More shoppers now ask ChatGPT what to buy before they search Google.
They describe what they need in a full sentence, compare a few options and click through when they're ready. That traffic is small today, yet it's growing fast and it buys.
Adobe found that generative AI traffic to US retail sites grew 693% over the 2025 holiday season, and AI referrals converted 31% better than other traffic.
A year earlier, AI visitors were far less likely to buy than anyone else.
AI shoppers went from browsing to buying
How likely visitors from AI tools were to buy on US retail sites, compared with other visitors
Source: Adobe Analytics, via Adobe and Marketing Dive.
I lead Shopify development at Blu Mint, and I'm currently working on the Shopify store for JALG, a maker of award-winning TV stands that sells to customers across the USA, Europe and Japan.
It's too early to share results on AI recommendations. This guide covers what we're putting in place and why.
How ChatGPT finds Shopify products
There are two routes into ChatGPT for a Shopify store. One is free, and one is paid.
| Organic recommendations | ChatGPT ads | |
|---|---|---|
| How it works | Shopify Catalog shares your products with ChatGPT and other AI tools through Agentic Storefronts | OpenAI's Shopify app syncs your catalogue to ChatGPT Ads Manager for paid placements |
| Cost | No extra transaction fees beyond standard processing | You pay for ads, with CPMs reported from around $25 |
| What decides it | Product data, reviews and your reputation across the web | Budget, bidding and the quality of your product feed |
| Best for | Every Shopify store, as a foundation | Stores ready to test a new channel with a set budget |
Organic recommendations are where I'd start. Paid ads only work well when the product data underneath is already strong.
Check that Agentic Storefronts is switched on
In March 2026, Shopify launched Agentic Storefronts, which brings merchants' products into ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Google's AI Mode and the Gemini app from one place in the Shopify admin.
Shopify says it activates Agentic Storefronts automatically for eligible stores, and every sale still goes through Shopify Checkout. In ChatGPT, mobile shoppers complete their purchase in an in-app browser, while desktop shoppers are sent to your store.
Open the Agentic Storefronts section of your Shopify admin and check which channels are active. For Google's AI Mode and Gemini, you also need to connect your Google Merchant Center account through the Google & YouTube app.
Being switched on doesn't mean being recommended, however. That depends on what AI tools can learn about your products.
Give AI tools complete product data
AI shopping tools work from structured data. When a shopper asks for "a solid oak TV stand under $1,000 that fits a 75-inch TV", the tool needs your material, price, dimensions and stock level in a form it can read without guessing.
Fill in every product field
Complete every field in Shopify, including product type, vendor, variants and metafields for details such as material, dimensions and care. Add GTINs or manufacturer part numbers where your products have them.
Make your schema complete
Check that your theme outputs product schema with brand, price, availability, variants and review ratings. Test your product pages in Google's Rich Results Test and fix any missing fields.
Max out your merchant feeds
Sync your store with Google Merchant Center and Microsoft Merchant Center, and don't leave optional attributes blank. Colour, material, size and age group all help AI tools match your products to specific requests.
Write product pages that answer questions
People search Google in a few words. They ask ChatGPT in full sentences, with their situation included.
Write descriptions around how people use the product, not only what it is. "Waterproof boots" tells an AI tool very little. "Built for wet winter hikes and sub-zero mornings" matches the way people actually ask.
Add a short FAQ to each product page covering sizing, compatibility, materials and care. For JALG, we split care advice by material, because oak and birch need different treatment. Only someone who knows the products could write that.
That kind of detail is what AI tools look for and what AI-only content can't fake.
Collect reviews that say something
When a shopper asks which product is most durable or best for a small room, AI tools lean on what reviewers have said.
"Great product!" doesn't help. A review that explains how someone used the product, and what they liked or didn't, gives AI tools something to quote.
Use a review app that adds review data to your product schema. In your post-purchase emails, ask customers specific questions about how they used the product, not only for a star rating.
Build a reputation beyond your store
AI tools don't rely on your store alone. They read review sites, comparison articles, forums and press coverage, then summarise what people say about you.
