Google Ads Search vs Amazon Ads Search: Understanding the Real Differences in 2026

“Search” looks like a single line in the media plan.
In reality, Google Ads Search and Amazon Ads Search are two very different tools that sit in different places in the customer journey and in the brand growth curve.

One is the default search layer of the open web (Google).
The other is the default search layer of digital shelves (Amazon).

In this article we’ll take a high-level, strategic view of:

• Why Google Ads Search and Amazon Ads Search exist in the media mix
• How user intent differs between “web search” and “shopping search”
• The role each channel plays across brand growth stages
• Key technical and operational differences between the two
• Typical challenges in managing campaigns (especially on a retail-native platform like Amazon)

If you want a deeper dive into how Amazon advertising behaves as a cost centre, you can also read your article The Hidden Costs of Amazon Ads.

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1. Why “Search” Is Not One Channel

Before comparing, we need clear definitions.

1.1 What Google Ads Search is really for

Google Ads Search (the classic text ad on Google search results) is built to:

• Capture declared intent across almost any topic
• Reach users before they decide where to buy
• Drive traffic to brand-owned or partner-owned destinations (website, app, landing page)

It is channel-agnostic: a single query could lead to:

• Brand websites
• Retailers and marketplaces
• Review sites
• YouTube videos
• Local stores

Search ads here help brands shape consideration and capture demand across the whole digital ecosystem, not just in one store.

1.2 What Amazon Ads Search is really for

Amazon Ads Search (mainly Sponsored Products and Sponsored Brands) is built to:

• Capture and redirect shopping intent inside a retail environment
• Influence which product and which brand wins the basket
• Defend or grow a brand’s share of shelf within Amazon’s category

Here the question is no longer “What should I buy?” in general, but “Which exact product will I add to cart – and from which seller?”.

Amazon search operates inside a closed commerce ecosystem:

• The click does not go to the open web
• The conversion happens on Amazon
• The signal loop (impression → click → purchase) stays within Amazon

This is why Google Ads Search and Amazon Ads Search cannot be treated as interchangeable lines of budget.

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2. Intent: Information Search vs Shopping Search

2.1 Google: intent across the full journey

Google queries span the entire funnel:

• Upper- and mid-funnel:
  • “how to improve audio quality for online meetings”
  • “running plan for first 10km race”
• Lower-funnel but still open:
  • “best headphones 2025 reviews”
  • “Brand A vs Brand B running shoes”

Even when users are “ready to buy”, they often haven’t decided where or from whom. Google Search is therefore a:

• Demand shaper (people discover brands and solutions)
• Demand router (people are sent to whichever channel is most convincing: DTC, retailer, marketplace, physical store)

2.2 Amazon: transactional intent by default

On Amazon, the vast majority of queries are already shopping-intent-heavy:

• “wireless earbuds with noise cancelling”
• “running shoes men size 42”
• “grain-free dry cat food”

Users are:

• Logged in
• Able to buy in 1–2 clicks
• Browsing within a familiar basket environment (saved lists, previous orders, recommendations)

Amazon search is therefore:

• Demand closer for shoppers who already decided to shop on Amazon
• Share-shifter between brands competing on the same digital shelf

Even generic queries (“headphones”, “sport leggings”) happen in a context where the user has already chosen Amazon as a retailer. That changes everything.

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3. Where They Sit in the Media Mix

Think of Google Search and Amazon Search as two different levers in your performance and retail media mix.

3.1 Google Ads Search in the media mix

Google Search typically supports:

• Brand building and discovery (non-brand, category and problem-based queries)
• Consideration and evaluation (comparison queries, “vs”, “reviews”)
• Demand capture for brand and competitor terms

It interacts closely with:

• YouTube (video)
• Display & discovery campaigns
• SEO and content marketing
• Offline media (TV, OOH), which often triggers search spikes

A strong Google Search setup helps brands:

• Be present whenever users look for information about their category
• Redirect traffic towards high-margin channels (DTC, preferred retailers)
• Control brand messaging on brand keywords

3.2 Amazon Ads Search in the media mix

Amazon Search typically supports:

• Retail media performance (ROAS, revenue, share of category)
• On-shelf visibility (search results, product detail pages)
• Portfolio defence against competitors bidding on your brand terms
• New product launches within the Amazon ecosystem

It interacts closely with:

• Organic ranking on Amazon
• Amazon DSP (upper/mid-funnel audiences)
• Promotions, deals, coupons
• Retail operations (stock, price, Buy Box)

A strong Amazon Search setup helps brands:

• Win key category queries (generic and competitor)
• Protect their own branded queries from imitation or private label
• Monetise the demand that was already going to Amazon anyway

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4. Brand Growth Stages: When Each Channel Enters the Game

This is a high-level pattern (there are exceptions), but it’s a useful mental model.

