Google's Agentic Commerce Takeover, TikTok Shop's $1T Rise

Everyone's still trying to optimize their checkout flow.

Meanwhile, Google just made the entire funnel disappear.

It's not about clicks or carts anymore.

It's about whether your products can be bought by an AI.

🚨 The Big Marketing Story Today

Google Just Launched the AI Shopping Cart That Buys for You

Google has quietly rolled out its Universal Cart Platform (UCP), a new system that allows AI agents like Gemini to purchase products directly from retailers without ever visiting their websites. On February 11, Google's VP of Advertising & Commerce, Vidhya Srinivasan, announced that Wayfair and Etsy are the first to use the new protocol, allowing users to buy products directly within the AI chat interface .

This isn't just another 'Buy on Google' button. UCP is the technical backbone for "agentic commerce" — where you tell an AI what you want, and it handles the entire shopping process for you, from discovery and comparison to checkout and payment. It's a fundamental rewiring of e-commerce that moves the point of purchase from the retailer's website to the AI platform itself.

For a product to be eligible, it requires deep integration. Retailers need to provide highly structured data through their Merchant Center feeds and on-site schema, including detailed return policies, customer support information, and specific consumer warnings. This isn't just about product discovery; it's about giving the AI everything it needs to make a confident purchase on a user's behalf.

🧠 Why This Matters (The "So What")

• The End of the Traditional Funnel. Agentic commerce bypasses the entire marketing funnel as we know it. Awareness, consideration, and conversion now happen within a single AI interaction. If your products aren't optimized for this new reality, you will become invisible to a growing segment of AI-powered shoppers.

• Your Product Data Is Now Your Most Critical Ad Creative. The battle for visibility is no longer just about keywords and bids. It's about the richness and accuracy of your product data. An AI agent will choose a product based on detailed attributes like specific color shades, materials, compatibility, and shipping details. Incomplete or poorly structured data will get you eliminated before the user even knows you exist.

• Retail Media Is Shifting to AI Platforms. As AI assistants become the new storefront, the ad dollars will follow. Walmart is already seeing this with its own AI shopping assistant, where users build 35% bigger baskets than non-AI users . The competition is no longer just about ranking on a search results page; it's about being the product that an AI agent selects and purchases.

🔍 What Smart Marketers Are Doing

They are treating their product feeds like a strategic asset, not an IT task. They are auditing their on-site schema and Merchant Center feeds relentlessly, ensuring every possible attribute is populated. They are thinking beyond basic product descriptions and considering how an AI would compare their products to competitors, optimizing for compatibility, substitution, and cross-sell opportunities.

🧪 Try This This Week

• Go into your Google Merchant Center account and review your return policies and customer support information. Are they complete and up-to-date?

• Look at your top 5 products. Do they have complete and accurate data for every possible attribute, including shipping details, consumer warnings, and multiple high-quality images?

⚡ 3 Quick Signals

TikTok Shop Is Coming for the Throne. A new report projects TikTok Shop will be a top-3 global retailer by 2030, surpassing Walmart and driving nearly $1 trillion in sales. Its fusion of entertainment and commerce is creating a demand engine that rivals Amazon .
Snapchat Is Chasing the Creator Subscription Model. Following the lead of other platforms, Snapchat launched creator subscriptions this week, allowing select US creators to offer exclusive content for a monthly fee. It's another sign that direct fan monetization is becoming a key part of the creator economy .
Last Friday's News (In Case You Missed It): ChatGPT officially rolled out ads for free and low-tier users, appearing after the very first prompt. With a reported $200,000 minimum ad buy, the organic answer slot just became the most valuable free real estate in marketing .

🤖 Tool Watch

Google just rolled out a "Results Tab" in Google Ads Recommendations. For years, marketers have complained that Google's recommendations felt like a black box. Now, you can finally see the actual performance impact after you apply a recommendation, bringing much-needed accountability to the feature .