For retail CMOs and ecommerce leaders whose traffic is down, rankings are fine, and loyalty programs are starting to feel less reliable.
If your traffic is falling while your rankings hold and nothing in your analytics explains why, the cause is probably not on your site. More shoppers now do their research inside AI tools that read your site, your competitors, your reviews, and your marketplace listings, then hand them a shortlist. The funnel still exists. Shoppers just skip the middle of it.
The short version for a leadership team: the decision is increasingly made before the visit, and AI shopping agents are starting to test the loyalty retail brands spent years building. The response is to make sure your brand is in the answer, and to give an agent the same reasons to choose you that a loyal customer has.
The research phase has moved into the answer
What used to take several sessions across several days now happens in one conversation.
A shopper used to search, click a few results, compare, and return the next day to go deeper. Retail teams could see that path in sessions, pageviews, and assisted conversions. Now the same shopper asks an AI tool directly. The tool pulls from many sources at once, summarizes them, and recommends a few options, without the shopper visiting any of those sites during research.
The data shows how widespread this is. In the first four months of 2026, 68% of U.S. Google searches ended without a click to any website, according to SparkToro's analysis of Similarweb data. Bain's 2025 research found that about 80% of consumers rely on zero-click results, such as AI summaries and answer boxes, for at least 40% of their searches. And Accenture's 2026 Consumer Pulse survey of 25,590 consumers across 16 countries found that 71% expect generative AI to influence at least half of their spending decisions over the next 12 months.
We cover the broader zero-click shift in "The Zero-Click Debate, Revisited" and how ChatGPT's shopping and ads have changed in "AI-Driven Shopping in 2026." This post focuses on what that shift means for two things retail teams rely on most: visibility during consideration, and loyalty after the sale.
The mention is the new impression
Mid-funnel influence now happens when an AI names your brand, whether or not anyone clicks.
The most useful idea in this shift is simple to state. The new mid-funnel impression is not a banner view or a sponsored placement. It is whether the AI names your brand in its answer. That is when the shopper forms a shortlist, and it is completely invisible to standard retail dashboards, which track sessions and assisted conversions rather than the summary that shaped last week's purchase.
Most of what an AI says about your brand comes from sources you do not control. McKinsey's State of the Consumer 2026 report found that only 1% of the sources AI tools cite for consumer goods questions are brand-owned websites. Reviews, retailer listings, forums, and publishers make up most of the rest. That makes your review base and your presence on marketplaces and third-party sites part of your marketing, not just your operations.
There is also good news in the traffic that does arrive. Adobe Analytics reported that AI-referred traffic to U.S. retail sites rose 62% year over year in July 2026, and that those visitors converted 60% better than visitors from other sources. Demand has not disappeared. It has been rerouted, and the shoppers who do click through tend to arrive ready to buy.
The retail funnel got bypassed
The mention is the new impression.
The old path: days, on your site
- Search
- Click
- Compare on your site
- Return
- Buy
The new path: one conversation
-
Ask AI One question replaces days of tabs.
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The shortlist Built from reviews, listings and forums. In consumer goods, brand sites supply 1% of AI citations.
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Buy AI-referred US retail visits converted 60% better in July 2026.
Give the AI something it can verify
- Accurate product information on your site, marketplaces and listings
- Recent, specific reviews that name uses and outcomes
- A clear category position stated the same way everywhere
- Offers an agent can compare: price, service, fulfillment
Sources: McKinsey, State of the Consumer 2026, consumer goods citations. Adobe Analytics, US retail, July 2026.
The loyalty problem retail is not ready for
AI agents re-evaluate the category every time someone asks, and loyal customers are starting to let them.
This is the part of the shift most retail teams have not fully reckoned with. To see why, it helps to be clear about why traditional loyalty worked in the first place. Most retail loyalty has rested on three things. The first is memory: email, retargeting, and advertising keep a brand top of mind, so it comes to mind first when the need returns. The second is friction: saved payment details, accumulated points, and a familiar account make switching feel like more effort than staying. The third is habit: once a shopper has a default retailer for a category, they rarely reconsider it.
AI shopping agents weaken all three. An agent does not work from memory; it searches fresh each time it is asked. It reduces friction, because comparing ten retailers takes it seconds rather than an evening. And it replaces habit with instructions: instead of returning to a default store, the shopper tells the agent what they want and lets it find the best match. An agent works from whatever is best supported, best reviewed, and most credible when the question is asked, and it can reconsider the whole category every time.
