Target expands voice-activated shopping with Google Express nationwide; option to link Target.com accounts to Google coming in 2018
- Other retailers on the Google Express platform include Wal-Mart, Costco, Kohl's and Ulta, according to Google's website.
Context & Ripple Effects
Voice shopping on Google's side has been assembling quickly: Google Home gained the ability to buy from select Google Express partners by voice in February, and in August Google signed Walmart while dropping the $95/year Express fee to widen adoption. Target going nationwide makes it the next major general retailer on that roster, alongside Wal-Mart, Costco, Kohl's and Ulta.
The 2018 account-linking option is the more consequential half: it would let voice orders run through existing Target.com accounts rather than a generic checkout. That matters because later reporting showed Google Express struggling to hold partner stores — expansions like this were Google's attempt to keep big retailers invested in the platform.
First-order effects
- Target shoppers across the country can now order through Google Assistant on Google Home, with a Target.com-to-Google account link promised for 2018 that would tie voice purchases to existing Target accounts.
- Walmart's head start from its August voice-shopping partnership with Google narrows, as Target becomes a second mass-market general merchant on a platform that also carries Costco, Kohl's and Ulta.
Second-order effects
- Competing retailers face pressure to appear on the Assistant surface or risk absence from voice reordering, a channel Google made cheaper to join when it eliminated the annual Express fee.
- Amazon's Alexa, the established voice-commerce destination, now confronts a broadening Google Express roster chasing the same household-replenishment habit.
Third-order effects
- If account linking spreads, Google inserts itself between retailers and their customer relationships — though the later report of shrinking partner counts and Walmart investing in its own infrastructure suggests big merchants may ultimately keep fulfillment and data in-house rather than cede them to an aggregator.
The trend: Big-box retailers are racing onto voice-assistant shopping platforms even as they hedge by protecting their own apps, accounts and fulfillment.