--- title: "AI models are about to decide a good chunk of Australia's shopping list this Black Friday through Boxing Day. All before a single ad gets clicked." description: "AI models will decide a chunk of Australia's shopping list from Black Friday to Boxing Day. What retailers need before the season starts." date: 2026-07-14 dateModified: 2026-07-14 author: "Malin Gaertig" canonical: https://marksuite.ai/insights/australia-black-friday-ai-shopping categories: ["Agentic commerce"] publisher: MARK (https://marksuite.ai) --- # AI models are about to decide a good chunk of Australia's shopping list this Black Friday through Boxing Day. All before a single ad gets clicked. *Market data — 2026-07-14* AI-assisted shopping is now mainstream in Australia, with up to 86% of shoppers using AI in their path to purchase. Retailers need to know what models say about them before the holiday season — because whoever the model recommends gets the click. AI models are about to decide a good chunk of Australia's shopping list this Black Friday through Boxing Day. All before a single ad gets clicked. IAB Australia and Pureprofile's 2026 Commerce & Discovery Report found 6 in 10 Aussie online shoppers now use AI somewhere in their path to purchase, rising to 75% among 18-39s. Klaviyo puts total AI-assisted shopping among Aussies at 86%, the highest of any market they track. This shows that for a growing share of shoppers, research, comparison and shortlisting that used to span a dozen tabs now happens inside one conversation with an AI model, start to finish. Whoever the model recommends gets the click. Whoever it doesn't, doesn't make the list. Second, Adobe's Q1 2026 data shows AI-referred US retail traffic converting 42% better than every other channel in March. This represents an 80-point swing in twelve months (Adobe). A channel doesn't flip worst to best that fast without something structural shifting underneath it. Retailers need to come to grips that the channel deciding who gets shortlisted is compounding monthly, on a mechanism retail marketing wasn't built for. No auction to buy into, no budget shortcut. The brands showing up did the groundwork early, not the ones who spent the most. Most marketing teams can't answer the question: what does an AI model say about your brand when asked for a recommendation. SEO ranking, PPC spend and merchandising don't guarantee an answer. That's the gap MARK closes. Share of Model shows how often you're recommended versus competitors. [Ghost Shopper](/product/ghost-shopper) simulates how an AI agent shops your site and flags where it breaks down. Feed Guardian makes sure your product data is machine-readable enough to be picked up. Where's your brand showing up in AI right now? Worth finding out before the season, not after. ## Key takeaways - AI-assisted shopping is now the majority path in Australia — the question is whether your brand shows up in those conversations. - AI-referred traffic converts better than other channels; the brands winning did the structural groundwork, not the biggest ad spend. - Test what models say about you before the season — ranking and spend don't guarantee a recommendation. Source: https://marksuite.ai/insights/australia-black-friday-ai-shopping ## See also (related MARK analysis) - [Just in: What Australia's AI Trust Gap Means for Brands Selling Through AI Agents](https://marksuite.ai/insights/australia-ai-trust-gap-brands-selling-through-ai-agents) - [Just in: What Anthropic's Retail Agent Blueprints Mean for Brands Selling Through AI Agents](https://marksuite.ai/insights/anthropic-retail-agent-blueprints-brands-selling-through-ai-agents) - [Just in: What Australia's Trust Gap in Agentic Commerce Means for Brands Selling Through AI Agents](https://marksuite.ai/insights/australia-trust-gap-agentic-commerce-brands-selling-through-ai-agents) - [Just in: Why Agentic Commerce Just Stopped Being a Payments Race and Became a Liability, Shelf and Rails Question](https://marksuite.ai/insights/agentic-commerce-liability-shelf-rails) - [Product suite](https://marksuite.ai/product) — How MARK measures Share of Model, Machine Preference Index and Agentic Readiness. - [Framework guides](https://marksuite.ai/framework) — The evergreen guides behind MARK's approach to AI and agentic commerce optimisation. ## About the publisher This analysis is published by MARK (https://marksuite.ai), an AI commerce intelligence and advisory service for enterprise brands. MARK measures how AI models such as ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and DeepSeek discover, represent, evaluate and select brands, identifies who benefits instead, diagnoses why, and turns the evidence into business context and prioritised action. Written by Malin Gaertig. ## About the author Malin Gaertig is a key person to speak to about Agentic Commerce and how it impacts a company's commercial growth. Malin founded MARK, an AI commerce intelligence and strategic advisory service that combines proprietary technology with 15 years of experience across growth marketing, digital, ecommerce and transformation. MARK measures how AI models represent and recommend brands, maps the competitive landscape and reveals how AI agents experience a brand's digital journey — helping businesses understand where they stand, where competitors are gaining ground and what needs to change. Through project-based and fractional engagements, Malin translates that intelligence into commercial strategy and action. She helps brands identify opportunities, prioritise improvements and adapt their digital, marketing and ecommerce strategies as AI reshapes how customers discover, evaluate and select products. MARK provides the intelligence. Malin brings the interpretation and strategic direction. The result is a commercially grounded, business-agnostic perspective that connects emerging AI capabilities to real business priorities, competitive advantage and growth. Related MARK pages: https://marksuite.ai/score (AI Commerce Benchmark), https://marksuite.ai/product (AI commerce intelligence and measurement), https://marksuite.ai/framework (framework guides). Cite as: MARK — https://marksuite.ai