Accenture's 2026 Consumer Pulse survey, covering 25,590 consumers in 16 countries, put numbers on how far even loyal customers are willing to go. Among "behaviorally loyal" consumers, meaning people who usually buy from one to three preferred brands in a category, 37% said they would let an AI agent switch them away from their favorite brand for a better fit on price, preference, or performance. More than half of all consumers, 56%, said they would tell their agent which brands to consider, and 43% said budget and value would top their instructions. In travel, Accenture's October 2026 research found that 96% of travelers would switch from a preferred brand if another provider offered a significantly easier, faster experience.
That does not mean loyalty is gone. Accenture found that about four in ten consumers still want to stay involved in at least one part of the journey because they enjoy shopping or feel connected to a brand, and only 12% are open to agents making the final purchase decision on their own. What is changing is the form loyalty takes. A useful way to think about it is three kinds of shopper, often the same person in different categories:
Shoppers who delegate. They let the agent choose within broad limits, such as a budget or a delivery date. For them, loyalty depends on whether your offer wins the comparison on the things an agent can check.
Shoppers who set guardrails. They tell the agent which brands to consider. For them, the new form of loyalty is being on the list they name. That depends on recognition and trust built before the shopper ever opens the agent.
Shoppers who stay involved. They enjoy the process or feel connected to a brand, and they use AI to help rather than decide. For them, the experience of shopping with you still matters, and traditional loyalty efforts still work.
For a leadership team, the implication is that loyalty programs need a second job. Points balances and member emails are built for shoppers who remember you. They are hard for an agent to weigh. Benefits an agent can verify are easier: a price-match guarantee, free returns, a delivery promise, a service commitment. There is also a risk worth naming. If agents compare mainly on price, retailers that respond only with deeper discounts will compress their own margins. The more durable response is to compete on value an agent can confirm beyond price, such as reliability, service, and terms. Brands now have to win the agent's comparison as well as the customer's affection.
An agent is not loyal to your brand. It is loyal to whichever brand it can prove is the better fit.
What durable brand equity looks like now
The brands that hold up are the ones a person or an agent can verify.
Brand still matters, but its job has changed. Brand equity used to be measured mostly by awareness and recall: did people know you and think of you first? In a journey increasingly shaped by AI answers and agents, the more important question is whether your reasons to be chosen hold up when someone checks.
The research shows how much rides on that. Edelman's June 2026 Trust Barometer Special Report on brands found that 88% of consumers call trust in a brand an important or critical reason to buy, nearly level with product quality at 89%. When asked what shapes that trust most, 41% pointed to what unpaid people say about a brand, compared with 20% who pointed to what the brand says about itself. And 71% said they would keep using a brand that starts selling to people different from them when they both trust the brand and find it relevant, compared with 36% when they feel neither.
Checking is now routine. A Morning Consult survey for Yelp found that 63% of AI search users double-check AI results against other sources, such as news and review sites. And the material an AI uses to describe a brand mostly lives off the brand's own site: McKinsey found that only 1% of the sources AI tools cite for consumer goods questions are brand-owned websites. Durable brand equity, in other words, is now built largely in places a retailer does not control.
In practice, it rests on four things a person or an agent can verify:
1. Accurate, consistent product information. Prices, availability, specifications, and policies should match on your site, your product feeds, and every marketplace listing. An agent comparing options will trust the version it can confirm, and a mismatch makes it less certain about all of them.
2. Recent, specific reviews. Reviews that describe how a product was used and what result it delivered give AI tools and shoppers concrete reasons to choose you. Recency matters as much as volume, and a considered response to a negative review often builds more trust than a page of perfect ratings.
3. A clear category position, stated the same way everywhere. AI answers tend to describe each option in a short phrase, such as "best for families" or "the premium choice." A brand with one clear, honest position that outside sources repeat is far easier to recommend than one described differently in every place it appears.
4. Promises you can prove. Delivery times, return windows, guarantees, and service standards are among the easiest things for an agent to compare and the fastest way for a brand to lose trust if they are not kept. Stating them clearly, and meeting them, turns operations into brand equity.
There is a fifth element that supports all four: recognition. When 56% of consumers say they would tell their agent which brands to consider, the brands they think to name have an advantage no comparison can replace. That recognition is still built the familiar way, through consistent experience, word of mouth, and marketing that gives people a reason to remember you.
Retail in an AI-shaped journey
Some retail strengths are weaker than they look. Durable ones give an AI agent something to check.
| More exposed than it looks | Durable in an AI-shaped journey |
|---|---|
| Repeat purchase driven mainly by email opens and retargeting | Repeat purchase driven by service people would recommend |
| Loyalty measured in points balances | Loyalty backed by benefits an agent can verify, such as guarantees and free returns |
| Product details that differ by channel | Product details that match everywhere |
| Reviews that are old, sparse or generic | Reviews that are recent and specific about use and results |
| Frequent discounting to stay competitive | A clear position and value beyond price |
A retail brand that appears consistently in AI answers and has a strong record of verified customer experience has real, lasting equity in this environment. A brand that relies mainly on email open rates and pixel-based retargeting to drive repeat purchases is more exposed than its dashboards suggest. The practical test is simple: ask an AI assistant to describe your brand and compare it with your top competitor, then check whether the answer matches what your best customers would say. Where it does not, that gap is where brand investment should go next.
