Amid the general perception that artificial intelligence is disrupting traditional online publishing and causing declines in advertising and click-through rates, e-commerce software giant Shopify has delivered a completely different result. During the company's recent second-quarter earnings call, CEO Harley Finkelstein publicly stated that AI search has not replaced traditional search engines but has instead become a new driver of traffic and sales growth on the platform, significantly benefiting small and medium-sized merchants on the platform.

Financial data shows that Shopify performed strongly in the second quarter, with total revenue growing 36% year-over-year to $3.6 billion, exceeding Wall Street expectations; gross profit also increased 31% to $171 million. The company clearly attributed part of its unexpected business performance and revenue surge to the rapid development of AI search, noting that traffic and order volume driven by AI grew three times compared to the same period last year during the second quarter.

However, this does not mean that AI is eating into traditional search's share. Finkelstein pointed out that traditional search remains one of the largest sources of buyer traffic and is still growing, with traditional search sessions increasing 1.3 times over the past two years, still accounting for about one-third of all store sessions. In their view, AI plays more of a "complementor" role in search, and the synergistic effects between the two are becoming evident.

When discussing the efficiency of AI search, Shopify explained that traditional search engines primarily rely on keywords and popularity for ranking, while AI agents can directly access a vast product catalog and rich structured data to accurately match complex buyer intent. For example, when users search for products with specific specifications, AI agents consider multiple constraints to filter truly applicable products, rather than simply relying on keyword rankings.

This deep intent matching leads to higher conversion efficiency. Data shows that about half of AI-driven sessions directly lead to product detail pages, a conversion rate 2.5 times higher than that of traditional search. Additionally, 75% of AI-related purchases occur in long-tail products outside the top 100 popular categories, benefiting more small and medium-sized merchants. Currently, Shopify has connected with numerous AI tools and vibe-coding platforms such as Claude, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Manus, Replit, and Vercel, continuously deepening its layout in the AI transaction ecosystem.