The digital advertising industry has long operated on a simple, linear premise: an advertiser bids for a user’s attention, the user clicks a link, and the user completes a transaction on the brand’s website. But major tech players like Google, Amazon, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Perplexity are attempting to change the dynamic by ushering in agentic AI commerce tools that move the transaction to where the search occurs. On January 11, Google made a major step forward by unveiling a new open standard for agentic commerce and AI tools to help retailers connect with high-intent shoppers and drive sales.
By introducing agentic commerce tools, including an open standard for AI-to-AI transactions and virtual brand associates that live directly on search results, Google is moving the point of decision and the point of sale away from your website and into its own AI-powered ecosystem, which is exactly what its competitors are trying to do.
This move matters because Google is attempting to standardize the plumbing of the entire AI economy. While competitors like Amazon and OpenAI have built powerful but siloed shopping assistants, Google is pitching an open standard designed to ensure that no matter which AI a consumer uses, the transaction remains anchored in Google’s data and infrastructure. To stay competitive, brands must now transition from a passive web presence to an active, interoperable data strategy that AI agents can navigate and execute.
For advertisers, this is a restructuring of how consumers discover, evaluate, and buy products. If you are still optimizing solely for clicks to your landing page, you are preparing for a world that is rapidly being replaced by one where AI agents do the shopping for consumers.
The Rise of In-Platform Conversions
Developed in partnership with retail giants like Shopify and Walmart, Google’s new Universal Commerce Protocol allows AI agents to communicate across platforms to handle everything from discovery to checkout. Soon, a shopper won’t need to visit your site to buy your product; they can complete the purchase inside Google’s AI Mode using payment credentials stored in their Google Wallet. While this reduces friction and potentially boosts conversion rates, it also means brands risk losing direct control over the customer journey and the valuable first-party data that comes with a website visit.
Branding Through AI Personalities
Google’s new Business Agent allows retailers to deploy a virtual sales associate that speaks in the brand’s specific voice directly on Search. This moves the user experience from search results to conversational service. For advertisers, this means that success will no longer be determined just by a high-impact image or a catchy headline, but by the quality and personality of the AI agent representing the brand. If your AI agent doesn’t have the right data or tone, you lose the sale before the customer even sees your product catalog.
Data as the New Creative
With dozens of new data attributes coming to the Merchant Center, Google is signaling that keywords are no longer the primary currency of discovery. AI agents require context, like information on product compatibility, answers to common customer questions, and nuanced use-case data. In this landscape, your product feed is your creative. Advertisers who fail to enrich their data feeds with these new conversational attributes will find their products filtered out by AI agents that are looking for specific solutions, not just matching keywords.
Real-Time Value Injection
The introduction of Direct Offers within AI Mode allows Google to use AI to determine exactly when a shopper is ready to buy and inject an exclusive discount at that precise moment. This changes the role of the advertiser from a broadcaster of sales to a provider of real-time value. It creates a high-stakes environment where your promotional strategy must be as agile as the AI determining when to show it.
Google Is Not Alone
While Google’s announcement is massive, it’s important to recognize that we are in the middle of a global agentic arms race. Every major tech player is vying to become the primary concierge for the consumer’s wallet.
Amazon, the 800-pound gorilla of retail, continues to innovate. Its AI assistant, Rufus, has moved far beyond its initial launch phase, now using autonomous Buy For Me capabilities to track price volatility and execute orders the moment specific criteria are met. Meanwhile, Microsoft recently unveiled Copilot Checkout, a deep integration with Shopify and PayPal designed to turn every chat into a point of sale. Not to be outdone, OpenAI is aggressively rolling out its Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP) and Operator, an agent capable of navigating the web to fill out forms and handle checkouts on a user’s behalf.
Despite the heavy competition, Google’s announcement is a watershed moment for three reasons:
The Power of the Open Standard
While Amazon remains a closed garden where Amazon control the entire stack, Google’s Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP) is an open standard. By co-developing this with Shopify, Walmart, and Target, Google is attempting to build the universal plumbing for the entire industry, positioning itself as the infrastructure for all AI-led commerce.
