How 23% of Merchants Captured Retail’s Next Agentic Commerce Advantage

Artificial intelligence agents hold significant potential to transform retail commerce, yet only 23% of merchants can currently accurately identify both AI-driven traffic and completed purchases, according to the PYMNTS Intelligence report "Global Digital Shopping Index: Merchant Edition." Another 21% recognize AI traffic but struggle to link it to successful transactions. This gap presents a substantial opportunity to develop measurement systems for a new commerce channel before it becomes widely adopted.

Merchants increasingly acknowledge the growing influence of AI agents. Sixty-one percent anticipate AI-generated results will shape purchases more than traditional search, while 58% expect agents to select payment methods based on fees and rewards. Sixty-six percent foresee agents completing transactions on their own. Even large merchants lag behind in identifying agent-driven purchases, with just 27% successfully doing so, compared to 19% of small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs).

The challenge lies in creating digital attribution systems that can link agent activities to completed purchases, payment choices, loyalty program usage, and transaction values. The ultimate goal is determining whether agents contribute to incremental revenue or merely alter a customer's purchasing journey. Merchants need to establish robust reporting systems capable of tracking agent involvement throughout the transaction process.

This will enable them to ascertain whether agents are generating additional revenue or merely modifying existing customer behaviors.

While having a cutting-edge shopping agent is not the sole advantage in agentic commerce, understanding the extent of agent involvement is crucial. Merchants must prioritize infrastructure to monitor agent activities as they occur, rather than solely relying on predictions about future AI shopping capabilities. A strategic approach involves first optimizing checkout processes to accommodate autonomous purchases, followed by understanding when agents are involved, assessing the economic value of agent interactions, refining loyalty offers based on agent usage, and adjusting payment strategies according to agent preferences.

Creating a feedback loop that identifies agent demand, measures its economic impact, optimizes the customer experience, and evaluates the effectiveness of these changes could give merchants a competitive edge similar to those gained from mastering search, social, and mobile analytics in the past. This approach turns agent attribution into a proactive strategy akin to early gains achieved in other digital domains.

The PYMNTS Intelligence team, comprising experts in data analysis and strategic research, offers merchants the tools to uncover insights that support intelligent, data-driven decision-making in the evolving retail landscape.