I asked ChatGPT and Perplexity five ordinary questions about buying coffee online, then checked whether 50 randomly chosen independent roasters showed up in the answers.
When software pays on your behalf, someone has to prove you said yes. Here is who is building that proof, and what it means for a business that sells online.
The shopper describes what they want. The agent does the rest. How it works today in ChatGPT, Google, Amazon and Perplexity, and what a brand has to do to be the one it picks.
One kind shops for your customers. The other works inside your store. What each does, which platforms run them, and the order I would build in.
Ten launches from OpenAI, Google, Amazon, PayPal, Shopify, Visa and Mastercard, each with a date and a source. Then the companies and startups behind them, and what they have in common.
The question every business owner is starting to ask. The answer is not what most SEO agencies are selling.
The shift from search to agent is already happening. Most businesses are not ready for it.
Every AI agent that shops on your customer's behalf runs three tests on your business before it completes the transaction. Most companies fail at least one.
Every major AI company now supports the Model Context Protocol. What that means for a business that sells to people is not what most developers will tell you.
It will not browse your website. It will ask three questions about you, and if any answer is missing, it will pick someone else.