Christine Russo and Jonathan Arena on AX: The Agentic Experience Defining 2026

AX. Agentic Experience.
This is the phrase I am taking into 2026, and it is where I open my final show of the year.

Christine Russo sat down with Jonathan Arena, CEO of New Generation AI and trykeppler.ai.

Jonathan explains the breakdown of what happens when agents arrive on your brand site. They are trying to read catalogs, understand product attributes and answer real shopper questions. And most websites are not ready for that level of traffic or that style of discovery. And let's not forget behind every agent is a human seeking information and product that fits their need.

Sites obsessively built for CX are not build for AX (Agentic Experience). Pop ups, scripts, PDP clutter and traditional search patterns all get in the way.

So the headline is not that agentic search does not work. It is that retailers have not built a companion experience for agents to understand their products. That is AX. And that is the work that must begin in 2026.

Jonathan laid out the starting point with a level of clarity the industry needs. Identify the agents already reaching your site. Understand what they are asking for. See where your catalog breaks down. From there, create the layer that allows agents to access your product information cleanly and quickly. Once that foundation exists, everything else becomes possible. Better discovery, better conversion, better loyalty and eventually agent driven checkout.

So as we close 2025 and look to 2026 seeking information on what will put you ahead, this is a starting point.