Growth & retention
Substitution rule
Definition
A structured, brand-authorized statement of what an agent may do when a subscribed SKU is unavailable — reorder a specific approved alternate, ask the customer first, or decline and flag the gap. Without an explicit rule, an agent's only safe default is to stop and ask, which defeats the point of autonomous reordering.
Defined in Subscription & Replenishment: When Agents Reorder For You.
Related terms
- Owned channel
- A communication channel where you hold the relationship directly — email and SMS lists built on explicit consent — as opposed to rented reach (ads) or mediated reach (assistant shortlists). No algorithm re-ranks who receives your message.
- Machine-visible trust
- The subset of your operational performance an AI system can verify from data: review content and velocity, delivery-time consistency, return and dispute rates, published policies, and support outcomes. Agents can't feel your brand; they can read your record.
- Zero-party data
- Information a customer intentionally and proactively shares with you — preferences, intentions, context — as opposed to data observed from behavior or bought from third parties. It is consent-clean, regulation-proof, and more accurate than inference.
- Agent-influenced arrival
- A new subscriber whose path to signup included an AI assistant's recommendation, comparison, or summary - on-site (a Brand Agent conversation) or off-site (ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini, Google AI Overviews, or Amazon's Rufus). Distinct from organic browsing, where the shopper found and evaluated the brand unassisted.
- Trust transfer
- The degree to which a shopper's confidence in the AI assistant that recommended a product carries over into confidence in the brand itself, surviving past the first purchase into repeat behavior. High trust transfer looks like an organic-search-level or better repeat rate; low trust transfer looks like a one-and-done customer who reverts to asking the assistant again next time.
- Post-purchase Brand Agent
- A Shopify Brand Agent (Spring '26 edition, currently Shopify Plus only) scoped to post-order conversations — order status, delivery issues, warranty, product care, and returns — with access to live order data and the merchant's enriched catalog.
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