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Every week we publish a rundown of new services for ecommerce merchants. This installment includes updates on answer engine optimization, agentic commerce, analytics, marketplaces, cryptocurrencies and alternative payments, AI marketing, fulfillment, fraud prevention, and creator-led commerce.
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New Tools for Merchants
Contentsquare and Shopify partner to deliver customer-experience insights. Contentsquare, a provider of AI-first analytics, has partnered with Shopify to provide customer experience visibility across ecommerce. According to the companies, the combination of Shopify’s commerce platform and Contentsquare’s granular behavioral insights gives businesses a comprehensive view of the customer experience, from first interaction through post-purchase. The partnership enables participating merchants to (i) visualize how shoppers browse, search, and move across products and categories, (ii) use AI to detect obstacles and strengthen A/B testing, and (iii) analyze placement, merchandising, and cross-sell strategies.
Contentsquare
GoDaddy’s ANS Marketplace advises which AI Agents to trust. GoDaddy has announced the next phase of its Agent Name Service by launching the ANS Marketplace and related AI agents. According to GoDaddy, the ANS Marketplace lets users discover ANS-verified agents, understand how they work, and see them in action. The curated set of agents includes Brand Advisor, Home Page Advisor, Place Reviews Analyzer, Social Media Post Generator, and Business Information Snoopy.
Shift4 launches stablecoin settlement platform for merchants. Shift4, a developer of integrated payments and commerce technology, has launched its stablecoin settlement platform to receive and move money 24/7. According to Shift4, the platform will allow merchants to opt into being settled in popular stablecoins such as USDC, USDT, EURC, and DAI rather than receiving a bank transfer. It will also give merchants the flexibility to choose from popular networks such as Ethereum, Solana, Plasma, Stellar, Polygon, Ton, and Base.
Squarespace introduces Pay Links to help small businesses get paid. Squarespace, a website builder and hosting platform, has introduced Pay Links, dedicated URLs that collect payments online via text, social media, QR code, or embedded links. Pay Links offer a fast way to collect payments with a branded design, built-in security, and integrated tools for tracking and analytics. Unlimited use of Pay Links is included across all plans and can be accessed through Squarespace’s merchant dashboard once connected to a payment processor.
Squarespace Pay Links
Akii launches AI Engage to train genAI engines on brand content. Akii, a search intelligence tool for businesses and marketers, has launched AI Engage, a search engagement platform to help brands educate genAI engines at scale about their content, offerings, and positioning. The platform runs automated engagement campaigns that prompt AI search engines to fetch, analyze, and learn from a brand’s content using realistic user-style queries. The platform executes campaigns across four major AI search engines simultaneously.
BigCommerce partners with Stripe to support Agentic Commerce Suite. Commerce, parent company of BigCommerce, has announced BigCommerce’s integration with Stripe’s new Agentic Commerce Suite, which will enable BigCommerce merchants to leverage AI agent-driven shopping by making products more discoverable and purchasable. Through a single integration, BigCommerce merchants can connect their existing product catalogs to their chosen AI agents to power an agentic checkout experience, allowing merchants to scale while still maintaining control of their brand.
Teikametrics announces Artificial Retail Intelligence for marketplaces. Teikametrics, a marketplace optimization platform, has announced its AI-driven Artificial Retail Intelligence to scale across marketplaces such as Amazon, Walmart, and TikTok Shop. Users can unify campaigns and optimize inventory on one platform, which populates and edits listings based on performance data from ad campaigns and on what’s working in the marketplace.
Teikametrics
Salesforce to acquire Qualified. Salesforce has agreed to acquire Qualified, a provider of agentic AI marketing tools to engage and convert inbound buyers. Qualified says its flagship product transforms websites into multimodal conversational experiences to screen and nurture leads. According to Salesforce, bringing Qualified into the Salesforce ecosystem will enable customers to quickly deploy fully featured marketing agents that autonomously generate sales pipelines. Salesforce states the transaction will close in the February to April 2026 range.
Kibo Commerce announces advanced B2B and fulfillment innovations. Kibo Commerce, a provider of composable commerce tools, has announced product releases and enhancements, including expanded Agentic Commerce capabilities, streamlined order management processes, and extended B2B functionality. Kibo’s Merchandiser Agent empowers teams to generate and update product descriptions and search-engine metadata using natural language. Agentic Roadmap includes a suite of order management agents: Order Routing, Reverse Logistics, and Forecasting. B2B merchants can now define custom roles and permissions.
Intelo.ai launches on Microsoft Marketplace for retail operations. Intelo.ai, a provider of retail technology, has announced the availability of its specialized AI agent network on the Microsoft Marketplace. Microsoft customers can now access Intelo.ai’s retail agents that automate workflows across planning, allocation, and replenishment. The agents include Strategic Planning, Core Planning, Assortment Planning, In-Season Management, Pricing & Promotion, and Vendor Management.
Intelo.ai
Shopline partners with Hive Analytics. Global commerce platform Shopline has partnered with Hive Analytics, a performance marketing and growth agency that builds custom fractional marketing teams. Shopline says the partnership enables consumer brands to launch or migrate onto its platform with an optimized, “growth-ready” setup supported by Hive Analytics’ dedicated fractional teams. This includes streamlined store execution, conversion rate optimization, user-experience setup, full-funnel performance marketing, scalable retention strategies, and regional market insights.
Amenexia launches AI shopping assistant for ecommerce. Amenexia, an AI-powered digital shopping assistant, is entering the U.S. ecommerce market. According to Amenexia, its AI assistant provides seamless, human-like interaction for customers at every step of their journey, from product inquiries to checkout. Available 24/7, Amenexia ensures that online stores can engage with customers in real-time, offering personalized assistance and boosting conversion rates without additional human staff.
Pattern acquires NextWave, expanding TikTok Shop and creator-led commerce. Pattern Group, a marketplace accelerator for brands, has acquired NextWave, an agency specializing in creator-led product discovery, TikTok Shop operations, live selling, and affiliate acceleration. According to Pattern, the acquisition enhances the platform’s ability to help brands reach customers through TikTok Shop and social commerce.
Pattern