If Jeff Bezos woke up in a cold sweat last night, it's probably because he sensed the partnership Google and Walmart announced today. It sees hundreds of thousands of Walmart products available to purchase using your voice and a Google Home gadget or Google Assistant.
From late September, hundreds of thousands of Walmart products will become available through the Google Express shopping service. Ordering can be done using your voice and a Google Home gadget, using the Google Assistant, or directly through the Google Express website.
If using your voice you can order one product at a time, or you can add lots of products to your cart that way and complete the purchase later using the app. Walmart also integrated its Easy Reorder feature into Google Express allowing for simple repeat purchases.
Google intends to use the Walmart account link to offer personalized shopping results based on what you buy through Express, but also what you buy when visiting a Walmart store. So expect your Google Express recommendations to improve if you start using this new service next month.
As an added incentive to try Google Express, Google is from today offering free one-to-three day deliveries as long as your order is above a store's minimum. So that should apply to Costco, Target, and many others immediately, with Walmart orders getting the same option next month.
If you own a Google Home device or an Android phone and regularly shop at Walmart, this partnership should make shopping more convenient. It also offers Amazon greater competition in this space where the Prime-Echo-Alexa combination works so well.