Visa Says Small Merchants Could Move Faster on AI Shopping

Small merchants are preparing for a customer who may find them through artificial intelligence before ever visiting their website, app or store. They aren’t particularly ready. Just 11% of small- to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) qualify as agent-ready, compared with 19% of large merchants. The PYMNTS Intelligence report “2026 Global Digital Shopping Index: Merchant Edition,” a collaboration with Visa Acceptance Solutions, found in June that 15% of merchants overall have structured product data for agent access. Yet 68% expect AI agents to account for at least 5% of digital sales within two years, and 38% expect more than 15%. Sara Craven, general manager of Verifi / ANET at Visa, told PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster that SMBs may be able to close the gap faster than their larger competitors. “Small businesses have a distinct ability to pivot faster, to move faster,” Craven said, adding that “with AI, they have the ability to learn a lot faster.” One place to start is the product catalog. A description written for someone browsing a website may not give an AI model enough information to answer a specific shopping request. Merchants need precise descriptions, inventory, sizes, prices and payment options, Craven said. Loyalty information can also affect recommendations when consumers ask AI to account for memberships or rewards. For an SMB, the data can determine whether it makes the consideration set. Webster illustrated the point with a shopper looking for a dress for an October wedding in Paris, asking AI to consider the destination, weather, occasion and other requirements. Craven took the example to a local Paris merchant. If the business has accurately described a small gold dress, its location and October availability, AI could surface it for a shopper who might never encounter the merchant through conventional search. “That helps the small businesses in Paris,” Craven said, by way of example. “The agentic world and AI has now helped you to find something you otherwise would never have found if you were just doing a standard search.” For now, much of that opportunity remains at the discovery stage. A shopper can ask AI to find a blue sweater in a particular size and at a specified price, but having an agent independently complete that purchase from beginning to end isn’t broadly available yet. “Consumers are using it today as just a better search, and they’re buying where they always buy,” Webster said. The distinction creates a measurement problem. Only 23% of merchants can clearly identify both AI-driven traffic and completed purchases, while 37% can’t distinguish AI-driven traffic from other digital traffic. Without that visibility, merchants can’t readily determine how much business AI is producing or adjust their approach to capture more of it. “It is a different channel, and it is a channel that you have to modify how you sell [in order] to get the pickup in transactions and conver...