The department store giant has been working for years to turn around falling revenue and its latest move is a digital push using artificial intelligence to make online shopping feel more like a guided in-store experience. Instead of expecting customers to click through pages of products, Macy’s now invites them to ask questions and get tailored suggestions in real time as part of a broader strategy to modernise its website and keep shoppers engaged.
In recent tests with roughly half of its site visitors, Macy’s found that people using its new “Ask Macy’s” assistant, built on Google’s Gemini AI platform, are spending close to 4.75 times more than those browsing without the tool. The chatbot answers product questions, narrows down options and helps customers discover items they might not find on their own, which appears to translate into bigger baskets and more confident purchases. Other retailers are rolling out similar conversational tools because they see a risk that without them, shoppers will simply research products on external AI platforms instead of staying on their sites.
This shift toward AI-guided shopping looks like it could reshape how people explore and buy products online, potentially rewarding retailers that invest early in conversational search. At the same time, it seems to raise longer-term issues around customer trust, data use and whether the initial spending surge will last once the novelty wears off, leaving retailers to balance innovation with a careful watch on how these tools change shopper behaviour.
