Time to read: 4 minutes
Not too long ago, we shared how Google had introduced various AI-powered features for online shoppers. Today, we’re sharing the company’s newest big announcement: Universal Commerce Protocol, an agentic commerce and AI tool designed to help retailers connect with online shoppers and drive more sales. Soon, shoppers will be able to research and buy products right from conversations with Google’s AI without ever leaving the chat.
This announcement comes as no shock since ChatGPT introduced their similar instant checkout feature within AI conversations just last year. Keep on reading to learn more about UCP, new AI chat agents, and how you can sign up.
But First, What Is the Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP)?
According to Google, the Universal Commerce Protocol is an open standard that establishes a common language for AI agents and systems to work together across websites, shopping platforms, and payment providers.
You can think of it as a universal online translator. Online commerce platforms like Shopify, Amazon, and others all speak a different language, making it hard for AI tools to show potential customers products because things get lost in translation. Now, with UCP, your online store can speak to AI bots and search engines instantly in a way they understand, essentially removing the language barrier between your products and the people looking to buy them.
UCP was co-developed and is support by various platforms and payment ecosystems such as:
Also Coming Soon: Branded AI Agents
Google is also launching Business Agent, which allows shoppers to chat with brands, right in search results.
Business Agent will be able to answer product questions in your brand’s voice by using product and brand information gathered from your Merchant Center account. This allows retailers to easily connect with potential buyers during their shopping experience, helping to drive sales.
To use Business Agent, visit your Merchant Center account and look for a new option in the left-hand navigation under the Marketing dropdown:
(Source: Brodie Clark on LinkedIn)
What This Means for Your Marketing Strategy
Many of us have known for a while that AI will continue to shake up how we conduct SEO and PPC, but this may be one of the biggest changes yet for retailers. For the first time, the goal posts are moving from getting a human to click on your website’s link to convincing AI platforms that your product is the best answer to a query.
Here are some things you should prioritize in your marketing strategy to ensure you don’t get left in the dust:
- Fix Your Product Feeds – Go into Merchant Center and make sure your products all have a GTIN (Barcode) and SKU. New evidence has shown that AI uses these to compare your products with those of competitors. But also, make sure you’re resyncing your feeds when products go out of stock!
- Keep the Pop-ups to a Minimum – AI scrapers need to be able to scan your site to easily digest it, and pop-ups can get in the way! Things such as “spin-to-win” wheels and complex CAPTCHA could be holding your site back from being readable to AI scanners. If an AI bot can’t reach your checkout button because a pop-up is in the way, it will move on to the next store.
- Enhance Your Schema – If you aren’t already using Schema Markup, now is the time to start. Schema acts like the answers you find in the back of the textbook for your different products, and easily tells AI important details such as price, color, and return policies without the AI having to “guess.” The result is fewer hallucinations and less incorrect information being relayed about your brand.
- Continue to Optimize Your Products – Make sure you aren’t using product titles like “Blue Hiking Boots.” Instead, use keyword-rich phrasing that can match users’ searches, like “Joe’s Waterproof Hiking Boots – Blue.”
- Consider Investing in Help – Whether you seek to hire an internal resource or outsource to an SEO company with ecommerce experience, if you wait to jump on board with UCP, you may end up losing potential sales.
