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New data shows the growing influence of ChatGPT as a reference for e-commerce sites, but also how small its share of that market currently is.
According to a new analysis by mobile app insights provider UtopiaChatGPT referrals to the retailer’s mobile apps increased 28% year over year during the Black Friday shopping weekend, which runs from Thanksgiving Day Thursday through Sunday.
However, using ChatGPT may not benefit small retailers as much as it helps boost e-commerce giants, Amazon and Walmart. This year, Amazon’s share of ChatGPT referrals rose to 54%, up from 40.5% in 2024. Meanwhile, Walmart’s share increased from 2.7% last year to 14.9% now.
The data was collected by the US Apptopia Panel, which is based on observed consumer activity on mobile devices. Since it is not first-party data, its numbers are just estimates. For this analysis, the company defined a referral session as a retail mobile app session that directly follows (within 30 seconds) a ChatGPT session.
Despite the big jump from 2024, consumers using AI chatbots to find e-commerce deals still represents a small slice of the overall referral market, Apptopia noted. Last year, ChatGPT referrals to e-commerce apps accounted for just 0.64% of all Black Friday ChatGPT sessions, and that number has risen to just 0.82% this year.
In this case, a referral session was any time ChatGPT presented a searcher with a shopping idea or a user clicked on a link directly from their chat session that took them to the retail app.
Apptopia isn’t the only company looking at how AI will impact e-commerce during the busy holiday shopping season. Adobe also reported this week that AI traffic to US retail sites (measured by shoppers clicking on a link) increased 805% year-over-year on Black Friday, and that those who arrived at a retail site from an AI-powered chatbot were 38% more likely to make a purchase.
Additionally, Adobe said AI traffic to US retail sites on Cyber Monday increased by 670%. And in the holiday shopping season so far (November 1 to December 1), AI traffic is up 760%.