The numbers behind the shift
Search, agents and loyalty
68% of US Google searches end without a click. 71% of consumers expect AI to influence at least half of their spending within a year.
Loyalty is becoming conditional: 37% of behaviorally loyal shoppers would let an AI agent switch them to another brand for a better fit.
| Finding | Figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Where search ends | ||
| US Google searches ending without a click, January to April 2026 | 68% | SparkToro, Similarweb data, June 2026 |
| Consumers relying on zero-click results for at least 40% of their searches | ~80% | Bain & Company, February 2025 |
| Agents and loyalty · Accenture, 16 countries | ||
| Consumers expecting generative AI to influence at least half of their spending in the next 12 months | 71% | Accenture Consumer Pulse, June 2026 |
| Behaviorally loyal consumers who would let an AI agent switch their brand for a better fit | 37% | Accenture Consumer Pulse, June 2026 |
| What AI cites and sends | ||
| Brand-owned websites as a share of AI citations, consumer goods | 1% | McKinsey, June 22, 2026 |
| Growth in AI-referred traffic to US retail sites, July 2026 versus July 2025 | +62% | Adobe Analytics, August 19, 2026 |
| Conversion of AI-referred US retail visits versus other visits, July 2026 | +60% | Adobe Analytics, August 19, 2026 |
| What keeps customers · Edelman, 15 countries | ||
| Willing to keep using a brand that starts selling to people different from them: those who trust brands and find them relevant, versus those who do neither | 71% vs 36% | Edelman, June 2026 |
These figures come from different studies with different samples. SparkToro and Adobe cover the US; Accenture surveyed 25,590 consumers in 16 countries and Edelman surveyed 15 countries. The zero-click figure excludes searches in Google’s mobile app.
Survey figures reflect what consumers say they would do, which can differ from what they actually do. Accenture's survey was fielded in January 2026 across 16 countries.
What this likely means over the next 6 to 18 months
Expect the consideration stage to keep moving into AI tools, and loyalty programs to need a new job.
If current trends continue, more of retail consideration will happen inside AI answers and agents, and more of the remaining site visits will come from shoppers who have already decided. Loyalty programs will most likely need to shift from keeping brands top of mind toward giving shoppers, and their agents, verifiable reasons to choose the brand again: better service, reliable fulfillment, and rewards that show up in the comparison. The retailers best positioned will be those that treat product data, reviews, and third-party presence as core marketing infrastructure rather than back-office tasks.
If you want to see how AI tools answer the buying questions in your category, Camino5's free AEO Invisibility Score shows you in about 30 seconds, delivered by email.
How to start today
Run a prompt audit. Ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google with AI Overviews the questions your shoppers ask, such as the best option in your category or how to choose between the main alternatives. Record which brands are named. If you are not in the answer, that is your gap.
Check that your top 20 product and category pages answer their main question in the first two or three paragraphs. AI tools cite pages that answer plainly and early.
Set up or improve a post-purchase review request, and ask customers to mention how they used the product and what result they got. Specific, recent reviews are what AI tools draw on when comparing options.
Track branded search alongside organic traffic. If branded search rises while organic traffic stays flat, your brand is likely being named in AI answers even though standard attribution cannot show it.
Review your loyalty program and ask what it gives a shopper's agent to compare. Price, service guarantees, and fulfillment reliability are easier for an agent to weigh than points balances alone.
The retail funnel did not break; it got bypassed, and the brands that win from here will be the ones an AI can name with confidence and a loyal customer would still choose if they checked.
If AI is rerouting your shoppers, the first step is seeing where they're being sent instead. Run your free Invisibility Score to see exactly how AI platforms answer the buying questions in your category. About 30 seconds, delivered by email.
Sources
Accenture, "Talk to my AI agent: The new rules of brand value," Consumer Pulse Research 2026
Fortune, "Why travelers are switching their favorite brands," October 14, 2026
Search Engine Land, "Google zero-click searches hit 68% in early 2026: Study," 2026
Bain & Company, "Goodbye Clicks, Hello AI: Zero-Click Search Redefines Marketing," February 2025
McKinsey & Company, "State of the Consumer 2026," June 22, 2026
Edelman, 2026 Trust Barometer Special Report: Brand Growth in an Insular World, June 2026