MarTech: AI Agents Are Coming Between You and Your Customers

In my latest article for MarTech, I look at the decisions brands now face as consumers send their own AI agents to shop. In one week in September, Amazon warned Muse users that the agent’s access violated its Conditions of Use. In the same week, Shopify and PayPal opened checkout to Meta’s agent. Every brand now has to make the same access decision, and at many companies the security team makes it before marketing knows the decision exists.

The article covers four areas for marketing teams. First, decide which agents get in and how far into the purchase funnel, using Visa and Mastercard verification signals to admit trusted agents at checkout. Second, rebuild measurement for checkouts that never fire an analytics pixel. Third, align return, shipping, and warranty terms across every channel so they hold up when a customer’s agent compares them. Fourth, make loyalty benefits apply without a human logging in. It closes with five first steps teams can take before the Q4 numbers come in.

Read the full article on MarTech for a worked example of an apparel brand that loses sales to a competitor with one consistent return policy. The article also explains why I treat this as a coherence-at-velocity problem.