If nobody talks about your brand outside your own website, AI tools have little reason to recommend it. Digital PR, reviews from credible publications and genuine discussion in communities such as Reddit all feed into how AI describes your products.
It's the same principle behind brand visibility in AI tools generally, and why I see GEO as an extension of good SEO, not a replacement for it.
Should you try ChatGPT ads?
ChatGPT ads launched in 2026, and in September OpenAI released a ChatGPT Ads app for Shopify that syncs your product catalogue to ChatGPT Ads Manager and sets up conversion tracking.
The app is free to install, and you pay for the ads themselves. Industry trackers report starting CPMs of around $25, shopping carousels for brands with product feeds and Sponsored Agents that answer shoppers' questions before they click.
It's still early.
As of now, the app has a 2.2/5 rating from 21 reviews, and several merchants report that their products don't sync.
I'd treat ChatGPT ads as a test with a fixed budget, not a main sales channel yet. Ecommerce brands are a better fit than B2B, since ChatGPT ads don't reach most B2B buyers yet. Our AI search ads team can run a test alongside your Google and social campaigns.
What's hype and what works
A lot of what's being sold as AI optimisation is repackaged SEO. Some of it is a real change in how people find products.
| Hype to ignore | What actually works | |
|---|---|---|
| Content | Hundreds of AI-written blog posts to build "semantic depth" | Fewer, expert articles that link to the products they discuss |
| Technical | Special code or hidden tricks aimed at chatbots | Complete schema and merchant feeds with every attribute filled in |
| Product pages | Stuffing exact-match keywords | Use cases and FAQs written the way people ask questions |
| Reputation | Optimising your own pages and nothing else | Reviews, press coverage and real discussion of your brand elsewhere |
| Ads | Treating ChatGPT ads as a guaranteed sales channel | A small, measured test once your product data is strong |
AI tools compress what the web says about you into a short answer. You can't trick them. You can make sure your data is complete and that real people say good things about your products.
How to track AI recommendations
ChatGPT doesn't publish search volumes or click data, so tracking needs different tools. David Bailey, who leads our SEO and AI search work, uses Ahrefs Brand Radar to track how often AI tools mention a brand compared with its competitors.
Brand Radar separates mentions, where AI tools name your brand, from citations, where they link to your site. Both matter, because visibility and traffic aren't the same metric in AI search.
On a small budget, you can track manually. Write 20 to 30 questions your buyers would ask, run them in a logged-out ChatGPT session and record whether your brand appears, whether it's linked and which competitors show up.
David's advice is to look for trends, not single answers:
“Don’t stress over a single bad answer. Track the data weekly or monthly to spot directional movements.”
You can also see visits from ChatGPT and other AI tools in Google Analytics 4 by creating a custom channel for AI sources.
Our Shopify development and ecommerce SEO services prepare stores for AI shopping from the ground up, and our AI search optimisation work tracks the results. We work alongside our SEO, content writing, PPC, social media and web design teams. If you're building a new store, the same foundations apply when you start an online store, and they'll matter even more as agentic commerce grows.
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Probably, if your store is eligible. Shopify activates Agentic Storefronts automatically for eligible stores, which makes products discoverable in ChatGPT through Shopify Catalog. Check the Agentic Storefronts section of your Shopify admin to see which AI channels are active. Being discoverable doesn't guarantee recommendations, which depend on your product data, reviews and reputation.
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Partly. On mobile, ChatGPT shoppers complete their purchase through Shopify Checkout in an in-app browser without leaving the app. On desktop, they're sent to your store in a new tab. Either way, the sale goes through your Shopify checkout, with no extra transaction fees beyond standard processing rates.
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No. Organic recommendations are free and depend on the quality of your product data and your reputation. ChatGPT ads are a separate, paid option that places your products in sponsored shopping results. Most stores should strengthen their product data, schema and reviews first, then test ads with a fixed budget if the channel makes sense for them.
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Expect weeks for the technical work and months for reputation. Complete product data and schema can be in place within a few weeks, and AI tools pick up feed changes relatively quickly. Building enough reviews, coverage and discussion for AI tools to recommend your brand over competitors takes longer, in the same way that SEO does.