AI Readiness Assessment
Applied where it fits, AI can move e-commerce conversion meaningfully – but only in the right places for your store. This assessment tells you where AI delivers ROI, and where it doesn't – before you commit budget.
- Fixed price
- 5 – 7 days
- Vendor-independent
- Async, documented
- PDF report + roadmap
Every AI vendor says your store needs their tool. Nobody tells you which ones to skip.
An AI Readiness Assessment is a fixed-price, vendor-independent review of a mid-market e-commerce store across six AI directions – search, recommendations, chatbot, content automation, dynamic pricing, and agent-readiness – that returns one verdict (invest, wait, or skip) and an effort-vs-payback read for each, so you know where AI pays back before you commit budget.
If you run a mid-market store, you are getting pitched AI search, AI recommendations, AI chatbots, AI pricing – usually all at once, usually with a demo that looks great on someone else's catalog. What you actually need is an honest read on effort vs expected payback per direction, grounded in your data, your stack, and your team.
That is what this assessment is. I review your store across every major AI direction, tell you where the numbers work, where they don't, and in what order to move. The assessment is vendor-independent: the recommendation is the product, not a sales funnel for an implementation contract.
42% of consumers now use AI tools when shopping – evaluating options, comparing products, narrowing choices (NIQ, May 2026). That is decision-influence, not autonomous purchasing: fully autonomous transactions remain limited. But it means AI already touches the buying decision before a visitor reaches your store. The question is no longer whether AI matters – it's whether you invest where it pays back.
Six AI directions, one verdict each: invest, wait, or skip – plus effort-vs-payback per direction.
The AI Readiness Assessment reviews six AI directions for a mid-market store and gives each one verdict – invest, wait, or skip – with an effort-vs-payback read. (Agent-readiness, the sixth direction, means how AI shopping agents see your catalog: structured data, feed quality, and machine-readable product information.)
- Search state – how your current site search performs and whether AI search (Algolia/Klevu class) would move conversion for your catalog.
- Recommendations – what your merchandising does today vs what AI recommendations would realistically add.
- Chatbot & service automation – where automation reduces support load, and where it would damage trust.
- Content automation – product descriptions, translations, content generation: what's safe to automate at your scale.
- Dynamic pricing – whether your margin structure and competition justify it.
- Agent-readiness – how AI shopping agents see your store today: structured data, feeds, checkout accessibility. The youngest direction in the assessment, and the one moving fastest in 2026.
Plus the effort-vs-payback layer: effort vs expected impact for each of the six directions, so the roadmap is ordered by payback, not by vendor enthusiasm.
Each direction gets a current-state finding, a recommendation, an effort-vs-impact read, and an explicit "not worth it" call where that's the honest answer.
Free check vs this assessment
The free AI Readiness Check and this assessment are two different things – one is an automated tool, the other an expert review:
| Free AI Readiness Check | AI Readiness Assessment | |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Automated one-page snapshot (the /analyzer tool) |
Expert human review across six AI directions |
| Depth | AI-readiness signals on your homepage | Direction-by-direction verdict + effort-vs-payback |
| Deliverable | Snapshot report in your cabinet | Prioritised recommendations PDF + 90-day roadmap |
| Price | Free (3 runs) | €900 – 1,800 fixed |
Deliverable, timeline, price
You get a prioritised recommendations PDF: direction-by-direction breakdown, where AI pays back and where it doesn't, and a 90-day roadmap ordered by payback. Everything in writing – no meeting required.
- Price: €900 – 1,800 fixed. The exact figure inside the range is confirmed in writing after a short intake, before any work starts; it does not change after. No hourly billing.
- Timeline: 5 – 7 days from access.
- Format: async, documented. Written intake questionnaire instead of a discovery call; a PDF report instead of a presentation deck.
After the assessment – optional, scoped from your roadmap
The assessment and its 90-day roadmap are yours to keep, whether or not we work together again. If a direction comes back "invest" and you want it built:
- Implementation: from €2,000 (e.g. AI search integration) to €3,000+ (chatbot / recommendations) – the exact fixed price comes from the assessment scope, never a blind quote. Your team or your agency can execute the same roadmap instead; the recommendation does not change.
- Ongoing – Technical Advisor: a fixed monthly scope cap for review and oversight as you roll the roadmap out, agreed in writing after a first engagement. Optional – not a starting offer.
How it works
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Intro
Share context about your store, goals, and what feels blocked.
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Discovery
Written intake questionnaire, read access, constraints.
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Analysis
Six-direction review, ROI modelling per direction.
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Delivery
PDF report with findings and actionable recommendations.
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Next step
Implement with your team, hand to your agency, or continue with monthly advisory. Your call – the roadmap is yours either way.
How I work with AI in real stores
How I work with AI in Magento – built as production infrastructure, not bolted on. Two examples of what I've built:
- An LLM gateway for Magento. A provider-agnostic LLM layer (Anthropic, OpenAI, Gemini, or a local model) with bring-your-own-key, spend caps, and an on-prem privacy mode – so AI features run without your catalog or customer data leaving for a third-party SaaS, and without lock-in to one vendor.
- AI scoped to a narrow, real job. On that gateway, an AI field-validator: the merchant describes in plain language what a field must contain (a country-specific tax number, an engraving with no profanity), and the model validates the input and explains what is wrong – a check a regex cannot express, without paying a developer per format.
That is the posture this assessment is built on – scope AI to where it pays, build it to last, and never for the buzzword.
Reading before you buy: Google launched Universal Cart. We have 30 days. – why agent-readiness is now a line item. How the analyzer scans your site – the tooling behind the free check. Credentials.
Frequently asked questions
- How is this different from the free AI Readiness Check?
- The free check is the automated free tier of the /analyzer tool – a snapshot of your AI-readiness signals (crawler / agent access, structured data, content extractability, entity signals, agentic-commerce readiness). This assessment is a separate, expert consult: a direction-by-direction read across six AI directions with an effort-vs-payback estimate for each, and a prioritised recommendations PDF with a 90-day roadmap.
- What exactly do I receive?
- A PDF report covering six directions – search, recommendations, chatbot, content automation, dynamic pricing, and agent-readiness – each with a finding, a recommendation, and an effort-vs-payback read. The roadmap is ordered by payback, and it explicitly lists what not to invest in.
- How much does it cost and how long does it take?
- €900 – 1,800 fixed; the exact figure inside the range is confirmed in writing after a short intake, and it does not change. Delivery in 5 – 7 days from access. No hourly billing, no scope surprises.
- Do I have to hire you for implementation afterwards?
- No. The assessment is vendor-independent and implementation-independent – the roadmap works whether your own team executes it, your agency does, or I support it as a monthly advisor. The recommendation is the deliverable, not a pitch.
- Does it cover AI shopping agents and protocols like Universal Cart?
- Yes. Agent-readiness is one of the six directions: how AI agents see your catalog today – structured data, feed quality, and how machine-readable your product information is – with a finding and a recommendation like every other direction. The free check already scans the underlying signals; the assessment adds the expert read on what to fix first and whether it's worth it for your catalog.
Tell me about your store and where AI could help
Get a grounded answer on where AI pays back in your store – before you sign with a vendor.
Useful to include: store URL, platform, which AI tools you're being pitched, and what feels blocked.
Or run the free AI readiness check first and bring the snapshot with you.