of at the end close to purchase? And do we have those touch points to make sure we can influence the purchase? Yeah. Um All right. So, let's talk about um you know, you guys talk a lot about I think Google puts out a lot of future of shopping kinds of um perspectives. My question is how far out is the future of shopping? How accurate do you think you can be for how long? Is that 2030? Like how long can you go out and what do you what are you guys specifically building that is going to build into that future? Sure. Yeah. We're living in an era of information overload and for shoppers it can often feel like finding a needle in a haststack and so we think a lot about how do we better connect brands to customers and help them cut through the noise. And I think we're well positioned to do that as 83% of Gen Z use Google and/or YouTube on a daily basis. So that's a pretty staggering number. 83% on a daily basis. You know, when we think about the future, we're really thinking about technologies that are assistive and highly personalized experiences. And so last year we launched the new Google Shopping. So if you haven't used Google Shopping, uh it's a pretty remarkable experience. We're pretty proud of it. And it's built from the ground up with AI. And so it allows you to do some things in search that we haven't been able to typically do as shoppers before. And so for example, full disclosure, a couple weeks ago, I decided to search for a new outfit for a shop talk. Okay? So I went into Google Shopping and I searched for men's jeans for a Shop Talk keynote. And now that's a pretty atypical query. There's no probably nothing in any database in the world that says if you're going to wear jeans to shop talk, here's exactly what you need to wear. And so the site actually responds with a paragraph summary telling you the things to think about for a shop talk keynote. And so for denim, it says consider a dark wash, straight straight cut, uh maybe something with a little stretch, uh that because you may be sitting or standing and it's a really amazing experience to get that type of result back. And then we can show results categorized by those same attributes that we called out at the top. So again, really powerful. Similarly, I live in the Seattle area and I'm a big skier. And so instead of just searching for skis, I search for skis for the Pacific Northwest. And again, we show a summary of things to consider for skis in the Pacific Northwest. Like consider a wider ski because the snow is heavier and wetter and a little bit chunkier. So you want a wider ski that can cut through that. And then we show you product recommendations using AI to really consolidate all the professional reviews that we see talking about wider skis. And then again, we show categories of products below that. And what's really, I think, unique and amazing about all this is that we're not a retailer. We don't have any inventory. We don't ship anything. And yet over a billion times a day, people are shopping across Google, which I think really speaks to the power of the platform. So, I', you know, invite you all to go try Google Shopping if you haven't already. So, either go to Google, type in your query, and hit the shopping tab, or you can go to shopping.google.com and really see kind of the power of AI and what we've built. And I think it really speaks to the future and where we're headed and how we're thinking about our products. Yeah. Um, you said AI a couple times. I think on day three, we were probably like 10,000 uh references at Shop Talk into AI. Um, I guess the question is as competition, as your AI search competition gets stronger and stronger, uh, and there's more and more news about it every day, how does Google look at search right now from an AI perspective? Like specifically in the context of shopping like yeah, we know how Google Shopping works. The question is like what do you see next? How do you stay ahead of that when there's so much competition in AI search? Uh, we've been innovating search for decades and some of our newest features like AI overviews, lens, and vert.ex AI search really take this to the next level. And not only are they driving more queries, but they're actually creating more opportunities for retailers and merchants. If we look at one in particular, Lens, raise your hand if you've used Google Lens. See a quick show of hands. A few people, not nearly enough people. Um, Lens is amazing. So, it lets you visually search the open web with a photograph. So, literally you can take a picture of anything. So, I can take a picture of your great shoes and start shopping for those shoes. We show you the price. We show you where you can buy. And it's just such an amazing experience. Um, I like to go to my friend's house and take pictures of their furniture and show them how much it cost and show them where they can buy it. And they really appreciate seeing that in the context of their own home. Uh but usually by the end of the dime, the end of the journey, I've converted another lens customer. Uh we also saw a lot of customers uploading screenshots and so we invented circle search. So right there in the context of your own app or your browser, you can circle the image or part of the image and kick off that same visual search. Now this is extremely powerful way to search. So no text. And there's, we were talking yesterday, there was a planter on a table. And imagine trying to describe a very textured ornate planter with words. It's nearly impossible and you would probably never find it giving, you know, all the products that we have on the web. And yet, a simple picture finds it almost instantly. And these new features, new capabilities are really working. We have about 20 billion visual lens searches per month. And one/4 of those have commercial intent, which really shows you, I think, the innovation and the power of some of these new features. These new features are not only driving, you know, more engagement, but they're also creating more qualified leads for you and ultimately more sales. And you guys continue to really dig in on natural language search at the same time as visual search. Absolutely. Okay. Absolutely. We see a the world is going to a multimodal world. So, it's not just A or B, it's A and B. So it's uh it's it's pretty exciting just all the things that are happening right now. I'd agree with you. I mean um you know of course I've I've used Lens and used a lot of you know looked at visual search quite a lot and how you can describe something in words versus what that image looks like is completely different and I think it answers some of the challenges people have had from a search perspective of I don't want five million results of what I might be asking. I just want you to tell me the answer and I think visual search definitely helps in that way. Um so let's talk a little bit about you know the rest of the purchase journey. Social media is often seen and by most people in the audience probably seen as the point of discovery whereas you're seen as the point of you know getting getting down the funnel into conversion. So how do you think of Google's role versus a Tik Tok versus a meta? How do you see your role in the actual discovery process? Yeah, I think what really differentiates Google is trust. Customers trust us for everything from their smaller impulse buys to some of their largest most complex life decisions. Uh we all have those friends and family members we go to to ask questions like you know what laptop should I buy or what should I wear to