4.1 Early-stage / new brand

Objective: awareness, first buyers, proof of concept.

• Google Ads Search:
  • Often one of the first paid channels
  • Used to test messaging and understand how people search the category
  • Helps send traffic to a DTC site or a selected retailer
• Amazon Ads Search:
  • Comes into play when the brand decides to list on Amazon
  • Used to generate initial reviews and sales velocity for a limited number of hero SKUs

At this stage, Google helps you exist in the category; Amazon helps you exist on a specific shelf.

4.2 Scaling brand

Objective: grow market share and distribution across multiple channels.

• Google Ads Search:
  • Becomes a core demand capture channel
  • Works together with SEO and content to defend brand terms and expand non-brand coverage
  • May be used to selectively push traffic to marketplaces or retailers with strong margins
• Amazon Ads Search:
  • Budget increases as Amazon becomes a relevant sales channel
  • Focus on generic category queries, competitor conquesting and branded defence
  • Starts to integrate with Amazon DSP for full-funnel impact

Here, the two searches start to co-exist:

• Google: captures demand across the open web and distributes it
• Amazon: converts the portion of demand that materialises inside Amazon

4.3 Mature brand / portfolio management

Objective: optimise profitability, defend share, manage portfolio and categories.

• Google Ads Search:
  • Optimised at the margin: efficiency, incrementality, incremental revenue by segment
  • Strong focus on brand safety, legal, multi-country governance
  • Works as a “control room” for how the brand appears across different queries
• Amazon Ads Search:
  • Treated as a retail media line of business
  • Managed by specialised teams or agencies in close alignment with sales and key account managers
  • Used to engineer category share during key events (Prime Day, Black Friday, seasonal peaks)

In this phase, the questions become more advanced:

• How much incremental value do Amazon search campaigns deliver vs organic?
• How should Google search spend be balanced between DTC and marketplaces?
• How do we coordinate promotions, inventory and bids across multiple markets?

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5. Technical Differences: How the Two Searches “Think”

Both platforms use auctions and machine learning, but the signals they ingest and the constraints they operate under are very different.

5.1 Data signals

Google Ads Search typically leverages:

• Query text and match types
• User device, location, time
• Historical behaviour (site visits, app use, YouTube views)
• First-party data uploaded by the advertiser (CRM, GA4, consented audiences)
• Conversion data from websites, apps, offline imports

Amazon Ads Search typically leverages:

• On-site browsing behaviour (product views, detail page visits, add to cart)
• Purchase history and reorder patterns
• Prime vs non-Prime status
• Category-level behaviour (e.g. “heavy buyer” in Home Care)
• Real retail data: price, stock, Buy Box status, delivery options

The retail layer makes Amazon much more sensitive to operational issues: if you are out of stock or lose the Buy Box, your campaigns can’t scale or convert, even with “perfect” targeting.

5.2 Auction and delivery logic

At a high level:

• Google: optimises towards conversions or value on destinations you control (your site, your app, sometimes a marketplace listing). The creative and experience after the click are your responsibility.
• Amazon: optimises towards sales inside Amazon itself. The platform controls both media and store.

This has several implications:

• Amazon can see full-funnel behaviour up to the purchase and beyond (reorders, repeat purchase).
• Google has a broader but more fragmented view; it depends on tracking, consent and pixels.
• Amazon can choose not to show your ad if the system “thinks” another ASIN on the shelf will create a better outcome for the shopper.

