Search is evolving faster than ever. AI-generated answers, shopping panels, and zero-click results are reshaping how customers discover and choose products.
For commerce brands, this isn’t a challenge to fear but a huge opportunity to lead the way. The brands that adapt now will gain visibility in places competitors haven’t even started to think about yet.
AI doesn’t just search, it selects – make sure it chooses you
Consumers are increasingly leveraging AI tools to guide purchases in the UK. In fact, Adobe Analytics reports that traffic from generative AI sources to UK retail sites has increased significantly. It reveals a 20% month-over-month jump between February and March 2025 and a staggering 790% increase since August 2024.
When a shopper asks for ‘the best moisturiser under £30’, AI isn’t scrolling through endless results. It’s selecting a small set of trusted, well-structured options.
Brands that enrich their product data, optimise feeds, and ensure AI fully understands their inventory will be the ones that consistently make the cut.
Technical SEO is more important than ever
Technical SEO has always been the backbone of visibility, but in an AI-driven search world, it’s evolving into a growth engine.
-
Schema markup helps AI recognise your products, prices, reviews, and availability with confidence.
-
Optimised, real-time product feeds boost placement in shopping panels and recommendation carousels.
-
Smart crawling and indexation management ensures no valuable SKU is missed.
This is no longer just about rankings; the challenge is being fully understood by machines that surface and recommend your products. The brands mastering this will gain a lasting competitive advantage.
Trust signals shape AI choices
AI doesn’t just look at product data, it also weighs social proof and authority. Reviews, expert mentions, and consistent, trustworthy information across platforms all make it more likely that your products will be surfaced first.
Brands investing in authentic reviews, brand reputation, and trusted citations are building visibility that goes way beyond keywords – it influences the AI decision-making process itself.
Agility wins in an AI-driven landscape
AI search evolves rapidly. New organic shopping formats and shifts in how AI interprets data mean static SEO strategies won’t cut it anymore.
Success comes from building real-time optimisation into workflows, testing and refining feeds, schema, and attributes regularly, and connecting SEO with paid search, CRO, and merchandising teams to respond fast and capture every opportunity.
The future of SEO is AI-ready, data-first, and full of opportunity
AI hasn’t replaced SEO; it’s redefined what great SEO looks like. Commerce brands should treat this moment as an opportunity to achieve three things:
-
Strengthen data foundations across feeds, schema, and reviews
-
Optimise for AI-powered discovery in shopping panels and recommendation engines
-
Build agile, connected search strategies across teams
AI is rewriting the rules of discovery. Commerce brands that optimise their data today will own the digital shelf tomorrow.
