The AI shopping revolution is here: How to compete in the age of Agentic Commerce

Agentic commerce: The next leap in marketplace automation and AI-driven selling

The numbers tell the story: Around 2% of all ChatGPT conversations already involve shopping, translating to roughly 75 million shopping-related chats every week, or about 11 million per day globally. And consumers are catching on fast. Six in ten U.S. consumers have already used generative AI to find or buy products online.

Last week, OpenAI launched Instant Checkout, allowing U.S. users to complete purchases directly within ChatGPT, starting with Etsy and expanding to millions of Shopify merchants. This isn't an experiment. It's a tipping point.

Welcome to agentic commerce: where AI assistants don't just recommend products, they complete the purchase. The traditional path from discovery to checkout is collapsing into a single conversation. And for merchants, the implications are significant.

From discovery to instant checkout

For decades, commerce has followed a predictable pattern: ads → website → cart → checkout. That model is fracturing. OpenAI's Instant Checkout, powered by the open-source Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP), enables AI agents to discover, evaluate, and transact products within a conversational interface.

Currently rolling out in the U.S., this shift signals something larger: the next generation of commerce infrastructure is being built right now. The merchants who adapt early will own the advantage.

Why it matters for your business

• Data quality becomes your competitive advantage. AI agents evaluate and compare products based on the information you provide. Structured, comprehensive, and accurate product data determines whether your products get recommended, underscoring the importance of AI-powered product discovery for merchants.
  
  
• Transaction costs are performance-based. ChatGPT is expected to charge approximately 2% per completed transaction, which will be refunded if the item is returned. You pay when you sell, not for visibility or traffic.
  
  
• You maintain ownership of the customer relationship. You remain the merchant of record. Customer data stays yours. You manage fulfillment, handle support, and maintain control over the entire post-purchase experience.
  
  

This creates a fundamentally different playing field: relevance and reliability matter more than ever. AI agents need to trust the information they're working with. They recommend products they can interpret, verify, and confidently present to shoppers.

How ChannelEngine prepares you to compete and win

Connecting to new channels is table stakes. Winning with agentic commerce requires data excellence, integration readiness, and the ability to operate across platforms without friction.

At ChannelEngine, we have spent years advancing product data optimization for marketplaces, environments that already reward structure and relevance. Now, we're applying that expertise to AI-powered shopping, where data quality is even more critical. Here's how we're positioning you to lead:

1. Structured data for every major AI platform

Our upcoming AI-driven marketplace integrations will make your catalog, inventory, pricing, and offers interpretable by conversational LLMs (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Copilot, Gemini) in formats optimized for agent discovery.

2. Enrich product data

We help layer in the context AI agents need: reviews, detailed attributes, Q&A, policies, and specifications. When agents quote products, yours will stand out as the most complete and trustworthy option.

3. End-to-end transactional management with ChatGPT

Through the Agentic Commerce Protocol, ChannelEngine will sync orders placed in ChatGPT directly into your backend systems. You manage payments through your existing provider.

Stripe offers near-instant enablement, while other processors can connect via Stripe's Shared Payment Token API or the Delegated Payments Spec. Fulfillment updates flow automatically back to ChatGPT.

The merchant readiness checklist: Is your business prepared?

As agentic commerce scales, visibility won't be optional. It will be the new cost of entry. Ask yourself:

Foundation layer

• Is your product data structured for AI interpretation? Agents need clean, consistent information to evaluate and recommend your catalog.
• Can your checkout integrate with conversational interfaces? Smooth transaction flows will separate winners from bystanders.
• What will your point of differentiation be when agents compare dozens of similar offers? Price alone won't cut it.
  
  

Competitive edge

• Are your titles and descriptions specific and quotable? Vague copy won't make it past AI evaluation.
• Are product IDs, GTINs, and variant structures accurate? Broken data could mean invisibility.
• Do your feeds include reviews, Q&A, specs, and return policies? Agents use these signals to build trust.
• Is inventory, pricing, and availability updated in real time? Stale data costs sales and damages credibility.

If you can't answer yes to these questions, you risk becoming invisible when shoppers start buying through AI-driven discovery.

Leadership perspective: Why we’re building for the agent economy

“Conversational AI is becoming a new sales channel alongside marketplaces, D2C, and social commerce. The challenge for brands is to keep product data, stock, and pricing consistent across all these environments. ChannelEngine is built to solve exactly that. Our mission is to make sure merchants can connect once and sell everywhere, including emerging AI-powered shopping interfaces.”

Jorrit Steinz,
Founder & CEO  

ChannelEngine is your bridge to the future

As a marketplace integration platform, our mission has always been to connect your products to where your customers shop: from online marketplaces to click and ad channels, and social platforms. Now, we're extending that reach to agentic commerce interfaces.

As a founding member of the Agentic Commerce Alliance, ChannelEngine is helping shape the standards that will define the next era of AI-driven commerce. The Alliance unites global ecommerce leaders to ensure that agentic commerce remains open, interoperable, and built around merchant autonomy.

We believe AI agents will become one of the dominant forces in commerce within the next few years. Merchants will need both visibility and control in that world. ChannelEngine is purpose-built to deliver both.

The future of shopping is conversational. The merchants who thrive will be those whose products AI agents can find, interpret, and confidently recommend. Trusted intermediaries will be the key to connecting today's systems with tomorrow's agent-first platforms.

ChannelEngine is here to make sure it's your products the AI quotes.

Ready to lead in the age of AI commerce?

The shift to agentic commerce is happening now. Early movers will establish the data foundations, integration frameworks, and competitive positioning that define success in this new channel.