You may have artificial intelligence to thank for the gift waiting under your Christmas tree this year. Across virtually every sector—from cutting‑edge technology firms to major retail brands—businesses are investing heavily in artificial intelligence, weaving it into their products, operations, and customer experiences. The trend is no longer confined to back‑end efficiency improvements; it has become an integral part of how consumers themselves are engaging with brands. As the holiday season unfolds, shoppers are increasingly turning to AI‑powered tools to navigate the complex world of deals, product options, and seasonal promotions, using intelligent assistants to discover, evaluate, and purchase their holiday gifts with unprecedented ease and accuracy.
Recent insights from Salesforce illustrate just how pivotal this technological shift has become. The company, through its Agentforce platform that specializes in creating AI‑driven digital agents, reported that during Cyber Week—the highly competitive shopping period spanning the days leading up to and including Cyber Monday in the United States—these AI agents were responsible for generating 17% of all online orders across Salesforce’s network of retail partners. In monetary terms, this translated into an extraordinary $13.5 billion in sales within a single week. This surge in activity highlights how AI systems have evolved from experimental tools into vital engines driving consumer engagement and revenue.
Artificial intelligence is now guiding customers not only toward the most attractive discounts but also more efficiently through the purchasing process itself—from initial discovery straight through to checkout. According to Salesforce, the use of AI tools, including generative conversational systems like ChatGPT, tripled during the Cyber Weekend period compared with usage in 2024. Such growth signals that investments in AI by retailers—whether through strategic partnerships with established AI companies or the in‑house development of proprietary chatbots—are now delivering tangible and measurable returns during the busiest shopping season of the year.
As Lori Niquette, the director of data storytelling at the digital analytics firm Quantum Metric, observed, AI enables shoppers to bypass the conventional pathways of online browsing. Instead of navigating through multiple menus or homepage banners, consumers are now able to go directly to the specific product pages that match their expressed needs, thereby reducing friction and increasing efficiency throughout the digital shopping journey. For retailers, this development marks a profound transformation—a departure from long‑standing marketing strategies that prioritized homepage design and social media exposure as the main avenues for driving sales traffic. The center of gravity has shifted toward intelligent interaction and personalization.
The scale of this change becomes even clearer when viewed alongside industry‑wide spending figures. Adobe Analytics, which aggregates and analyzes customer data from millions of websites and mobile applications, reported that consumers spent a record‑breaking $11.8 billion online on Black Friday, a year‑over‑year increase of 9.1%. Many of these online shoppers employed AI‑enabled chat interfaces to locate discounts, evaluate competing products, and validate purchasing decisions in real time. Adobe’s data further indicated that AI is enhancing the overall shopping experience by offering finely tuned product recommendations and facilitating the discovery of new brands that align closely with individual preferences.
The influence of intelligence‑assisted engagement was especially evident on Black Friday itself. Shoppers who accessed U.S. retail sites through AI‑based chat services were 38% more likely to complete a purchase than those who arrived through other, non‑AI channels. This striking difference underscores the persuasive power of personalized guidance and responsive interaction that AI systems can provide—traits that traditional search bars or static web pages struggle to replicate.
Anticipating the intensity of the holiday‑season demand, numerous leading retailers have been accelerating their efforts to integrate generative AI solutions across their digital ecosystems. Some have launched advanced chatbots capable of mimicking the attentiveness of in‑store clerks, while others have established major partnerships with AI technology firms to strengthen their customer engagement tools. For example, Target introduced a festive AI shopping assistant designed to deliver gift ideas based on user input, thereby combining convenience with personalization and holiday cheer.
According to further analysis from Quantum Metric, consumers are primarily leveraging AI to identify the most advantageous deals available in the marketplace, harnessing its capacity for rapid comparison and adaptive filtering. However, as Niquette emphasized in her remarks to Business Insider, these tools are not altering the fundamental nature of what people choose to buy. Rather, AI is redefining the process by which those buying decisions are reached, transforming it into one that is faster, more informed, and significantly more tailored to each individual shopper’s unique preferences and constraints.
Sourse: https://www.businessinsider.com/ai-holiday-sales-black-friday-cyber-monday-2025-12
