Why your future top customer may never actually visit your homepage

For years, retailers have optimized for a single moment: the website visit. How do we drive more traffic to our site? How do we increase time on page? How do we move shoppers from homepage to product detail to checkout? That model, however, is breaking down.
Right now, a meaningful and rapidly growing segment of your highest-value customers are making purchase decisions before they ever reach your site. They’re doing so via an artificial intelligence assistant. These AI agents include tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, and emerging shopping assistants that help consumers research, compare and select products before visiting a retailer’s site. By the time a consumer arrives at your product page, the consideration work is done. They’re there to buy.