Agentic commerce explained: the future of AI eCommerce

Agentic commerce is redefining how products are discovered, evaluated, and purchased in eCommerce. Instead of shoppers manually browsing stores or marketplaces, AI agents increasingly act on user intent, researching options, comparing products, and recommending purchases automatically.

This article explains what Agentic commerce is, why it matters now, and how brands can prepare by optimizing their product data for AI-driven buying. You’ll also learn why structured, AI-ready product feeds are becoming the foundation of this new sales channel and how Channable helps brands get there.

Key takeaways

• Agentic commerce is a new eCommerce model where AI agents handle discovery, comparison, and buying on behalf of shoppers

• Agentic AI eCommerce relies on structured, accurate product feeds to make decisions

• ChatGPT and AI assistants are emerging as real sales channels, not just search tools

• Brands that prepare AI-ready product data early gain a lasting competitive advantage

• Automation enables Agentic commerce through optimized, AI-ready product feeds

What is Agentic commerce?

Agentic commerce is a new eCommerce approach where autonomous AI agents act on shopper intent to discover, evaluate, and purchase products.

Instead of users clicking through category pages or scrolling marketplaces, AI agents interpret goals like “find the best running shoes under €150” and do the work for them, instantly filtering options, comparing specs, and recommending the most relevant products.

At its core, Agentic Commerce shifts buying from human-driven exploration to AI-suggestions.

How Agentic commerce is different from traditional eCommerce

Traditional eCommerce and Agentic commerce operate on fundamentally different assumptions:

Traditional eCommerce	Agentic commerce
Search-driven browsing	Intent-driven decision making
Humans compare products manually	AI agents compare products automatically
Optimized for clicks and pages	Optimized for structured data
Discovery happens on marketplaces and webshops	Discovery happens inside AI searches

The role of AI agents in Agentic commerce

What are AI agents?

AI agents are autonomous systems that:

• Understand user intent

• Retrieve relevant product data

• Evaluate options based on constraints (price, availability, preferences)

• Recommend or execute purchases

Tools like ChatGPT, AI assistants, and embedded shopping agents increasingly perform these steps in a single conversational flow.
According to McKinsey, generative AI is already reshaping how consumers discover and decide, especially in commerce-heavy categories like retail and travel.

Why structured product data matters

AI agents don’t “browse” websites the way humans do. They rely on:

• Clear titles and descriptions

• Accurate pricing and availability

• Consistent attributes (brand, size, color, GTINs)

• Structured formats like product feeds

If your data is incomplete or inconsistent, AI agents simply skip your products.

This is where AI-optimized product feeds come in. Channable’s AI Product Listing capabilities help brands structure and enrich product data so it’s usable by AI agents from day one.

Why Agentic commerce matters now

We’re entering a zero-click buying era

Shoppers increasingly get answers and product recommendations without ever visiting a website. This is known as zero-click discovery, and Agentic commerce accelerates it.

Instead of:
“Search → Click → Browse → Decide”

We now see:
“Ask → AI decides → Product recommended”

ChatGPT as a sales channel

ChatGPT and similar AI assistants are evolving into discovery and decision layers. Product recommendations happen directly inside conversations, and buying decisions are influenced or finalized there.

This makes ChatGPT a new sales channel, not just a research tool.

Channable already supports this shift with innovations like an OpenAI product feed and AI Max for Google, helping brands make their products discoverable and usable in AI-driven environments.

The problem Agentic commerce solves

Traditional product listings were built for humans, not machines.
That creates problems in an agentic AI eCommerce world:

• Inconsistent attributes across channels

• Missing availability or pricing signals

• Poorly structured descriptions

• Limited control over how products are interpreted

When AI agents can’t clearly understand your product data, you lose visibility and control.

Agentic commerce solves this by prioritizing:

• Clarity over creativity

• Accuracy over abundance

• Structure over storytelling

With the right product feeds, AI agents can confidently select, recommend, and rank your products.

The three pillars of Agentic commerce

Agentic commerce isn’t powered by a single technology, a combination of data quality, distribution, and continuous optimization enables it. Together, these form the three pillars that determine whether AI agents can discover, evaluate, and recommend your products.

1. Structured, trusted product data (your foundation)

Structured product data is the single most important requirement for Agentic commerce.
AI agents don’t infer meaning the way humans do. They rely on clearly defined, standardized attributes to determine whether a product is relevant, available, and suitable for a given intent.

That’s why your product feed must be treated as a single source of truth.

AI agents read your product feed to answer critical buying questions, such as:

• What is the product?

• Who is it for?

• Is it available right now?

• Does it meet the shopper’s constraints (price, size, brand, material)?

If your feed doesn’t answer these clearly, your products won’t be selected.

How to prepare:

• Start with your product feed, not your storefront

• Ensure all core attributes are present and machine-readable

• Remove ambiguity and unnecessary marketing language

2. AI-ready standardization and clarity

AI agents rely on patterns, not creativity. This makes standardization essential.

Inconsistent formatting across your catalog makes it harder for AI agents to evaluate and compare products reliably.

Key things to keep in mind:

Standardize your product attributes

• Ensure attributes like brand, size, color, material, and category follow a consistent format

• Avoid variations like “Nike / NIKE / Nike®”

• Use normalized values wherever possible

Improve product titles and descriptions for clarity

• Write clear, specific, and factual titles

• Prioritize what the product is, not how it’s marketed

• Avoid vague language and missing context

Good product titles and descriptions help AI agents understand:

• What problem the product solves

• How it differs from alternatives

• Whether it fits the user’s intent

This is where AI-powered feed enrichment, like Channable’s AI Product Listing capabilities, can dramatically improve clarity at scale.

3. Availability, accuracy, and continuous optimization

Agentic commerce operates in real time or close to it.

If an AI agent recommends a product that’s unavailable or incorrectly priced, it creates a dead end. Over time, this reduces trust and eligibility for future recommendations.

What this pillar requires:

Maintain availability and pricing accuracy

• Ensure pricing and stock updates happen in near real time

• Keep discontinued or out-of-stock products from surfacing or being advertised

• Reduce mismatches between feeds and actual inventory

Audit your feeds regularly
Optimizing feed quality is not a one-time task.
Regular audits help you:

• Catch missing or broken attributes

• Identify formatting inconsistencies

• Fix outdated pricing or availability

• Improve overall AI-readiness over time

As AI agents evolve, so should your product data.

Bringing the three pillars together

Agentic commerce rewards brands that are:

• Clear in how they describe products

• Consistent in how data is structured

• Accurate in pricing and availability

With the right foundation, AI agents can confidently surface, compare, and recommend your products, without human intervention.

That’s why data feed management isn’t just an operational task anymore. It’s a strategic advantage in the age of Agentic commerce.

How Channable enables Agentic commerce

Channable isn’t just a feed solution, it’s infrastructure for agentic AI eCommerce.
With Channable, advertisers can:

• Build AI-ready product feeds from a single source of truth

• Enrich listings automatically using AI

• Control how products are interpreted by AI agents

• Prepare for emerging sales channels like ChatGPT

If Agentic commerce is the future, product feeds are the language AI agents speak, and Channable helps brands speak it fluently.

Preparing for Agentic commerce starts now

Agentic commerce is already reshaping how buyers discover and choose products. As AI agents take on more decision-making, brands that invest in AI-ready product data today will win visibility tomorrow.

The good news? You don’t need to rebuild your commerce stack. You just need the right foundation.

With Channable, brands can prepare their product feeds for Agentic commerce, ensuring they remain discoverable, relevant, and competitive as AI becomes the new buyer.

Learn how Channable powers Agentic commerce with AI-ready product feeds.