The Ability for AI Video Generators to Significantly Decrease Search Costs for Customers on Amazon eCommerce.

According to Wyzowl’s State of Video Marketing Report 2026, the majority (85 percent) of respondents said that after watching a product video, they felt convinced enough to make a purchase. That statistic indicates the amount of effort being spent by consumers looking for products they feel are trustworthy or credible is beginning to decrease as AI video tools, which create videos from basic Amazon product descriptions in less than a minute, become more widely available to sellers.

Search Costs Represent the Time, Energy and Resources Invested by a Purchaser.

Search costs are defined as the time, energy and resources invested by a buyer into researching a product prior to making a purchase. In many instances, search costs can be paid by buyers, even if no money has been exchanged. For example, when shopping for new phone cases, a shopper may quickly scroll through dozens of very similar cases that appear almost identical to the shopper; however, shoppers cannot determine what would likely be considered the highest quality product. As a result, they may choose to purchase the case that requires the least amount of research, and will ultimately be left with an ‘inferior’ product because they put little effort into selecting their desired case. Retailers have been aware of the need to minimise search costs for consumers for a very long time. Retailers do this because as search costs rise, shoppers become less willing to complete a purchase and more likely to opt for the product requiring the least research.

Shoppers Previously Left Amazon to Close Information Gaps Themselves, Disadvantaging Small and Unknown Sellers.

In the absence of a video option on a listing, shoppers would often venture off Amazon to find out more about a product when they were faced with limited information from both the seller's knowledge base (what they knew about their product) and the images captured through the seller's photographs. They would turn to YouTube or Reddit and search for unboxing clips or product reviews or opinions from complete strangers. In essence, this is what is referred to as a search cost. Those consumers most affected by the increased search cost from multiple sources were buyers who were considering making a purchase from an unknown or small seller, and thus were most likely to not have access to that type of video content through traditional online search channels. While established brands would receive free marketing from the unboxing channels when they happened to feature their products, every other seller was placed at a significant disadvantage, either hoping someone would create the content or relying solely on their buyers' efforts to do the research.

Professional Video Production Was Too Expensive for Most Sellers to Produce.

Prior to the availability of AI tools, there was a good reason why sellers were unable to produce videos for their listings. Most sellers do not have the financial resources available to produce a video with their products, because the cost of producing a video can range from hundreds to thousands of pounds. According to Wyzowl's State of Video Marketing report, a quarter of businesses that do not produce videos describe the cost as one of the two top reasons, and the same percentage claims that they do not have a need for video. For sellers operating on thin margins, video spend is ultimately a pricing strategy decision as much as a marketing one.

AI Tools Have Nearly Eliminated the Cost Barrier to Producing Product Video.

With Pollo AI's Amazon-URL-to-video generator, this cost barrier to creating videos has been nearly eliminated. With the press of a button, a seller can take an Amazon product URL and create a completed video of that product in seconds. The video will contain voiceover and visuals extracted from a seller's existing listing. While the Pollo AI product will not take the place of seeing the physical product in hand, it does allow sellers to present all the information included in their Amazon listing in a format that a buyer can view and understand in 15 seconds, instead of having to spend five minutes scrolling through the different images and information and trying to compare them.

Lower Search Costs Translate Into Greater Consumer Surplus for Buyers.

Lower search costs have resulted in a wealth of additional value to consumers; they are not just experiencing convenience, but also a larger perceived consumer surplus. When search costs are lowered, buyers are essentially getting more value for the same amount of money they spent on the product that they purchased, which is what economists refer to as increasing consumer surplus. The time a buyer used to spend trying to determine the value of a product versus the price of the listed product has a significant opportunity cost, and therefore the opportunity created by reclaiming that time creates real value for the buyer, even though the price listed on the Amazon listing remains the same. An AI-generated video does not alter the nature of a product created by a small seller; it does, however, alter the manner in which an unknown, small seller's product is discovered by potential buyers.