Google’s looking to add another way for shoppers to get more info about a retailer in-stream, by adding new, aggregated AI summaries of online store reviews that you can access when you visit a website.
As you can see in this example, Google’s rolling out a new option in Chrome that will enable shoppers to easily access a cumulative overview of reviews of a company while visiting their site.
To check out the review, you’ll soon be able to tap on the info icon to the left of the URL on your Chrome web browser (not available on mobile at this stage). That will activate a drop-down overview, which will include an AI-generated summary of available reviews.
As explained by Google:
“Google gathers store ratings from reputable websites that aggregate business reviews, as well as from users on Google. These ratings primarily reflect customers’ overall post-fulfillment consumer experience with your business on a country basis.”
Google’s keen to note that it’s not using AI to create reviews, but simply summarizing them into a single paragraph, while the listing will also include the business’s star rating, based on Google reviews.
It could be a handy way to glean more info about a business, though no doubt some brands will be keen to control what information gets displayed, and ensure that this is a positive reflection of their brand.
The risk in this respect is that AI summaries could get things wrong, and could emphasize the wrong points, which may be a negative for the business. But in theory at least, these summaries should be no easier to manipulate than general Google reviews, and the summary should be a good, simple reflection of the overall feedback about a business.
Which could be good for consumers, even if it does add another expanded SEO-style consideration for brands.
And if it catches on, your Google reviews could be even more important, with consumers able to access those insights at any time during their visit to your site. So you’re not just trying to win that initial click, that checking method will be available at every stage, which, depending on how Google looks to highlight this, could be worth considering.
It’s another addition to Google’s evolving shopping tools, with the platform looking to fend off competition in search, and ensure it remains the key destination for discovery.
