{"id":539263,"date":"2026-07-22T21:35:15","date_gmt":"2026-07-22T21:35:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/539263\/"},"modified":"2026-07-22T21:35:15","modified_gmt":"2026-07-22T21:35:15","slug":"ai-is-changing-the-way-consumers-shop-and-businesses-need-to-get-ready","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/539263\/","title":{"rendered":"AI is changing the way consumers shop, and businesses need to get ready"},"content":{"rendered":"

For years, consumers have discovered products and made purchase decisions by using search engines, websites, or recommendations from family and friends.<\/p>\n

Enter artificial intelligence. The technology that has already changed so much<\/a>, is also transforming shopping.<\/p>\n

Research by PwC has found that AI tools have become the third most-used channel for product research among consumers, behind search engines and retailer websites or apps.<\/p>\n

PwC’s survey of 1000 consumers found 44 percent said AI had reduced their use of search engines when researching purchases.<\/p>\n

PwC partner Phil Wheeler said it was an important finding, and highlighted the start of an evolution for consumers.<\/p>\n

“They are using it primarily at the moment for the early stages of that shopping journey,” he said.<\/p>\n

It meant consumers were using AI for product inspiration, comparison, price options and price benefits, rather than executing the purchase itself.<\/p>\n

\"PwC<\/p>\n

PwC partner Phil Wheeler.<\/p>\n

Supplied \/ PwC<\/p>\n

“We think that [the latter point] is really related to trust in AI, and the evolution of AI — I mean it’s not perfect yet, there’s still development going on,” he said.<\/p>\n

Wheeler said businesses had to act<\/a> to get on top of changing consumer behaviour.<\/p>\n

“I think for consumer brands and retailers, they now need to start committing to adapting the way that they present in the market,” he said.<\/p>\n

“That’s no longer adapting it for [just] search engine optimisation … or social media.”<\/p>\n

Wheeler said it had become “how does AI view me as a brand or what type of perception is it going to provide to consumers when they search or prompt a particular product?”.<\/p>\n

The PwC report said for businesses it raised questions around the discoverability of their products and services within AI-driven experiences, and whether their production information was structured, accurate and trusted.<\/p>\n

And it raised a question of how marketing and online strategies should evolve if consumers bypassed traditional search methods.<\/p>\n

PwC said the next phase of the AI evolution was already emerging, with AI agents able to act on a consumer’s behalf, from comparing products to completing purchases.<\/p>\n

Its report said while agentic commerce was in its early stages, its findings suggested adoption was already underway.<\/p>\n

It found 31 percent of consumers were already comfortable allowing an AI agent to complete purchases on their behalf.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For years, consumers have discovered products and made purchase decisions by using search engines, websites, or recommendations from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":539264,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[365,363,364,111,139,69,145],"class_list":["post-539263","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-technology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539263","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=539263"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/539263\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/539264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=539263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=539263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=539263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}