Consumer brand websites have been built on one basic assumption for over twenty years. Consumers come to a site, poke around menus, read product pages, search FAQs… and then click “buy.” Artificial intelligence is starting to change all that. Consumers are increasingly asking questions instead of digging for information: “Which of these products is best for me?” “What’s the difference between these two models?” “Is this worth the extra $100?” “How does this compare with the competitor?” “Will this work for what I need?”

Should brands put an “Ask AI” or AI-query link directly on their websites?

I believe the answer is yes—but brands need to think carefully about how they implement it. The opportunity isn’t simply adding another button. It’s creating a new interface between consumers, brand information, and the purchase decision.

Consumer Search Behavior Is Already Changing

The age-old search-to-website funnel may be cracking. When Pew Research Center studied 68,879 searches on Google, they found noteworthy changes when AI-generated summaries populated on Google. Without an AI summary, people clicked on a traditional search result 15% of the time. With an AI summary populating, that dropped to 8%.

Even more telling, visits where people clicked on a source listed directly in the AI pared down to just 1%. If more consumers skip visiting websites altogether, that’s a seismic shift in digital marketing. Previously, brands optimized their sites to win clicks. Now, if shoppers can get enough information from an AI, they may not need to click through at all. As consumer brands consider SEO, content, and marketing strategies, they need to realize the website can no longer act just as a destination. It also needs to serve as informational content for AI-assisted browsing.

AI Is Becoming a Shopping Tool

The shift becomes even clearer when looking specifically at commerce. Adobe Analytics found that traffic from generative-AI services to U.S. retail websites increased dramatically during 2025. Adobe’s July 2025 analysis reported AI-driven retail traffic up 4,700% year over year.

In its survey of 5,000 U.S. consumers:

38% said they had already used generative AI for online shopping.
52% planned to use it during the year.
53% of AI shoppers used it for product research.
40% used it for product recommendations.
36% used it to find deals.

And the trend continued.

Adobe reported that during the 2025 holiday season, generative-AI referrals to retail websites increased 693% year over year. More interesting than traffic, however, is how those visitors behave.

Adobe subsequently reported that shoppers arriving from AI assistants spent 45% more time on retail sites, viewed 13% more pages per visit, and were 33% less likely to leave immediately than visitors from other traffic sources.

During the 2025 holiday period, AI-referred visitors actually converted 31% better than other traffic sources. That should get the attention of every CMO running a consumer brand. AI isn’t merely another media channel. It is becoming part of the consideration process.

The Next Website CTA: “Ask AI About This Product”

Imagine visiting a product page for a refrigerator. Alongside the familiar: Add to Cart, Find a Retailer, and See Specifications, there is another option:

Ask AI About This Product

Clicking would take you into a conversation based on the product details on that page. Rather than making someone wade through six pages of specs, the customer could ask: “Will this fridge work for a family of five?” “Show me the model just above this one.” “What am I sacrificing if I buy the low-end model?” “What features are important?” “Will this fit in a 36-inch space?” This is far closer to the human buying process.

But Don’t Simply Send Customers to ChatGPT

This is an important distinction. Simply inserting a generic link that says “Ask ChatGPT about us” onto a product page can hurt the brand. Why? Because when consumers exit the brand experience, the brand no longer owns the conversation. The AI could promote a competitor. It could pull up outdated product data. It may misconstrue a feature. And you’ve just redirected a qualified visitor out of your funnel. Brands should instead think hierarchy.

1ne. Build an AI Query Layer Into the Website

The best implementation is an on-site conversational interface grounded in approved brand and product data. Think of it less as a customer-service chatbot and more as a digital product expert. Consumers should be able to ask questions about specifications, applications, pricing, warranties, comparisons, compatibility, ingredients, availability, and other purchase considerations.

The objective isn’t to trap people in a chatbot. It’s to shorten the distance between “I’m interested” and “I understand which product is right for me.”

