Until the middle of the last decade, selling online meant one thing: bringing people to your own website. Today the same sale flows through many different channels. And increasingly, before the customer even sees a product, an AI agent is already selecting the alternatives.
This shift also changes the role of product data. For years it was a technical file, useful for feeding the catalog. Today it is the condition for being chosen.
This is the theme of "Beyond the eCommerce Website", the exclusive research by Highstreet.io (insert link: https://highstreet.io/) in collaboration with Casaleggio Associati, presented at Route to Digital Excellence 2026. The report reconstructs how the purchase decision has shifted over the past ten years and measures where Italian commerce stands today.
The first shift came in 2015. Until then, online selling went through a single point: the website, with a catalog read by a person. Then points of sale multiplied: apps, marketplaces, social commerce, retail media, comparison sites. The catalog was still read only by a person, but that person could now be reached in many places, each with its own rules.
The second shift began in 2025: an AI agent has stepped in between the customer and the channels, a piece of software that chooses first.
At every step, what makes the difference has moved upstream: product data, which has stopped being a lever and has become a condition.
If an agent chooses first, what is left in the company's hands? The research identifies three levers that agents, for now, do not mediate.
The brand: when a customer searches for a product by name, the choice has already been made before turning to the agent. Even the brand, however, has a limit: within the agent's answer, the advantage of a well-known brand shrinks more than you would expect.
The experience: a store, a live stream or a community generate sales because people want to take part in them.
The relationship: a company that knows the customer better than the agent does can anticipate their needs and make the right offer.
And there is a fourth variable, the most powerful of all: in the experiments available, it shifts an agent's choice far more than it shifts a person's. What it is, and how much it weighs, is explained by the research.
Discover what guides the choices of AI agents
Brand, experience and relationship remain in the company's hands. But to make it into the set of alternatives, a product must first be read by the agent. That is why everything comes back to product data: the asset that every channel uses and that only the company can generate. Yet its potential is still largely untapped.
Unlocking it is the work of Highstreet.io, part of the Impresoft Univerce ecosystem. The platform enables brands to automate data distribution processes, improving visibility and online sales also through the use of AI.
To learn more about this topic, download the full research “Beyond the eCommerce Website”