In addition to my work here at Shop Eat Surf Outdoor, I oversee a sister publication called Retail TouchPoints, which covers retail strategy, technology and commerce for the larger retailers it typically writes about. This week, RTP released a free special report that I think is just as relevant for the surf, outdoor and action sports brands in this community.
The report is called AI’s Impact on the Path to Purchase, and the short version is this: AI agents are starting to shop on behalf of consumers, and that changes everything about how your brand gets discovered, recommended and ultimately purchased. The scarier finding is that brands may still make the sale but lose the customer relationship in the process, along with the data and story that go with it.
Whether you’re a smaller specialty brand trying to get recommended by an AI agent over a big-box competitor, or a larger retailer figuring out how to protect your customer data and first-party relationships in an agentic world, this report has something for you. Experts from Kearney, SSA & Co. and S-RM break it all down in plain language.
Download the full report free here.