5.3 Formats and structure

Google Search:

• Text ads or assets (headline, description, sitelinks, etc.)
• Campaigns segmented by brand vs non-brand, categories, markets
• Increasing use of automation (Performance Max, broad match with smart bidding)

Amazon Search (simplified):

• Sponsored Products → “shelf-level” placements tied to individual ASINs
• Sponsored Brands → upper search placements + brand store traffic
• Sponsored Display → more display-like, but we’ll focus on search here

Structure is often built around:

• Product hierarchy (hero SKUs, long tail, variants)
• Category roles (traffic drivers, margin drivers, entry price points)
• Event calendars (Prime Day, seasonal peaks)

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6. Operational Difficulties: Why Amazon Search Feels “Heavier”

Managing Google and Amazon search both requires expertise, but the type of complexity is different.

6.1 Google complexity: measurement and fragmentation

Typical challenges:

• Tracking performance across multiple destinations (DTC, retailers, marketplaces)
• Dealing with consent, cookies and signal loss
• Avoiding cannibalisation between Performance Max, search and other campaigns
• Coordinating with SEO and content teams to avoid internal competition

Most of the pain sits in measurement, attribution and channel governance.

6.2 Amazon complexity: retail reality built in

On Amazon, campaign performance is tightly coupled with retail health:

• If stock is low, the algorithm may reduce delivery or spend aggressively and then hit a wall.
• If you lose the Buy Box, you might keep paying for clicks that convert for another seller.
• If the content (images, titles, bullets) is weak, your ad can win the auction but lose the shopper.

So Amazon Search managers must think in two layers at the same time:

1. Media layer: bids, budgets, keywords, targeting, placements
2. Retail layer: availability, price, promotions, catalogue hygiene, reviews

This is why retail media is often managed by specialised e-commerce teams rather than traditional paid search teams.

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7. How to Use Both Channels Together

Let’s keep the examples generic, as this is a “high” article.

7.1 Example 1

• On Google Search:
  • Run non-brand campaigns on “best wireless headphones for travel”, “how to reduce noise on long flights” to capture people still choosing between brands and retailers.
  • Use brand campaigns to ensure you own “[your brand] wireless headphones” and redirect users to your website or to the retailer with the best margin/availability.
• On Amazon Search:
  • Bid on generic queries like “noise cancelling headphones”, “bluetooth earbuds”.
  • Use Sponsored Brands to drive traffic to your Amazon Store with curated sub-pages for each use case.
  • Defend your branded terms to avoid competitors capturing your existing Amazon shoppers.

Here, Google helps shape the market; Amazon decides who wins the basket once the shopper is inside the marketplace.

7.2 Example 2 – Emerging beauty brand

• Start with Google Search to:
  • Validate which problems people search for (“acne-prone skin routine”, “gentle retinol for beginners”).
  • Drive traffic to educational landing pages and newsletter sign-ups.
• Add Amazon Search when:
  • You have 1–3 hero products with decent reviews.
  • You want to catch users who already prefer shopping through Amazon and are looking for a solution in your category.

Google becomes your insight engine and lead generator; Amazon becomes your conversion engine on marketplace-driven demand.

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8. Key Takeaways and Strategic Conclusions

Google Ads Search and Amazon Ads Search are both “search”, but they operate in different worlds:

• Google Search → open-web intent, multi-channel outcomes, strong role in discovery, consideration and routing.
• Amazon Search → marketplace intent, on-shelf competition, strong role in conversion and share of shelf.

For brands, this implies:

• Treat them as complementary, not interchangeable.
• Map each channel to specific business questions:
  • Google: How do users discover and evaluate my category and brand across the web?
  • Amazon: How do I win the purchase decision when the basket is built on Amazon?
• Align brand growth stage and retail presence with your search strategy:
  • Early: Google first, Amazon when listing becomes strategic.
  • Scaling: both active, with clear roles.
  • Mature: deeper optimisation, category share engineering, incrementality tests.
• On Amazon, never separate media strategy from retail reality (stock, price, Buy Box, content).

The brands that will win in 2026 are those able to:

• Design one search strategy with two layers: web search and shelf search
• Read intent correctly and assign each channel to the right moment of the journey
• Accept that Amazon Search is not just “another performance channel”, but a retail-native lever sitting at the intersection of marketing and sales

Extended FAQ: Google Ads vs Amazon Ads Search