a shop talk keynote that fashionista friend that you rely on for help in critical situations like this and for many people including those same people you're asking they rely on Google and YouTube for their answers. YouTube is the number one choice for product recommendations uh and product information. And so when we think about, you know, YouTube videos, we think about short form videos really help with discovery, but I think longer form videos can really help build brand and build trust. You know, I'm constantly looking at smartwatch videos to see what new smartwatch features are coming out, uh, as well as new cycling videos. There's a few channels I subscribe to on YouTube, and I rely on these these channels to really inform me on the latest bikes, the latest cycling gear. Uh, and I think I probably buy about half the products they're showcasing. And I'm not alone as Google and YouTube are present in about 2thirds of the journeys where customers discover new brands, products, and retailers. And I really think that speaks to not only the trust, but also the reach of our platforms for both publishers and advertisers. Yeah. And I think the um the YouTube opportunity with younger generation, too. I have teenagers and, you know, I know exactly how they how they look at it. So, that that makes a lot of sense. I um one of the things I want to talk about I've had this conversation quite a few times here but over the last four months I'd say there is just so much conversation especially from CMOs cos um I'm being held accountable for building a brand you know I I can't just dump all my money in and expect performance to to be the end- all beall I need to build a brand but I also have to comp right now I have to build sales right now and so I would like to hear your perspective like how do you think about that balance of building brands over time but driving sales right Yeah, we we get it. You know, marketing budgets are extremely tight and you have to make sure every dollar spent counts. You have to show that marketing is a profit driver and not just a cost center. And so, I think one area of opportunity is really to look upstream and a good example is Urban Decay. Urban Decay relaunched their eyeshadow palette by partnering with YouTube creators to use YouTube shorts to target a younger demographic and their results were pretty amazing. They saw a 278% increase in search, which far exceeded L'Oreal's expectations. And I think this really goes to the power of the creator community. In fact, online shoppers are 98% more likely to trust YouTube creators than they are other platforms. And so, if you think about that coupled with, you know, a 278% increase in search results, I'd sign up for that any day. Yeah, thanks for sharing that example. I think that that makes it tangible. Um, one of the we have a few more minutes. I'd love to kind of hear your recommendations for the retailers and brands in the room like about growing their business, you know, and growing their bottom line. You know, that I think that is quite different right now than it's been even a year ago and especially literally the last few months as we look at consumer behavior as it pertains to um the econ the economic situation. So, how do you kind of recommend people look at their budgets right now, look at their business? I think it's really two sides of the same coin. You know, you have to balance the the brand building, the longer term trust with those, you know, shorter term opportunities to to really get in front of customers. And so, I don't think, again, back to all the different touch points that you have throughout a purchase journey. I don't think you can say we're going to go all in on this area or all upper funnel. It really is a, you know, a journey that you have to be involved in because as soon as you decide, you know what, we're only going to participate in this part of the journey, you're going to lose in the rest of the journey. And so it it does require you to kind of take that more balanced portfolio approach and to really think about it like a portfolio and make sure you are touching all the various touch points. Yeah, it makes I I've seen a lot um it requires a lot of education. It requires some new metrics and education of those new metrics when everybody in the organization's looked at the same things or your board's looked at the same exact things for years and they're looking at comps and they're looking at the same um the same rorowaz numbers, whatever the case may be. You almost have to like find new metrics, all align and agree on in them and then teach even your higher ups exactly how we're going to look at this. We're not getting rid of your old metrics. Don't worry, we're going to work some new things in that are focused more on brand. That's right. It's a different world and you need those kind of historical comps to know how are we doing in those areas, but it is a new a new world and we have to look at it with a new new set of eyes because the world's changing. I want to um I want to end with you know I think there's a lot of a lot of doom and gloom out there. you're such a positive person and I would love to hear like what are you genuinely excited about either as it pertains to all the consumer behavior shifts that you're seeing or from a technology standpoint like whether it's Google or not what what are you excited about right now? I get excited about everything. Um uh but I I do think you know we can't say it enough that AI is a significant opportunity not just to run better ads but to actually run a better business. And I I really do think the brands that are the most willing to adapt and the most quickest to adapt will be the ones that get ahead. You know, all the time I'm getting the question, how do I take advantage of all the AI foundations, all the AI innovations that are happening around me? And the answer is to actually look at the foundations that are powering those AI experiences. And for us, it's structured product data in Merchant Center. Merchant Center is the AI foundation for Google and YouTube for all the features we've talked about like lens, like AR reviews, uh, like performance max and demand gen. One thing we haven't talked about is local shopping. So local shopping is another feature that's powered through merchant center and it really bridges the gap between online and offline retail. You know, there's a lot of times in life where you don't want to wait for 3 days, 5 days, you know, a week to get a product. Like, case in point, I was uh fixing a leaky faucet in my son's bathroom a couple weeks ago. I get it all apart and I need this little cartridge and I didn't have it. So, I used Lens, found the product on Google Shopping, saw there was available at a local hardware store, went and bought it, and within about an hour, I had the faucet back together. And so, I was pretty excited for myself. But I think the real magic of that whole experience is was you all in making sure your data is actually there for customers like me to find it locally. Now what that means is you have to upload you know not just your online inventory or not just one store's inventory but all of your stores inventory because again shoppers are everywhere and if you're going to reach them wherever they're at you need to make sure that that inventory is available for them. So dads like me can fix leaky faucets. Yeah, I love that. Thank you so much for sharing your perspectives. Thank you all so much for being here. Have a great rest of the show today. Great. Thank you.