Presented by Synchrony

By Maran Nalluswami

Retail is entering agentic commerce, a new phase where more shoppers will use AI assistants to search, compare, and buy.

Instead of clicking through tabs and reviews, a shopper may ask, “Find me the best option under $300 that will arrive by Friday, easy returns, pay over time” and get a short list, sometimes a single recommendation, based on what the agent can verify quickly and even purchase on their behalf.

For small and mid-sized businesses (SMBs), that changes the game. Trust becomes the growth strategy, measured in operational proof. That means trust and speed must show up in everyday details. Agents use various data sources to determine the option most likely to deliver a smooth purchase, like accurate inventory, reliable delivery dates, clear returns and quick issue resolution. When a business regularly misses delivery windows or creates unexpected results for customers late in the checkout process, they will get filtered out as a preferred shopping option.

Consider a local furniture retailer. A family might ask for “a sectional under $2,000, delivered within 10 days, monthly payments and easy returns.” The agent will weigh more factors in its selection order than simply price and look, favoring the merchant that always delivers on timelines, explains policies plainly and makes payment options easy to use.

The same thing applies far beyond retail. A customer with a check engine light might ask, “Book me an appointment this week near Logan Square, confirm the part is in stock and give me a clear price range.” A specialty auto shop in Chicago that can quickly confirm appointment slots, parts in stock, and price ranges will outrank one with disconnected systems.

Why a Trusted Financing Partner Matters

While many large enterprises can build custom technology to keep up with shifts like this, small and mid-sized businesses will win by strengthening the basics and leaning on partners who turn change into consistent and reliable execution.

At Synchrony, trust is our foundation and it enables us to innovate with speed. As a Fortune 200 consumer financing company, we serve over 100 million active card users with acceptance across 500,000 merchant locations in the U.S., including more than 15,000 merchant locations in Illinois. But scale alone is not the point. In agentic commerce, trust is what an AI agent can verify, and it’s the trust our partners place in us to help extend credit to consumers responsibly. We help merchants deliver flexible financing options today, positioning SMBs to compete as agentic commerce grows and setting the foundation for clear, comparable offers, responsible and secure data practices, and a checkout experience with fewer surprises.

In this environment, financing and rewards can be strong tiebreakers, but only if the value is easy to recognize and consistent across channels. That’s where a partner like Synchrony comes in, helping shape the rules of agentic commerce with simple, fast, frictionless financing at checkout and clear, consistent terms wherever shopping decisions happen.

What SMBs Can Do Now

What can an SMB do now without a major tech overhaul? Reduce uncertainty for customers by making product information consistent and current across channels, putting shipping timelines and return rules in plain language and tightening the handoffs between order confirmation, fulfillment updates and support so customers are not left guessing.

Then fix the issues that show up most often to reduce friction, from improving tracking updates and proactive notifications to simpler returns and fewer surprises in pricing or policies.

The Long Game: Becoming Agent-Ready

AI can help when it targets the work that slows the business down. The small businesses getting real value from AI pick a few customer pain points and use it to standardize product content, speed up customer support, and spot checkout drop-offs. Checkout deserves special attention. If payment breaks on mobile or if financing takes too long, the customer will leave at the moment the purchase should have been easiest.

As agentic commerce grows, agents will rely less on marketing language and more on performance signals. SMBs can prepare by connecting the systems behind the customer experience so inventory, communications, support and payments stay aligned. They can also set simple responsible data use rules that preserve customer trust as more steps become automated.

Agentic commerce is moving quickly. Trust will be the difference between being recommended and being skipped. The small businesses that deliver clear information, reliable follow-through and smooth financing and rewards will earn that trust in the moments when decisions get made fast.

Maran Nalluswami is Executive Vice President, Chief Strategy and Business Development Officer of Synchrony. A proud resident of Chicago, Nalluswami is a member of the Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce Board.