2wo. Put “Ask AI” at the Product Level

Don’t hide AI under a generic customer-service icon in the bottom corner. Put it where questions occur.

For example: BUY NOW | COMPARE | ASK AI

An AI conversation initiated from a product page should automatically know which product the consumer is viewing. That’s much more useful than forcing the consumer to explain everything again.

3hree. Create Suggested Questions

A blank AI prompt can be daunting. Provide consumers with helpful entry points: Is this right for me? Compare models: Learn the differences; explore pros & cons. Things to know before you buy. Find the right product for you. Each of these questions also gives marketers actionable intent data.

AI Queries Could Become an Extraordinary Source of Consumer Insight

This may be the most overlooked opportunity. Google Analytics tells marketers what pages people visit. Search data tells marketers what terms they use. AI conversations potentially tell marketers what consumers are actually trying to decide.

Suppose 14,000 people visit a washing-machine product page. Traditional analytics might tell you:

time on page;
bounce rate;
traffic source;
pages viewed;
conversion rate.

AI-query analytics could reveal something much more valuable:

31% asked about reliability.

24% asked how the product compared with a competitor.

19% were confused about capacity.

14% asked about installation.

12% were concerned about warranty coverage.

That’s essentially continuous qualitative consumer research occurring at scale. Product managers, marketers, agencies and even R&D teams should want that information.

AI Optimization May Become as Important as SEO

Companies have invested billions of dollars in making their websites SEO-friendly. Now they’re figuring out how to make them AI-friendly. ChatGPT, Google’s Bard and other AI assistants don’t just spit back ten blue links. They synthesize information from across the web.

OpenAI has steadily improved shopping and product discovery functions in ChatGPT over the years, adding product comparisons, up-to-date product info, and the ability to ingest merchant product feeds.

Marketers need to start thinking about AI discoverability in addition to SEO. Information about products should be explicit, structured, and machine-readable. Instead of marketing speak like: “Experience the pinnacle of our cleaning technology,” AI needs to know: Capacity: 5.2 cubic feet; Cycle time: 28 minutes; Warranty: 10 years on motor; Energy Star certified? Yes. Dimensions: X × Y × Z. Best suited for: families of 4-6 people. Naturally, marketers don’t abandon language that appeals to people. They also need to create machine-readable content that helps AI understand their products.

Don’t Let AI Become Another Marketing Gimmick

There’s a huge risk of brands running here. Every brand is going to want to throw an AI bot icon on their website and say they’re innovative. That’s not innovation, that’s marketing. An AI interface that just reads their FAQ page aloud to people (or provides canned responses) will create little value. The KPI should not be: “How many shoppers interacted with our AI?” Instead, it should be: Did AI help consumers make better purchase decisions faster? To understand this, marketers will need to track engagement metrics like:

AI interaction → product-page engagement; AI interaction → comparison activity; AI interaction → retailer locator

AI interaction → add-to-cart; AI interaction → conversion; average order value of AI-assisted conversions

Questions consumed before purchase. Questions correlated with cart abandonment. And most interesting of all:

AI users vs. non-AI users conversion rate.

That becomes the business case.

Start With an Experiment

I wouldn’t recommend rebuilding an entire consumer website around AI tomorrow. I would run a controlled test. Select several high-consideration products—electronics, appliances, beauty, automotive, home improvement or other categories where consumers naturally have questions.

Add:

ASK AI ABOUT THIS PRODUCT

Then test it against the existing experience. Measure engagement, conversion, revenue per visitor, customer-service contacts and the types of questions consumers ask. I’d also test three experiences:

A: Traditional product page

B: Product page + on-site AI product expert

C: Product page + external AI-query link

The results could be extremely revealing.

The Bigger Issue Isn’t the Button

The strategic question isn’t whether websites should have an AI link. It’s whether consumer websites were designed for how consumers increasingly want to get information. Most weren’t.They were built around navigation.

AI is built around questions. That difference could fundamentally change digital marketing. For 25 years, brands have asked: