AI Commerce has arrived

A new wave is reshaping online shopping. Welcome to AI commerce.

Shopping has evolved before. First moving online, then to mobile.

Now it's moving into AI tools like ChatGPT, and this shift is happening faster than most retailers realize.

OpenAI's product search works like having Amazon's catalog paired with a personal shopping assistant. Shoppers simply describe what they need ("best shoes for flat feet") and receive tailored recommendations, detailed comparisons, and direct purchase links.

Soon, you'll complete entire transactions without leaving the chat interface.

This isn't a distant possibility; it's happening now. Shopify is actively testing a Catalog API integration with Perplexity. ChatGPT's shopping capabilities are expanding rapidly. And AI tools are steadily capturing search traffic that once belonged exclusively to Google.

The entire buying journey is being rebuilt around conversational AI. The retailers who understand this shift will thrive. Those who don't will be left behind.

Here's what you need to know.

What AI Commerce means

ChatGPT already displays products like Google Shopping, linking directly to product pages.

But it goes further, showing comparison tables, "how to choose" guides, and detailed feature breakdowns, like affiliate buying guides.

The game-changer is memory. Unlike Google, ChatGPT knows you.

It reviews your conversation history to deliver personalized recommendations based on your actual needs and preferences, not just which products pay the highest affiliate fees.

Every shopper gets a truly customized experience.

Thus we can expect unique results for each searcher.

The bigger disruption is already in development: direct buying within AI search.

Shoppers will soon bypass product pages and brand websites entirely, completing purchases without ever leaving the chat interface. The infrastructure is being built right now through API integrations with platforms like Shopify.

This is a fundamental shift in how people discover and buy products online. Retailers who adapt to this new reality will capture the next generation of shoppers. Those who ignore it risk becoming invisible.

Making your brand discoverable

The most critical adaptation your brand has to make is optimizing for AI discoverability.

This is the difference between showing up and being invisible.

Your products need to be easily readable by AI systems. That means rich metadata and semantically structured information that algorithms can quickly parse and understand.

While your current interactive, visually stunning product pages might drive conversions today. But if AI can't interpret them effectively, they may become a liability.

OpenAI plans to allow merchants to submit product feeds directly to ChatGPT, which you definitely want to do. (They have a signup form you can fill out to be notified here.)

Otherwise, start testing now by searching the way your customers do.

Study which products appear in AI results and examine how they're cited and presented. This will give you some idea of how AI finds and chooses the products it presents.

This area is evolving fast, and no one has all the answers yet, but here are some things I’ve observed about AI search visibility so far:

• Being listed in major stores seems to help (social proof, plus more sources for the AI to pull from)

• Third-party buying guides, product roundups are often cited (get your products listed on as many as possible)

• AI pulls from public product reviews. Focus on getting people to review your products on various platforms

• AI in general heavily cites platforms like Reddit and YouTube. Expect more social platforms to come into play in the future

In general, it’s about visibility.

The more your products are out there and talked about online, the better your chance of showing up in AI searches.

LLM CRO

In AI commerce, clarity > conversion optimization.

As shopping becomes AI-native, your influence over customers’ purchase decisions drops significantly.

Traditional conversion tactics (compelling copy, stunning visuals, A/B tested checkout flows) matter less when AI makes the recommendations. Especially when PDPs are out of the picture.

What matters is providing clear, structured product information that AI systems can easily parse and understand.

AI already knows your target customers better than you do. It understands their pain points, priorities, and decision-making criteria. Your job is to make sure your product information clearly demonstrates how you meet those specific needs.

This shift means awareness becomes the new CRO. We've seen this pattern before on Amazon and Google - success belongs to whoever appears first, not necessarily who has the best product or sharpest marketing.

Getting your product recommended first in AI results has an outsized impact on sales. And the brands and products that figure out how to do this will capture disproportionate market share.

This makes optimizing for AI discovery and recommendation algorithms your most important organic growth lever.

Why retention and loyalty just became an even bigger moat

In AI-first commerce, you lose control over the discovery and consideration phases.

AI decides what to highlight about your product. While your brand messaging, upsells, and CRO features become invisible to shoppers.

What you retain is complete control over the post-purchase experience. And this becomes your most powerful differentiator.

With AI, making a sale no longer equals customer acquisition.

The real work begins after purchase. Your confirmation emails, shipping updates, and delivery experience become critical touchpoints for building lasting relationships and demonstrating value.

These retention flows do double duty. They drive repeat purchases, while simultaneously feeding the discovery engine.

Satisfied customers create the reviews, user-generated content, and social signals that boost your visibility in AI.

With limited control over the platform, strong repeat purchase rates become essential for survival.

Owned channels (email, SMS, mobile apps) provide the stable revenue foundation that protects you from algorithm changes and platform dependencies.

New customer acquisition will always fluctuate, but brands with strong repeat customer revenue and direct communication channels can weather any disruptions.

So what changes, really?

