In my day-to-day conversations with brand leaders, from small businesses to larger enterprise operations, what I see is that most brands have a discovery strategy. They are well aware of the steps they’re taking for their customers to find them. Very few, however, have a proof strategy: how they encourage customers to become advocates at the tail end of the customer journey.

If you’re a brand or marketing leader allocating budget across the purchase funnel, the assumption is usually that awareness drives conversion. My team wasn’t convinced. So, in Q1 2026, we surveyed 3,522 Canadian consumers to map the path from discovering a product to buying it, and the data tells a different story. We asked 19 questions across the full journey, online and in store, and the pattern was consistent: shopping today has become an investigation, and the proof consumers seek before they buy is recent, human, and credible. Those characteristics outrank star ratings, influencer content, and AI-generated summaries.

Honestly, because we are biased, we were not surprised that consumer reviews lead decision making. We see it in the work we do with our clients every day. What did surprise us, and this part is completely unbiased, is the degree to which consumers use reviews to inform most every purchase decision they make.

Here’s what we found.

Research Is Now a Given

82.3% of our respondents research most or all purchases before committing. Over half of them research almost everything. Just 1.9% say they rely on instinct or brand familiarity alone.

They also cross-reference. 72.9% consult two to three sources before buying, usually some combination of a retailer page, a search result, and a review or social platform. Only 13.8% rely on a single source.

If your reviews aren’t current and visible in the places these consumers are checking, you’re probably not part of their consideration set. They’re not going deep on any one source. Instead, they’re doing a quick scan across two or three, and if what they find doesn’t look fresh, they move on.

Where Discovery Really Starts

We asked respondents how they usually first hear about a product. Friends and family led at 52.9%. Search engines followed at 43.1%, then creator or influencer content at 38.2%. Retailer websites and apps came in at 35.3%, paid social ads at 27.4%.

The channels that ranked lowest? The ones brands control most directly: brand emails (17.4%), brand websites (13.8%), editorial and blog content (13.3%). AI recommendations sat at 8.2%.

None of this is new information, but the scale of the gap is important. The most trusted discovery channel is still other people. Word of mouth, peer recommendations, and creator content dominate the top of the funnel, and brand-owned channels rank consistently lower. Most brands know this already yet few invest accordingly.

Social Media Starts the Journey But Doesn’t End It

This is where the funnel leaks for a lot of the brands we work with.

When consumers discover a product through social media or a creator, 56.4% immediately search for reviews. Another 22.4% go to the brand or retailer site. 15.0% bookmark it to look into later. Only 1.3% buy without any additional research.

Social is a powerful awareness channel, but this data confirms what we’ve been seeing in practice: it’s not a conversion channel. Consumers treat creator and social content as a starting signal, something that puts a product on their radar. The purchase decision happens somewhere else.

I see this play out in client work all the time. A brand invests in creator partnerships, runs paid social, builds a beautiful content library, and the conversions just aren’t there. The consumer saw the product, was interested, went looking for reviews, and found them stale, thin, or missing entirely. So they left. That lost sale never shows up in the analytics. It just looks like the ad didn’t work.

We’ve now coined this as the “awareness-to-proof gap,” and it’s one of the most common places brands lose money without knowing it.

What Consumers Look for in Reviews

When we asked respondents to pick the three qualities that matter most in reviews, recency led at 59.8%. Reviews posted in the last few weeks or months matter more than volume, more than verified purchase status, more than photos or video.

The second tier was tightly grouped: number of reviews (41.6%), verified purchase (40.6%), customer photos or videos (40.0%). Balanced reviews showing both positives and negatives (34.5%) and detailed descriptions (29.4%) also mattered. Brand responses to negative reviews came in at 10.0%, though as we’ll get to, they play a bigger role than that number suggests.

So, as an example, a health food brand with 400 reviews from a 2024 launch campaign may be losing to a competitor with 30 reviews from the past six weeks. Old proof isn’t working for you. You need continuous review generation, not a one-time campaign that produces a burst of content and then goes quiet.

What Happens When Proof Isn’t There

When proof falls short, it costs you money.

89.1% of our respondents have hesitated or abandoned a purchase because the reviews or recommendations didn’t feel trustworthy. 58.9% said it’s happened more than once. Only 6.1% have never experienced it. That’s a lot of almost-purchases lost because the proof was missing or felt manufactured.

And it’s not just reviews. 63.6% of respondents said overly polished or “too perfect” brand content makes them less likely to buy as well. 21.2% said it actively turns them off. Only 13.8% said it has no effect.

A lot of brand teams still default to the idea that higher production value means higher trust. Our data suggests the opposite. Real photos, real language, real imperfection are working as trust signals. If your content looks too polished, it may be costing you sales.

There is good news, though. Brand responses to negative reviews carry more weight than most brands seem to realize. 81.1% of respondents said a brand’s response to a negative review has at least some impact on their purchase decision, and 32.8% said it can change their mind. If you’re ignoring negative reviews, you’re leaving both reputation and revenue on the table.

Current Consumer Use of AI

As of Q1 2026, AI-assisted product discovery is still early. 52.6% of our respondents have never used AI tools for product discovery. Among those who have, 22.5% always do additional research before buying. Only 3.4% trust AI-generated summaries more than real customer reviews, and over 77% either prefer human reviews or reject AI summaries entirely.

