How to tackle AI shopping this BFCM

AI is changing holiday shopping. Here are 3 moves to make before BFCM.

Hey folks - if holiday planning still feels like a race to send more messages, this year's shopper data is a useful reason to pause and rethink the playbook.

Today, October 7, Klaviyo is hosting How to be the brand LLMs recommend, a virtual conversation with OpenAI about AI search visibility and the holiday customer journey. You can save your seat, and a recording will be sent to registrants who can't make it live.

The numbers worth planning around

The State of the Holiday Buyer 2026 study asked 6,750 consumers across 8 markets how they plan to shop this season. A few findings stand out:

• AI-assisted shoppers are planning to spend more: 34% of shoppers who've used an AI assistant say they'll spend more this holiday season than last year, compared with 14% of shoppers who haven't used one.

• The consideration set is getting smaller: 67% of shoppers say they typically have a gift idea first, then search for the product. In traditional search, that can lead to many results. An AI assistant may return only a few brand recommendations.

• AI shopping is already mainstream in several markets: 61% of US consumers, 62% in the UK, and 81% in Singapore say they'll use AI to shop this holiday season.

• Email still matters: Email is the preferred marketing communication channel in every market surveyed, ranging from 52% in Singapore to 73% in the UK.

• Relevance beats the production method: 57% of consumers assume most brand messages are AI-generated, while 55% say they don't care whether a message is AI- or human-generated when it's helpful and relevant.

What this means for your holiday strategy

1. Treat product information as part of the customer experience

AI assistants can compare product titles, attributes, sizes, prices, availability, shipping promises, return terms, and reviews before someone visits your site. That means the product feed isn't just back-office housekeeping. It can influence whether your brand makes the shortlist at all.

Before peak season, audit the details a shopper or AI assistant would need to make a confident recommendation. Look for missing attributes, outdated availability, unclear shipping cutoffs, and return information that's hard to find. The Community's product feed guide is a useful place to compare notes on getting product data into customer-facing experiences.

2. Use owned channels for what AI can't do yet

The study found that 36% of consumers value early access to sales, with that number even higher among people who've already used AI to shop. Early access is a moment your brand can create directly for loyal subscribers, customers, and followers.

This is a good time to decide who gets first notice, what the offer or experience is, and which channel should carry it. Email may do the storytelling; SMS may be the better fit for a time-sensitive drop. The point isn't to copy every send across every channel. It's to give each channel a job.

3. Let signals set the cadence

More AI-assisted shopping doesn't mean every customer needs more messages. Use behavior to decide who needs early access, who needs product education, and who should be left alone after purchasing.

For BFCM, that might mean starting with people who viewed a product, engaged with a teaser, purchased last holiday season, or are already in a high-intent segment. Then revisit those audiences as behavior changes. This customer-signal approach to BFCM segmentation is a helpful prompt if your team is relying on default 30-, 60-, or 90-day windows.

The practical takeaway: make it easy for AI systems to understand your products, make it valuable for people to hear from your brand directly, and use your customer data to decide what happens next. The BFCM 2026 Strategy Exchange is a good place to compare how other teams are making those calls.

If you want a more structured starting point, the BFCM in-app Hub includes a readiness score, checklist, and resources matched to where you are in your planning.