Holiday Shopping vs. AI Shopping: How the Customer Journey Really Works Now

Customers don’t browse. They ask. 

The biggest change in 2025 isn’t what customers buy, it’s how they decide. 

According to Adobe’s 2025 Holiday Sales Forecast, global online spending is projected to reach $240 billion, up 7% year-over-year. Yet, search traffic is flattening. Meanwhile, engagement inside AI tools is growing exponentially. 

This holiday season, the path to purchase no longer starts with a search bar. It starts with a question. 

Consumers are no longer typing “best deals for gifts” into Google. They’re asking “What’s the best wireless headphone under $200?” or “Which skincare sets are worth it this year?” directly to AI assistants that summarize, compare, and recommend. 

And that subtle behavioral shift is changing everything about how visibility, trust, and conversion work online. 

Let’s unpack how the AI shopping journey now runs parallel to, and often replaces, the traditional search funnel, and what brands can do about it. 

From Search to Suggestions: Two Different Journeys 

In traditional search, customers browse. They scan results, open tabs, and evaluate claims. Brands win through keywords, SEO structure, and clear CTAs. 

In AI shopping, customers ask. Large Language Models (LLMs) synthesize content across thousands of sources and present a short, confident answer. Instead of reading multiple reviews, users get a single summary and often, a single recommendation. 

Here’s a simplified map of the shift: 

The AI shopping path removes friction, but also removes optionality. If your brand isn’t part of that trust layer, it may not show up at all. 

At HatchEcom, we call this the visibility gap: when great brands exist online but remain invisible in AI-driven discovery. 

Behavior Shift #1: Discovery Happens in Dialogue 

Search used to reward visibility. AI rewards clarity. 

When consumers ask ChatGPT “What’s the best serum for acne scars?”, the answer is no longer a ranked list of 10 blue links. It’s a curated insight built from verified sources, brand mentions, and consistent information. 

SPATE’s 2025 report on ChatGPT vs Google Search confirms that beauty shoppers now turn to AI for personal, problem-specific recommendations (facials, sunscreen, eczema treatments) topics driven by concern, not curiosity. 

That’s the new baseline: people want conversation, not content. They don’t scroll through pages; they ask, refine, and decide in minutes. 

This means AI visibility, how easily your brand appears in AI-generated answers, has become a new growth lever. To rank in conversations, your data, reviews, and product details must be structured, factual, and consistent across channels. 

In short: Search rewards discoverability. AI rewards trust. 

Behavior Shift #2: Purchase Decisions Are Context-Driven 

Traditional holiday campaigns focused on price, promotion, and urgency. But AI-driven discovery surfaces context instead of discounts. 

Tools like ChatGPT’s Shopping Partner, Microsoft Copilot, and Amazon’s Rufus AI are integrating real-time commerce features. Users can ask, “Find the best holiday bundle for a family of four”, and receive results filtered by value, sustainability, and reviews, not just lowest cost. 

AI doesn’t care how loud your sale banner is. It reads what customers say about you, what influencers publish, and what reviewers confirm. 

In fact, a 2025 Shopify Plus benchmark shows that conversion rates are 19% higher for shoppers engaging with personalized or AI-assisted recommendations.  

This shows what HatchEcom teams see daily: campaigns that align around buyer context, not budget size, consistently outperform in both return and retention. 

For brands, this means: 

• Reinforce credibility through verified claims and reviews. 

• Align PDP copy with how people ask (not just search). 

• Add structured data that clarifies purpose, benefits, and trust factors. 

Price might still close the deal, but context now opens it. 

Behavior Shift #3: Channels Are Converging 

In 2024, ecommerce felt fragmented: social commerce, marketplaces, brand stores, email, ads. In 2025, AI acts as the interface that connects them all. 

When users engage with Copilot for Shopping or ChatGPT’s PayPal + Shopify integration, they can browse, compare, and purchase without leaving the chat. 

That means every product description, review, and headline contributes to a brand’s AI footprint, the network of information that models use to decide whether to recommend you. 

Adobe’s 2025 holiday forecast also highlights that AI-assisted shopping will influence over $100B in online sales this season, particularly through hybrid journeys that start in chat and finish in-store. 

For marketing teams, this convergence changes the equation: 

• Visibility is no longer limited to SEO. 

• Ads and PDPs are no longer isolated. 

• Every digital touchpoint trains AI on what your brand stands for. 

In short: omnichannel isn’t just about presence anymore, it’s about consistency in data and messaging. 

How to Prepare Your Brand for the AI Shopping Journey 

Building for AI commerce doesn’t mean rewriting everything. It means structuring what already exists to be readable by both humans and machines. 

Here’s a quick roadmap: 

1. Audit Your Data Layer

Ensure your product feeds, schema, and PDP metadata are clean, consistent, and current. AI models prioritize structured information and verified sources. 

2. Speak the Language of Intent

Update copy to reflect natural-language questions. Instead of “Advanced Moisturizer with Collagen”, use phrases like “Best moisturizer for dry skin” or “Collagen cream for winter hydration.” 

3. Build Social ProofIntothe Ecosystem 

AI agents value signals of credibility: verified reviews, consistent ratings, and user-generated content across platforms. Feed these signals back into your PDPs and product listings. 

4. Test Queries, Not Just Keywords

Ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Copilot the same questions your buyers would. See if your brand appears. If not, identify where the model is sourcing its answers and improve your authority there. 

5. Balance Human Creativity with Machine Clarity

The best-performing brands in 2025 are fluent in both storytelling and structure. Emotional messaging builds connection; technical accuracy builds discoverability. 

When AI reads your content, it should find clarity. When people read it, they should feel trust. 

The Real Takeaway: From Clicks to Conversations 

The 2025 customer journey isn’t linear, it’s layered. Search still matters, but AI shopping now shapes what customers believe before they even click. 

In this environment, every product description, headline, and review is more than content, it’s a trust signal that tells AI how to interpret your brand. 

Brands that thrive this holiday season won’t just bid higher or post faster. They’ll design for a world where AI is part of the buying team. 

Because when customers ask instead of browse, the brands that answer clearly are the ones that win.