That’s where consumers say they are right now. But we know the market is already shifting.

Google now defaults to Gemini-powered AI summaries at the top of search results. That means consumers are encountering AI-generated product information whether they go looking for it or not. A shopper who searches for a product and reads the AI overview at the top of the page probably doesn’t think of that as “using AI for product discovery,” but that’s exactly what’s happening. Awareness and usage are likely rising together, even among people who would never describe themselves as AI users.

Human-generated reviews and UGC are still the trust layer consumers seek out when making purchase decisions. But AI summaries are increasingly shaping the context in which that proof gets found. What AI pulls from to generate those summaries matters. The quality, recency, and authenticity of your review ecosystem is becoming a factor in how your brand shows up in AI-mediated search, not just in traditional review browsing.

Investing in authentic, current, human proof isn’t a hedge against AI. It’s the foundation that makes your brand visible to both human buyers and the AI systems that are starting to sit between them and your product.

The Online-to-Offline Connection

Online proof doesn’t stop at the checkout page. It follows consumers into the store.

77% of our respondents research online before buying in store, often or almost always. 31.6% arrive having already made their decision. Only 2.6% rarely look anything up before an in-store purchase.

When we asked which online proof sources most influence in-store buying decisions, customer reviews led at 77.9%. Star ratings on retailer websites (50.1%) and customer photos or videos (47.9%) followed. Recommendations from friends or family (41.1%), search engine results (25.0%), and creator content (20.3%) also played a role. AI-generated product summaries came in last at 4.3%.

If you have physical retail distribution, this should change how you think about reviews. The store is the last mile, not the first touchpoint. The decision was shaped, and often made, on a screen before the consumer walked through the door. Review investment isn’t a digital commerce line item these days, it has become part of a comprehensive retail strategy.

The Shipping Cliff

One finding sits outside the trust and proof framework but hits conversion hard: when delivery costs are higher than expected at checkout, 95% of respondents either hunt for alternatives or abandon the purchase. 63.8% look for a promo code, free shipping, or a cheaper retailer. 31.2% just leave. Only 3.3% accept unexpected shipping costs without concern.

All the trust you’ve built through reviews and proof earlier in the journey can be undone by sticker shock at checkout. Transparent pricing and competitive shipping are non-negotiable in the world of Amazon Prime and too-often overlooked by brand teams as not important.

The Halo Effect Is Real

An important consideration that can drastically impact campaign tracking is that the data shows that trust built through one product extends further than most attribution models capture. 67.7% of our respondents say they sometimes buy another product from the same brand they discovered, rather than the exact product they were originally looking for. 85.6% are at least moderately more likely to explore a brand after one positive experience.

A single well-reviewed product, backed by credible proof, becomes the way in for a longer customer relationship. That first moment of trust has value well beyond the single transaction. It drives revenue across your full portfolio, and it’s the kind of multiplier that rarely shows up in attribution reporting but consistently shows up in customer lifetime value. So as much as you’re promoting that new cherry flavour, your original recipe might be enjoying a sales lift instead.

What All This Means for Your Brand

The survey data describes a consumer who buys differently than they did even just a few years ago. In 2026, shopping is an investigation. Trust is a value driver and proof is now a standard metric. The brands that are winning are the ones showing up with credible, current, human evidence at the points in the customer journey where decisions are being made. So, what can you do now to benefit from this data?

Close the awareness-to-proof gap.

56.4% of consumers who discover a product through social media immediately search for reviews. If your social strategy isn’t matched by an equally strong review ecosystem, you’re paying for attention and then losing the sale. Every dollar spent on creator partnerships should have a corresponding investment in generating authentic reviews.

Treat review recency as a priority.

59.8% of consumers told us recency is the quality they value most in reviews. Review generation needs to be continuous, not a campaign that runs once and then goes quiet. A handful of reviews from last month will outperform hundreds from two years ago.

Let authenticity do the work.

63.6% of consumers are put off by overly polished content. 89.1% have walked away from a purchase because the proof didn’t feel trustworthy. Real photos, real language, and real experiences from real customers are what move people to buy.

Recognize that a review strategy is a retail strategy.

77% of consumers research online before buying in store. Reviews are the proof source that travels from screen to shelf. This isn’t a digital-only investment. It’s an omnichannel revenue decision.

The proof-first purchase path is not a trend.

For the 3,500+ consumers in this study, it’s the default. The question for brands is whether their proof ecosystem is built to meet that default, or whether they’re still spending on discovery and hoping the middle of the funnel takes care of itself.

Methodology

Butterly fielded this survey to our advocate community in Q1 2026. We received 3,556 responses, of which 3,522 reached completion. The instrument consisted of 19 questions, primarily multiple choice with select-all-that-apply and rank-your-top-three formats. Our sample skews toward Ontario (53.7%), the 1981 to 1996 birth cohort (52.5%), and frequent online shoppers (67.8% shop online a few times a week or daily). This profile aligns with Butterly’s core community and represents a digitally active, research-oriented consumer segment. Respondent counts vary slightly by question. Full demographic and regional breakdowns are available in the complete report.

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