Would you let a bot pick your policy?
While the trial feature searches for products and gives users options, it currently cannot process transactions without users’ consent by clicking the “buy” button, but Whittle said the technology is advancing quickly and will soon work automatically.
“It takes out all that friction, time spent looking at specs and prices, and gives you direct recommendations,” Whittle said.
“If you think about the last few decades, there’s all this infrastructure set up for online shopping, search engine optimization and collecting data through cookies or directing customers to your website, but now there’s a risk that websites will become irrelevant for businesses because people won’t go to individual product pages, they’ll use AI chat tools,” he said.
Agent shopping technology, Whittle expects, will soon be able to predict time-sensitive events like policy renewal dates or loved ones’ birthdays, potentially offering users better deals or gift ideas based on a friend or family member’s personalized information.
Technology can also balance tradeoffs regarding product cost and trade-offs with other benefits, such as the potential to earn rewards and loyalty points.
But Whittle said a key question will be how to monetize mediated shopping bots, with the potential for product placement that could undermine consumers’ trust in the technology.
“Is the product it shows you based on your preferences rather than a special deal with certain vendors behind the scenes?” he said. “All these AI companies are hemorrhaging money right now, and if you look at how tech companies have made money in the past, it’s through web search ads or taking a cut of sales.”
“The question arises if consumers are being directed to certain types of products, but that already exists to some degree through web searches and algorithmic advertising,” Whittle said.
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AI-powered agent shopping is poised to challenge a wide range of business models, but experts are now sounding a particular alarm for industries like insurance, where companies tend to rely on inertia among customers and the perception that significant time and effort is required to shop around and switch providers.
TaeWoo Kim, a lecturer specializing in technology and human decision-making at the University of Technology Sydney’s business school, reiterated his prediction that agent shopping will challenge industries such as insurance.
“Insurance companies want customers to scrutinize and compare quotes less often. Customers are less inclined to switch providers because it requires too much effort,” Kim said.
While large insurers often gain customers who trust their brands and broad market presence, agency shopping can steer customers away from that bias and toward cheaper rates from smaller competitors, Kim said.
He said that unlike humans, agents do not experience decision paralysis.
Likewise, insurance providers have already begun using AI agents to communicate with customers and collect their information for quotes and claims, Kim said, which could make it an easier concept for consumers to adopt agent shopping bots to represent themselves.
“There may soon be a future where a business is not talking to a customer, but an AI bot is talking to another AI bot,” Kim said. “Just like a science fiction movie.”
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