Data Depth
Google’s Merchant Center is a massively comprehensive product database. By adding conversational attributes to this existing infrastructure, Google is allowing retailers to pivot their massive legacy catalogs into AI-ready assets without having to rebuild their data from scratch.
Search as the Front Door
Search remains the starting point for billions of shopping journeys. Embedding checkout and branded Business Agents directly into the search results helps Google capture intent at the moment of discovery. This cuts out the middle steps that traditionally lead to a brand’s own website.
How Advertisers Should Respond
To stay competitive, brands must transition from a passive web presence to an active, interoperable data strategy that AI agents can navigate and execute. Here is how you can prepare for the agentic shopping era:
1. Audit and Enrich Your Product Feeds Immediately
Your priority should be the Merchant Center. The new attributes Google is rolling out are the “nutrients” that feed the AI. Start by identifying common customer questions and accessory compatibilities for your top-performing products. By providing this data now, you ensure that when a Business Agent or a consumer’s personal AI agent goes looking for a solution, your product has the necessary metadata to be the recommended choice.
2. Prepare for a Headless Checkout Strategy
When the Universal Commerce Protocol gains traction, you need to ensure your backend can handle transactions that don’t originate on your site. This means tightening your integration with platforms like Shopify or ensuring your API infrastructure can talk to the UCP standard. Brands need to make it easy for an AI agent to complete a purchase with zero friction.
3. Develop a Branded AI Knowledge Base
The launch of Business Agent means you need to treat your brand voice as a set of rules for an AI model. Document your brand’s persona, common sales associate scripts, and unique value propositions in a structured format. When the time comes to train your Business Agent in Merchant Center, you should have a library of data ready to ensure the AI represents your brand as accurately as a human employee would.
4. Re-evaluate Performance Metrics
If the transaction happens on Google via an agent, your traditional cost per click (CPC) and click-through rate (CTR) metrics will become less relevant. You need to start looking at agent assisted conversions and feed visibility metrics. Demand better transparency from your platform partners regarding how many of your sales are being driven by agentic interactions versus traditional clicks.
Also, consider adopting attribution at the attribute level. When an AI agent recommends your product because it identified a specific compatibility or easy-to-clean feature in your data feed, you need to know which specific data points are actually closing the sale. Advertisers will need to move beyond aggregate ROAS and begin measuring information density performance. This means analyzing which parts of your structured data (like FAQs, material specs, or loyalty integrations) are most effective at convincing the AI to recommend their brand over a competitor.
5. Test Direct Offers Early
If you are part of the Google Ads ecosystem, look for opportunities to join the Direct Offers pilot. Start experimenting with dynamic discounting strategies. Instead of a sitewide 20% off sale, consider how you can use Google’s AI to offer that discount only to high-intent users who are at the brink of conversion in AI Mode. This precision discounting will be the hallmark of a profitable agentic strategy.
This is also an opportunity to move beyond price-only incentives and test value-added agentic offers. Because the AI agent has a deep understanding of the user’s specific problem (e.g., “I need a rug for a high-traffic area”), you can test offers that go beyond a percentage off, such as bundling a cleaning kit or offering an extended warranty directly within the conversation. By testing these context-aware offers now, you can determine which incentives resonate best when the buyer is in a research-to-purchase flow, allowing you to protect your margins while still securing the conversion.
The Bottom Line
Google’s announcement confirms that the future of commerce may not about searching for products, but about delegating tasks to AI. The barrier between research and purchase may evaporate soon. For advertisers, the challenge is to stop thinking about ads as a way to get people to a website and start thinking about them as a way to provide the data and permissions necessary for an AI to finish the job.
Contact True Interactive
Navigating the uptake of agentic commerce and AI-powered shopping requires a deep understanding of both the technology and the changing consumer journey. True Interactive can help you optimize your feeds, refine your AI strategy, and ensure your brand remains visible in this new landscape. Contact us to learn more.
