Your customers already shop by asking AI. Why the PDP is now your battleground, and three moves, ranked by risk, to close the Intent Gap before they leave.
Here's something I've been thinking about lately – and I'm going to be completely honest with you about it.
Six months ago, I watched one of my friends sitting in the passenger seat of my car, chatting away to ChatGPT like it was the most natural thing in the world. Not typing. Talking. Having a proper conversation about what they wanted to buy. Then Rufus on Amazon. Then Perplexity. Each one making their shopping experience feel... I don't know, more human somehow?
And then there's my 10-year-old mate's son. He's on Amazon mobile, looking at Lego, and his dad asks him how many pieces are in the set. The kid doesn't even look up. "Hold on, Dad. I'll just ask Rufus."
He's 10. He has no context for how things used to work. No baggage about what's "normal" for online shopping. To him, asking an AI assistant about product details is as obvious as asking his dad.
That's when it hit me. The genie's out. It's not going back in.
The Problem Nobody's Talking About
Every week – and I mean literally every single week – there's another groundbreaking feature dropping in the e-commerce space. Features that make our carefully planned websites feel... well, primitive.
I don't even need to list them for you. You've seen them. The conversational search. The contextual product questions. The way Rufus just naturally surfaces information about whether something needs glue, what factions are in the Warhammer set, if it can be painted. Stuff that actually matters to the person shopping right now.
Meanwhile, we're still operating in the world of lists, grids, and detail pages. The paradigm we've been trapped in for 20 years. Click on a list. Look at the detail. Come back to the list. Continue filtering. Repeat.
Don't get me wrong – that was innovative when it came out. But watching what's happening now? It's like we've all been having conversations in a language we barely speak, using a phrasebook, when suddenly everyone else learned to speak fluently.
Why Nobody's Doing Anything About It
Everyone can see what's happening. The writing's not just on the wall – it's lit up in neon. So why isn't anyone doing anything about it?
Let me tell you what I keep hearing from retailers. "It's a bubble." Yeah, someone actually said that to me this week. A retailer I genuinely respect, too. And I get it – I understand where it comes from. But when a 10-year-old is casually asking Rufus about Lego specs, and when that moment gets a South Park episode (yes, ChatGPT got a South Park episode), it's not a bubble. It's culture.
The real issue is Fear (with a capital F!)
You've got the ‘old house’ to maintain. Your whole next year of releases is already booked. Three projects max. A couple got pushed to 2027. Your platform capex is spreading into 2029. You're still paying off that £3 million replatform from two years ago.
And now I'm telling you the world's been upended in six months?
Nobody wants to re-platform. Nobody wants to suddenly switch everything over to what they think the future's going to be, only to find out everyone else wasn't ready, or it doesn't perform, or worse – it actually wasn't the future.
Plus, there's the corporate risk evaluation. What happens when your chatbot goes rogue? When someone screenshots it saying something ridiculous, and it's doing the rounds on social? Your share price takes a hit. Your AGM becomes difficult. Your Investor Relations team has kittens.
So everyone plays it safe. And I get it. I really do.
But your customers aren't playing it safe. They're already having these experiences elsewhere. They know what's possible. And every time they land on your site, there's this moment – this tiny moment – where they feel the gap.
The Thing We Forgot About Commerce
You know what I keep coming back to? Commerce was always supposed to be a conversation. We just didn't have a way to hold it.
Think about it. For years, we tried to make it iterative. We tried to make it responsive. We chased personalisation as if it were the holy grail. But we were never able to truly have a conversation with the customer. We could only give them options and hope they picked something.
It's like being at a dinner party where you don't know anyone, and you're desperately cycling through safe conversation starters. "Been busy?" "Nice weather, isn't it?" "How's the commute?" You're not learning anything. You're just filling space.
That's what self-serve e-commerce has been. We told ourselves it was efficient. Customers wanted to self-serve. And in a way, they did – because it was the only option we could give them.
But now? Now we can actually have the conversation we've been trying to have for 20 years.
The PDP Is Your Battleground (Whether You Like It Or Not)
Here's something you probably already know but haven't fully accepted yet: your product detail pages are where your future lives.
Right now, 50% of your traffic is landing directly on PDPs. By this time next year, it'll be more. Eventually, it might be the only way people come to your site. Google Shopping. Instagram. ChatGPT recommendations. AI agents. They're all sending people directly to the product.
Your homepage? Nobody cares. I know that's harsh. I know you spend hours in meetings arguing about who gets what space on the homepage, who's bringing the doughnuts, whose budget is getting that hero banner. But the truth is, your homepage is increasingly irrelevant.
The PDP is where your customers land. And right now, for most of them, it's a cul-de-sac. A dead end. They came because they were in the market for a kind of thing. They looked at it. Now they're bouncing back because they don't know what else to do.
And do you know what they want when they land there? Just two things. Clarity and discovery.
Clarity: Is this the right product for me? Does it work with Apple? Can I charge it in under an hour? Is there a matching trouser suit? The actual questions that matter to their decision.
