Agentic commerce might be one of the most exciting developments in AI and eCommerce of this decade – but how can AI-driven commerce gain your consumer’s trust and support your business?
What is agentic commerce? #
Agentic commerce describes the ability to search for and purchase products all inside an AI agent without having to go to individual web shops to make the purchase.
“Companies that fail to participate within the next three years risk losing access to a meaningful share of future transaction volume. Various industry estimates suggest agentic commerce could account for 10-20% of eCommerce revenue over time.”
Markus Brunke, Director of Product – Payments & Partners @ Frisbii
How does agentic commerce work? #
How classic online shopping works
The user researches and compares products online or via an agent. Once they’ve made their decision, they will go to the merchant’s web shop, put the product in their cart, pick a payment option, fill in all their payment data and purchase the product.
How agentic commerce works
The user can specify the product they are looking for within the agent, and the agent will provide a selection with direct comparisons (e.g. price, colors, styles, technical features). The user can then choose and purchase the product without having to leave the agent.
Agentic commerce combines both the product research and the checkout experience in one channel. Thanks to secure payment technologies such as tokenization and Click to Pay, the customer does not have to type in their card data every single time which also reduces fraud risks.
Additionally, agentic commerce will increase transparency because the AI agents can compare prices, terms and conditions, customer reviews, delivery options and more across multiple providers which evens the field for consumers and enables them to search and select by very specific and individual factors (e.g. by ingredients, ethical production, location).
What are the advantages of agentic commerce #
- If your web shop or marketplace enables agentic commerce, you will have more visibility and be competitive compared to shops that don’t enable agentic purchases
- You can offer your customers a simple way of researching, comparing, selecting and purchasing products without having to switch channels or devices
- You are counter-acting traffic decrease due to AI overviews and agentic summaries by being part of the agentic shopping experience
- Additionally, the risk of fraudulent purchases is reduced with a secure and transparent checkout process within the agent
How to prepare for agentic commerce #
Agents cannot act without access to data. Their capabilities are entirely determined by the information that is made available to them. This means that not just your web shop but also your broader eCommerce ecosystem must be accessible for the required information, including payment gateways, banks, card networks and merchants.
Ensure that you offer payment options that can be used in agentic commerce
Card companies like Visa & Mastercard are already actively working on agentic commerce options and are ready once agentic commerce has been rolled out in Europe.
If you want to be included in agentic commerce product searches, you need to offer payment methods that offer agentic checkout (e.g. use tokenization, passkeys, etc.).
You might be required to implement specific protocols and compliance settings to activate agentic commerce. Your chosen payment gateway can potentially help you in that regard.
Make your website machine-readable
Agents need to be able to crawl all required information, so make sure that your website including terms and conditions, pricing and product details (including images and videos) are accessible to agents.
Data quality is critical. Product information needs to be structured, metadata needs to be maintained and legacy e-commerce systems might need to be updated to provide agents access to all necessary data.
Product data that optimizes agentic commerce
- Product information
- Delivery times and conditions
- Inventory status
- Shipping costs
- Availability
- Return policies
- Discounts
- etc.
Additionally, while many agents can technically “read” images and videos, text is still the best media format to convey information, so make sure that your images have ALT text and your videos offer transcription files for the agents to read.
Find a payment gateway that enables agentic commerce
You will need a payment gateway that can easily activate agentic commerce options and payment methods in your payment setup.
For example, the Frisbii payment gateway is in close partnership with Visa and has worked on agentic functionalities that are ready to go once the technology has been rolled out in Europe.
Optimize your product portfolio
Not all products might be suitable for agentic commerce.
Examples:
- Highly customizable products and services,
- Age-restricted goods such as alcohol
- Other complex purchases
Make sure you know which products are easily purchased via agentic commerce and focus on them.
Enable checkout with a guest account
Right now, agentic payments are not possible* if customers have to sign up for or log into a customer account to make a purchase. It only works if you offer guest accounts that don’t require a full profile registration / login with password, etc.
If you want to be included in agentic product searches and purchases, you need to enable guest account functionalities.
*This is something that card companies and their partners are working on and want to solve in the future. However, to make sure you are agent-ready from the start, a guest account is your best option.
What is agentic commerce compliance? #
Our partner Visa has collaborated with web company Cloudflare to build a trusted agent protocol that ensures full compliance, data security and reduces fraud and other risks associated with online and agentic purchases.
What is the Visa trusted agent protocol?
This protocol is able to identify trusted agents and make sure there is a real human being behind that agent which ensures safety for consumers and merchants alike. Find more information on the Visa website.
Secure payments with tokenization
Agentic commerce technology as provided by Visa makes sure that the agent will never save or share raw card payment data. This is enabled via tokenization.
Tokenization is a card technology that replaces individual card data with a token as a payment credential that guarantees that the card is real, active and has not been stolen. Customers only have to share their credit card data once with the agent to verify their data and activate the token. Read more about credit card tokens in our blog article.
Passkeys
Authentication will be handled with passkeys to reduce friction (e.g. not having to switch to a verification app or receive a one-time password) and increase security.
“Everything should happen in the same place.”
Mikael Norgard, Digital Payments and E-Commerce Solutions Lead at Visa
Active opt-in
Another compliance feature is the active opt-in for a purchase. Only if a customer writes or says, “I want to buy/purchase this product”, will the agent activate the transaction. This ensures that there is a documented consent to the purchase in case of a dispute.
Agentic commerce and fraud prevention
For many consumers and merchants, the idea of an agent purchasing products might initially sound unsafe but agentic technology is built in a way that actually reduces fraud risks and increases security.
- Safety protocols ensure that every single purchase is done by a real human being
- Token technology removes sensitive card data from the process and guarantees that validation of the used cards
- Passkeys prevent identity and card theft
- The need for active purchase intent makes sure that no agent can act without the user’s explicit opt-in
Agentic commerce with Visa and Frisbii #
Frisbii is an official partner for Visa’s agentic commerce options and enables you to include agentic commerce as a shopping channel. Feel free to reach out about our beta program once Europe has introduced agentic commerce or discuss details with our payment experts.
