Etailers race to crack code for LLM-powered shopping

Platforms tweak how their products show up, not just for shoppers, but also for chatbots

- Sakshi Sadashiv

For years, ecommerce discovery was built around keywords, rankings and sponsored slots.

Now, ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude or Google Gemini are guiding users on what to buy, where to buy it and at what price, often without opening a marketplace app. That has forced online retail giants from Amazon and Flipkart to Meesho to tweak how their products show up, not just for shoppers, but also for chatbots.

Al answers often list, at most, three options. "If you're not in the answer, you don’t exist for that user," said Sohom Banerjee, senior research associate at CUTS International, an industry forum. "Unlike Google, where result #5 still gets traffic, AI sharply narrows visibility."

Bain & Company estimates that by 2030, AI shopping agents could influence 15-25% of ecommerce sales. ChatGPT already accounts for roughly 20% of referral clicks to retailers such as Walmart and Etsy, while about 2% of all ChatGPT queries nearly 50 million a day-are shopping-related.

Engagement is also rising: between March and June 2025, click-through rates on ChatGPT answers climbed from 2.2% to 5.7%, with total clicks roughly tripling, Bain found. Indian online retailers can’t ignore the implications as the country is among Open AI's largest user bases.