Discovery: Are there other things like this? Have I seen the full range? Can you show me more so I can build up a choice?
That's it. Two things. But instead, we're drowning them in 15-word titles, scrappage incentives, 10% discount with trade-in, 0% APR with PayPal Credit, the returns policy, "14 people looking at this right now," review summaries, star ratings...
It's clutter. Noise. And somewhere in all that noise, the customer is trying to work out if this is the right thing for them.
What You Can Actually Do About It
Alright. Enough of the problems. Let me give you three things you can do right now. I've organised these by risk appetite, because I know that's what matters in your world.
1. Fix Your Data (Low Risk, High Impact)
This is the foundation. The absolute primer. And it's safe because it sits within your existing structure. You don't have to rip out your technology. There's no re-platforming. Even if your data enrichment is creative, it only activates when the customer requests it.
Your data was shaped for your catalogue. Categories, attributes, hierarchy, structure. Fixed and thin. But your customers could be anywhere. Their language is rich and varied.
That growing disconnect between how your site's organised and how your customers think? That's the Intent Gap. And discovery only happens in the overlap.
So reshape your data according to customer intent. Not just more attributes – contextual, mission-based information. "Weatherproof garden chairs with UV protection that are heavy and good for a balcony." You know why heavy matters for a balcony? Because if you've ever lost your garden furniture to a strong wind, you understand.
This information doesn't bloat your product pages. It sits there quietly, only surfacing when someone searches for it. You're not changing everything for everyone – you're adding richness that only appears when it's needed.
And, if you take care of the data, the game takes care of itself. Every conversation I see about future innovations – generative imagery, conversational AI, whatever comes next – runs into the same wall. "Yeah, but the data's not there."
All roads lead to data.
2. Build Your "New House" (Medium Risk, Strategic Necessity)
Remember the old concept of "old house, new house"? You can't just switch from A to B overnight. You need to run them in parallel.
‘Old house’ is still your cash cow. Nobody wants to scratch it. Revenue might go down. Bonuses are at stake. Little Johnny's tennis club fees won't pay themselves.
But you need someone – a team – building ‘new house.’ Testing features from the new world. Gently teasing them into your existing experience. Encroaching until eventually, you push the old world out.
The key is to be open about it. I saw Nordstrom do something brilliant a few months back. They had an AI-powered gift finder on their site, and when you clicked for more information, it said: "We're trying out some AI features. This is AI-generated."
That's brave. That's honest. And most importantly, it's smart. They're putting something out in production that might go either way, and they're saying, "Hold onto your hats, people. We're giving something a go."
You need to create space to take risks. Not reckless risks – measured experiments that let you learn what works before you need to have all the answers.
3. Make Your PDPs Conversational (Bold Move, Future-Proof Strategy)
This one requires courage. But it's also safer than you think.
Everyone's terrified of site-wide conversational search. What if they ask about order information and we haven't built the routing architecture? What if they type something inappropriate? What if the scope is too broad and it goes wrong?
But on the PDP? The scope is narrow. You're talking about one product. One mission. Can I wash this in a cold wash? Does it work with black? Will my bum look big in it? Show me more from Warhammer.
It's a contained environment where you can start having real conversations with customers. Not everything at once. Just the conversations that matter on that page, in that moment.
And here's why this matters: customers are crying out for it. They want clarity. They want discovery. They want help that feels helpful, not a wall of irrelevant information and desperate cross-sells.
Look at what Rufus is showing us. Those contextual questions. That gentle prompting. That's not rocket science. It's just finally giving customers the conversation they've always wanted to have.
The Choice That's Not Really A Choice
So here's where we are.
The world's moving at a pace that makes your roadmap look like ancient history before you've even started it. Every week, something new drops that makes yesterday's innovation look primitive. Meanwhile, you're tied up in old house maintenance, capex commitments, risk committees, and roadmaps planned 18 months ago.
But your customers? They're not waiting for you to catch up. They're already experiencing the future on other platforms. They know what's possible. And every time they choose where to shop, they're making a calculation about whose experience works better for them.
You can't out-innovate Amazon. You can't move at the pace of a Silicon Valley startup when you've got legacy systems and a board to answer to.
But you can be honest. You can be brave. You can start building bridges between where you are and where you need to be.
You can fix your data. You can create space for experimentation. You can turn your PDPs from dead ends into the discovery hubs they need to be.
Because the customer is always the ultimate arbiter. They decide whose website speaks their language. They decide whether shopping feels effortless or exhausting. They decide who gets their loyalty.
The genie's not going back in the bottle. The question is: are you going to keep pretending it might?
Warren Cowan is the CEO and founder of FoundIt!, an intent-led commerce platform helping retailers like John Lewis, M&S, B&Q, and Neiman Marcus reshape their experiences around customer intent, not catalogue structure. After 20+ years in e-commerce, he's pretty sure he's seen the same problems everyone keeps expecting to disappear just... not disappear.
Want to talk about becoming more intent-led? We're sharing everything we know, zero held back. Get in touch at hey@foundit.com