Session Slides

Today we are talking about something that is happening right now - not in 5 years. Shopping with AI. You might have heard the term agentic commerce. We are going to break that down, look at what is live today and what is coming fast, and most importantly, think through what this means for you - whether you are selling something, marketing something, or just trying to stay ahead of a shift that is going to hit every business. This is one of those sessions where being early is the advantage. Let's go.

Think about how shopping worked even two years ago. You open Google or Amazon. You type a keyword. You get a list. You click through pages. You compare prices on three tabs. You read reviews. You decide. You checkout. That entire process - start to finish - required you to be present, clicking, and making every decision. AI was hidden in the recommendation algorithms, but it never talked to you and it never acted on your behalf. That is the world we are leaving.

Here is the shift that is happening. In the old model, AI was a research assistant. It helped you find things. You still had to go do all the steps yourself. In the new model, AI is the buyer. You say: I need flowers delivered to my girlfriend by 6 PM tonight, under 3 million dong, something romantic. The AI finds the options, compares them, picks the best one, processes the payment, and confirms delivery. You approved it. The AI did it. That is agentic commerce. The agent does not just advise - it acts. This is already starting to roll out and it is moving fast.

Let me run through what is actually live as of 2026 so you have a clear picture. ChatGPT launched product cards - visual search results with images, pricing, and reviews. Checkout started with Etsy and has expanded to Shopify stores and Stripe-connected merchants. The big unlock is that any business with a Shopify account can now connect to ChatGPT and be shoppable inside the conversation. Perplexity launched shopping with real-time price comparison and direct buy links - it is genuinely good at research-heavy purchases where you want to compare specifications. Amazon launched Rufus, their AI shopping assistant built into the Amazon app - it can answer detailed questions about products and navigate the catalog conversationally, though it is still catching up. Gemini has deep Google Shopping integration - real-time pricing, store locations, reviews, and Google Pay checkout potential. The common thread: every major AI platform is becoming a storefront.

Do this right now. Open ChatGPT or Perplexity on your phone or laptop. Search for something real - not a test query. Ask it the way you would ask a knowledgeable friend. "I'm looking for a beginner golf club set under 500 dollars" or "What is the best project management app for a team of five with a tight budget?" Watch what happens. Does it show product cards? Does it compare options? Does it give you a link to buy? Note what platform you are on and whether checkout is available. We will share what you found in two minutes. The experience is different depending on where you are in the world - and that gap is part of the story.

Every time a new commerce model launches, the first reaction is: I do not trust it. And that reaction is always right - and always temporary. When online shopping first appeared, people said they would never enter their credit card on a website. Then Amazon made it convenient enough. When Grab launched, people said they would never share their location with a food delivery app. Now they cannot live without it. AI shopping will follow the same curve. The first time you tell an AI to buy flowers and they arrive at your partner's office that afternoon - you are converted. The trust question matters for early adoption timing. It does not matter for where this ends up. Convenience wins. That is the pattern.

If you sell anything - products, services, courses, food - you need to be thinking about this now. Here is what matters. First, your product data has to be structured and clean. AI shopping pulls from product feeds, schema markup, and catalog APIs. If your product descriptions are vague, your images are low quality, or your data is not machine-readable, you are invisible. Second, GEO - Generative Engine Optimization - is the new SEO. Getting your products found inside AI platforms requires different tactics than ranking on Google. Structured data, clear category tags, detailed specifications, and authentic reviews are what AI shopping engines pull from. Third, and most importantly: the paid advertising layer is not built yet. Which means right now, you can get organic visibility in ChatGPT and Perplexity for almost nothing. Early movers in Google Ads in 2002 paid pennies per click. The same window is open right now in AI shopping. It will not stay open long.

Here is the challenge for this week. Pick one product - physical, digital, service, anything. Go to ChatGPT and Perplexity and search for it the way a customer would. Not your brand name - the category and the problem. "Best beginner golf clubs." "Affordable Vietnamese cooking class online." "Shopify theme for food brands." See what shows up. Then ask yourself: is my product there? If not, why not? What would it take to be there? Bring that answer to your AI Buddy. The submission is short: what did you search, what did you find, and what is one thing you would change about your product data or catalog to become more visible. This is not theory. This is reconnaissance.

Here is the leadership lens. Every business that sells things online is going to have to adapt to agentic commerce. Most of them will do it reactively - when their sales drop, when their competitors show up in ChatGPT and they do not, when a client asks why they cannot find them in AI search. You are doing it now. That is what AI Officers do. They see the shift before it is obvious and they build the systems before the competition arrives. Whether you are in a role where you advise clients, manage a team, or run your own business - the move is the same. Know this landscape. Map your exposure. Make one move this week. That is the job.