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iAdvize
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The traditional e-commerce flow hasn’t fundamentally changed in nearly two decades. Brands are stuck accepting a measly 2-3% conversion rate. Agentic commerce stands to replace this broken e-commerce model to drive better results for shoppers and retailers. Here we’ll break down why traditional e-commerce storefronts are failing and why agentic commerce is rising up to take its place.
Let’s say a shopper goes to a skincare retailer hoping to build a routine. In today’s world, they take a generic quiz that emails the results, get shown products that are sold out, or browse around aimlessly on PDPs.
But soon, they’ll be pulled into a new type of storefront that can instantly build them a curated regimen based on their budget, skin concerns, and favorite ingredients. Their most specific questions get answered not with canned responses but real expertise, reviews, visuals and key details surfaced at the right time. They check out seamlessly, set up a subscription, and come back for more. The storefront builds on their history instead of starting from scratch—all from the same place.
This is the promise of the AI storefront, where shoppers can depend on AI to suggest and make key buying decisions with minimal input and effort—and it’s the next evolution in agentic commerce.
What Is An AI Storefront?
E-commerce turned physical storefronts into digital ones. Chatbots are giving rise to AI shopping assistants. But agentic commerce is driving an even bigger evolution: the AI storefront.
An AI storefront delivers personalized guidance and product expertise in real time, while dynamically and autonomously adapting the interface to each shopper’s intent to help them move from browsing to buying faster, with more confidence.
More than simply answering questions or guiding shoppers, the AI storefront doesn’t just support the journey, it is the journey. As they continue to evolve, AI storefronts won’t just serve people, but also AI agents that will shop on their behalf.
In short: where chatbots disrupted UX and AI shopping assistants enhanced it, AI storefronts will become the UX, the default environment for modern commerce.
The Differences Between Chatbots, AI Shopping Assistants, and AI Storefronts
Nearly half of online retailers have already integrated generative AI into parts of their operations, most often through chatbots. But chatbots alone won’t take retailers into the era of agentic commerce. The real breakthrough comes with AI storefronts. In the meantime, AI shopping assistants have emerged, enhancing the customer journey today while being a crucial first step to pave the way for the fully embedded AI storefront experience of tomorrow.
What Is The AI Storefront User Experience Like?
The AI storefront offers a more engaging and effective experience across the shopping journey, unifying discovery, decision-making, and final checkout into one seamless, adaptive interface.
Here’s what shopping could feel like in an AI storefront:
Browsing drives a purchase—not more browsing.
A shopper says: “I’m looking for black short-sleeved turtleneck.”The storefront reshapes to show them a few
perfect picks, and explains why they’re a good fit.
Proactive prompts drive engagement and clarity.
The storefront proactively addresses FAQs and specific questions by pulling information across PDPs, blogs, reviews, and more. It offers one-click add to cart options and relevant upsells based on the interaction.
Finalize the sale and prepare for the next one all in one.
The browsing process, questions, shopping cart, add ons, check out and shipping happen in the same place—no tabs, no getting lost across pages and screens, no digging through email.
Improve the customer experience across visits.
The storefront adapts to their tastes, creating a unique customer profile and playbook for each person, instead of slotting them across a few generic ones.
(This video shares our vision of the experience to come, beyond the features available today.)
Why AI Storefronts Win: Key Benefits and Capabilities
Though AI storefronts are still taking shape, retailers can already set their sights and expectations on some clear benefits and capabilities:
Drive Engagement, Conversions, and Delight
- Adaptive, fluid interfaces pull from multiple sources to offer relevant recommendations in real time, transforming static PDPs into dynamic, personalized experiences.
- Proactive by design. The AI storefront doesn’t wait for clicks or searches; it anticipates intent and reshapes the journey, surfacing the right options, context, and guidance exactly when shoppers need them.
Boost Revenue with Smarter Sales Strategies
- All-in-one add-to-cart and cross-sell options to keep a customer in the same storefront conversation, instead of scattered across pages and tabs.
- Strategic decision-making abilities means storefronts can use context and reasoning to make better offers in real-time and employ the right sales tactics for each customer.
Expand Your Reach On Your Site and Across the Web
- Smart product discovery that replaces filters, ineffective search with natural language that makes all of your products easy to find.
- Well-structured metadata and attributes paired with agentic SEO (GEO) strategies ensure accuracy and visibility across human and AI-lead searches.
Maximize Existing Resources to Launch Quickly (and Safely)
- Fast storefront activation to launch in mere days while integrating seamlessly with your existing e-commerce stack, data inputs and outputs, and existing design and marketing standards.
- Data protection to ensure agents transact safely and transparently while accessing only the data they can and should and that customers opt in.
How E-Commerce Leaders Can Start Preparing for an AI Storefront
1. Add an AI shopping assistant now.
AI storefronts are on their way, but the first step is to adopt an AI shopping assistant today. This lets you begin training the LLM to learn what to recommend to shoppers, building the foundation for full-funnel sales conversations and, ultimately, your AI storefront.
2. Define the roles of your AI storefront.
Decide which roles it must take on: sales advisor, product expert, concierge... and map the customer journeys it should own. Choose a partner that can help you design the experience and implement it quickly and easily.
3. Make AI guidance your storefront, not an add-on.
AI storefronts will be the new “front door” of your brand. Don’t tack them on haphazardly. Integrate them as the core experience and craft experiences there just as you have for your website previously.
4. Measure success with new metrics.
Traditional KPIs (clicks, engagement, time on site) won’t capture AI storefront impact. Track guided conversion rates, add-to-cart within conversation, AOV uplift, and repeat engagement to prove ROI.
AI storefronts aren’t a future nice-to-have or just another tactic in the tech stack, they're a fundamental strategy shift that’s reshaping the face of e-commerce. AI shopping assistants are already driving higher conversions, revenue lifts, and customer delight, and AI storefronts will only improve that experience and continue to shrink the distance and effort from needing something to buying it. While the technical and habitual shifts making AI storefronts possible are still developing, AI moves quickly. Retailers that lay the foundation today won’t get left behind tomorrow.