Skeptics argue that not much will change. I see questions like:

• Will people use AI shopping?

Yes. It’s just too much of an upgrade over the increasingly broken Google search experience and the overwhelm of sponsored products on Amazon. And compared to Amazon, the ability to get personalized results, which you can ask followup questions, is just too good. Convenience always wins.

• AI search doesn’t affect direct marketing (which will still drive the bulk of growth).

Not a question, but yes, direct is still a major factor for DTC brands’ growth. But organic search and retention revenue provide the margins that make paid acquisition profitable at scale. Lose organic visibility, and your unit economics may be hard to sustain.

• Will PDPs actually disappear from the buying journey?

Maybe not overnight, but they’ll be bypassed more often. At first, people will probably still click through to PDPs to confirm their buying decision. But in time, the convenience of being able to buy with just a couple of clicks from an AI search will likely become the norm.

There’s a chance that AI changes everything. There’s also a chance it only changes a little bit.

But it will change in some way. You can bet on that.

Being even a few months ahead of competitors creates valuable arbitrage opportunities that compound over time. The brands that adapt first will establish dominant positions before the market catches up.

But having said all this, the fundamentals of selling don’t change.

Unit economics, quality products, and a great customer experience that feeds long-term retention and loyalty have always been crucial, and always will be.

A brand built on these pillars will work before and after AI commerce.

Quick Hits

Ecom Mobile App Benchmark Report

We found a brand that made over $360k revenue in just 30 days with abandoned cart notifications from their mobile app.

This is just one of the fascinating stats we found research and putting this report together. It’s (as far as I know) the most extensive report on ecommerce mobile app performance ever put together.

If you’re wondering if mobile apps move the needle at all, you’ll need to read this. Get it free in the link below.

Read more →

Instagram Posts To Be Indexed in Google

In a couple of weeks, you might start seeing more Instagram content showing up in Google.

While Instagram content already appears in Google, the platform discourages indexing of posts. That’s going to change in early July.

Implications? Not only the potential for more visibility for posts on Instagram, but also more likely that content on the platform will start influencing AI search.

Read more →

Ads Coming to WhatsApp

In more platform news, ads are about to come into WhatsApp. This could be a powerful new way to get in front of customers where they’re less guarded and fatigued by ads.

However, these ads won’t roll out in the EU until next year, reportedly, which puts a slight damper on the news, for a market where WhatsApp has much wider adoption.

Read more →

Using AI to Write Ad Scripts (that don’t sound like AI)

AI can do so much for your creative workflow… but it’s becoming easier and easier to spot when something’s been made with AI.

Pumping out clearly AI-made content in your ads can backfire in a big way.

This is a great guide on using AI the right way - to increase efficiency without pumping out slop.

Read more →

Yotpo’s AI Shopping Guide

Great timing to match the topic of this week’s newsletter - Yotpo just released a great report on how shoppers currently use AI in their buying journey.

The report found that 2/3rds of regular shoppers use tools like Chat GPT to guide their purchase decisions. While 31% of Gen Z respondents say AI is becoming “essential” for shopping.

If you’re in the camp that thinks AI won’t change much about the online shopping experience, give it a read and see if it changes your mind.

Read more →

Surviving 2025 (with Ridge)

In the Operators Newsletter, Ridge CEO Sean Frank shares his thoughts on the current state of play in ecommerce, and why the theme of 2025 is all about surviving.

It’s an insightful read - but one hidden nugget I found interesting was that Ridge acquired an affiliate site related to their niche.

This is an underrated play right now. AI search and Google volatility have been crippling the affiliate site model, so a lot of site owners are looking to get out of the game. This presents an opportunity for brands to acquire sites, send referral traffic to their sites, and also build visibility that helps your products show up more often in AI searches.

Read more →

Beauty Brands Grappling with Raising Prices

Related to survival, a lot of beauty brands in particular are having to make calls on whether to increase prices to absorb tariff impacts (and take the potential hit on conversions).

This is a good look into how some top brands are approaching the situation right now. Worth looking at if your brand is in a similar spot.

Read more →

The Secret Sauce Behind Fast-Growing Ecom Brands

In this excellent writeup, Eli Weiss breaks down the common threads with fast-growing brands like Grüns, Create and AG1.

These insights really resonate. In a nutshell, these brands all tackle simple problems, deliver a great product, and focus on building a strong brand.

The best quote:

“Performance marketing fills the funnel. Brand is what makes people want to stay in it.”

Read more →

That’s all for now.

I’ll be back in touch next week, with more on how successful brands are doing CX and retention right.

If there’s any topic you’d like to see us dive into, for either the newsletter or the podcast, just shoot me a message here.

Until next time,

Pietro and The Retention Edge Team

PS: want to boost retention, revenue and profitability? If so, launching your own app could be the best move you make this year.

See how: go to our website to get a preview of your app for free, or shoot me a DM on LinkedIn to talk about it.