AI is retail’s new front door: why GEO is the new SEO

For years, online retail discovery has followed a predictable path. Customers have used search engines to find their purchases on a journey inspired by engaging branding and product pages.

That era is ending. The arrival of conversational AI is fundamentally changing how shoppers find and buy products. Customers increasingly turn to GenAI for answers, trusting AI-powered summaries over traditional websites and making purchases without ever visiting a brand's homepage.

Recent consumer research speaks for itself: 67% of customers have used AI tools like ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, or Perplexity in the past three months to research products or services. What's more, 29% have already made a purchase based solely on an AI-generated response, with 87% satisfied with what they bought. Shoppers aged 18-44 are 3-4 times more likely to use AI daily to research products than those over 55 – and that balance will continue to shift. 

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) is the art of optimizing your website to rank well in traditional search listings through keywords, metadata and backlinks. It's what retailers became really good at. In contrast, GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is about optimizing your content to appear in the conversational answers that GenAI tools generate for shoppers. This distinction matters because AI-generated answers compress discovery, comparison and consideration into a single exchange. So instead of clicking through a list of ten blue links, shoppers get curated recommendations instantly – and if you're not in that conversation, you don't exist. 

The paradigm shift is that 42% of customers now trust AI-generated product summaries without clicking through to a retailer's website. In other words, nearly half of customers are already making decisions based on what AI says about your products without ever seeing your carefully crafted landing pages and product descriptions. Retailers must therefore treat AI summaries as an extension of their brand identity, not an afterthought. Companies must ensure they're featured effectively and accurately in AI-generated responses, with clear value propositions and consistent product data.

Yet the reality is that mastering GEO is only half the battle. The other half is redesigning your customer experience infrastructure to delight shoppers – whenever and however they arrive at your site or service. 

When conversational AI handles early-stage filtering, shoppers arrive at your channels much later in their journey – but with even higher expectations. They’re looking for fast, easy, trusted, personalized and contextualized services and support. The stakes are also high: according to a study by PWC, 59% of consumers will abandon a brand they love after several bad experiences, and 17% will leave after just one. 

To design your customer experience infrastructure, here are four key priorities:

1. Priority 1: AI-optimized product data. Accurate, structured product information is foundational. This ensures AI can deliver personalized experiences from the first interaction. Include contextual details like use cases, occasions and specific attributes that answer real customer questions.
2. Priority 2: Peak performance under pressure. Peak load capacity is non-negotiable when AI funnels concentrated traffic to your conversion points. Customers have compressed their research phase – they won't tolerate slow checkouts. Remember, CX infrastructure performs under pressure only when it has been built to scale from the start.
3. Priority 3: Unified multichannel operations. Your CX systems must provide a unified view across all touchpoints. After all, that's the standard that customers expect from leading brands. If they feel you don’t value them on all channels, they are more likely to go elsewhere.
4. Priority 4: AI-enabled customer service. Invest in AI that increases speed, accuracy and efficiency through two key capabilities: resolutions (AI solving common issues fully without human intervention) and assists (AI gathering complete context before passing complex issues to human agents).

Legacy CX platforms that are ticket-based will fail because they tend to treat each issue as isolated. Even agentic AI solutions will falter if they are siloed, lacking the context needed to make interactions feel personal. Instead, move to platforms that aggregate all customer interactions into a single, lifelong conversation regardless of channel. This gives both AI and human agents access to complete customer context – purchase history, preferences, past interactions.

With unified customer context, you ensure shoppers never have to repeat themselves – and you turn AI discovery into lasting loyalty.

Meanwhile, LLMs like ChatGPT are driving further into conversion territory with specialized shopping research features that pull real-time information on pricing, reviews and specifications. OpenAI is closing the gap even further with Instant Checkout, which enables purchases directly within the chatbot. This feature, rolling out with major e-commerce platforms including Etsy and Shopify merchants, means customers can complete transactions without ever leaving the chat interface. But here's the catch. While the purchase may be seamless for shoppers, as the retailer you remain the merchant of record. In other words, you are responsible for payment, fulfilment, returns – and ongoing customer support. Your customer service operation must be prepared to handle inquiries that originated from outside traditional brand channels.

The shift from SEO to GEO isn't just a marketing evolution: it's a complete reimagining of the customer journey. And the revenue impact is real. New 2025 ecommerce data from Adobe has revealed that shoppers who landed on a US retail site from an AI service were 30% more likely to convert than those who arrived via traditional search and other means.

In 2026, brands that win will be those that optimize for AI discovery while simultaneously building CX infrastructure that can deliver on the promises AI makes on their behalf.

If you're in retail, your digital front door has moved. The question is: are you visible and ready to welcome customers when they arrive?

Discover how Konecta helps leading retailers build scalable, AI-enabled CX operations that excel under pressure.