A shopper lands on your store at 11pm looking for a waterproof jacket in a medium. Your search box returns nothing because she typed “waterprof”. She wants to know whether you ship to Ireland and how returns work, but the answers are on two different pages she never finds. There is nobody to ask, so she closes the tab.
Most stores already have the answers she needed. They are in the catalogue, the shipping settings and the returns page. What’s missing is a way for her to ask a question and get an answer from that information, then act on it without starting over.
Today we are launching AI Shopping Assistant, a chat for WooCommerce that searches your catalogue, answers product and policy questions from your own pages, adds products to the shopper’s real cart and hands over to your normal checkout. Logged-in customers can also ask about their own orders. This post covers what it does, how to set it up, and what it deliberately does not do.
Launch offer: use code AISA40 for 40% off AI Shopping Assistant until 30 November 2026. Licences start at $79 before the discount.
Why shoppers leave without asking
Default WooCommerce search matches the exact phrase a shopper types against product titles. A typo, a plural, or a word that only appears in a tag or category returns an empty page. Most people won’t try a second search.
Policy questions have the same problem. Delivery times, payment options and return windows are spread across your settings and your pages. A shopper who has to hunt for them before buying often decides it isn’t worth the effort. Those who do buy send the same questions to your inbox afterwards, starting with “where is my order?”
A generic chatbot can make this worse if it invents an answer. A wrong delivery date or a made-up discount creates a support ticket, and possibly a refund. Any assistant you put in front of customers has to answer only from what your store actually says.
What the shopping assistant does
Finds products, even when the search is misspelt
The assistant searches names, categories, tags and SKUs. If the whole phrase finds nothing, it tries the words one at a time, cuts plurals to their stem and corrects misspellings against your own product names. Results appear as product cards under the reply, with image, price, any sale price struck through, a stock badge and an Add to basket button for simple, in-stock products.
It also knows which page the shopper is on and what is already in their basket. On a product page, “is this one waterproof?” refers to that product. On a category page, “which of these is cheapest?” compares what’s listed there.
Answers policy questions from your own pages
Questions about delivery, payment and returns are answered from the Website Brain, the plugin’s index of your pages, store settings, installed plugins and the documentation that comes with it. You decide which sections the assistant may read. Prices come only from your catalogue.
Builds a real WooCommerce cart
The assistant adds products to the shopper’s actual WooCommerce cart. It can change quantities, remove lines, and apply a discount code the shopper already has. Your theme’s mini-cart and header count update straight away, so nobody needs to reload the page. When the shopper is ready, the assistant sends them to your normal checkout, so your payment gateways, shipping rules and checkout fields all work as usual.
Answers “where is my order?” for logged-in customers
A logged-in customer can ask about their own orders and see the status, dates, total and tracking. They see nothing else: no name, address, phone number, email or line items. A guest sees no order information and is asked to log in, in your own wording and with a link. If order questions take up a lot of your support time, our guide on reducing “where is my order” tickets covers the other half of the problem.
Starts returns and exchanges in the chat
With Zorem Returns active and licensed, a logged-in customer can view their existing return requests or start a new one. They choose an order, the items and a reason. Nothing is filed until they press Send request, and Zorem Returns then handles it exactly as if it had come from its own form. Your eligibility rules and exchange workflow stay in charge.
Hands over to a person when it can’t help
If a reply didn’t help, or the shopper asks for a person, the chat offers buttons for your email address, a WhatsApp number and your contact page. The WhatsApp button opens WhatsApp with your number and the shopper’s question already typed in. Nothing is sent until the shopper sends it.
A read-only store assistant for administrators
The plugin also adds a second chat for administrators, opened from the admin bar. You can ask which products have no SKU, what sold best this week or which orders are stuck, and get answers with edit links. It can only read. It cannot change, refund or reprice anything, and it does not read customer details. That narrow scope is the same principle we described in giving AI agents safe access to your store.
The store assistant needs an AI model. The shopping assistant does not (more on that below).
How to set up an AI shopping assistant in WooCommerce
The plugin requires WordPress 6.9 or later, PHP 8.0 or later and WooCommerce. It is compatible with High-Performance Order Storage.
- Install and license. Upload and activate the plugin, then go to AI Shopping Assistant > License and activate your zorem.com licence. Until you do, the License tab is the only one shown and nothing else runs.
- Choose what it may read. In Website Brain, pick the pages and sections the assistant may use to answer.
- Switch the chat on. Under AI Shopping Assistant > Shopping assistant, turn on Show the shopping assistant (off by default). Leave On every page on, or turn it off and place the
[zorem_shopping_assistant]shortcode where you want the chat. - Make it look like your store. On the same screen, set the Brand colour, Title, Button label, Greeting and up to four Starter questions. Under placement, choose the Corner, limit it to shop pages if you like, and hide it on Cart, Checkout, My account or any URL path.
- Optionally connect an AI provider. Install the WordPress AI provider plugin for Google (Gemini), OpenAI or Anthropic, then go to AI Shopping Assistant > Settings > AI provider. Tick the acknowledgement, choose the provider, paste the API key, click Save key and pick a model. A key already set in
wp-config.phpor the WordPress Connectors screen is used without storing it again. - Set limits. In Settings, review the per-shopper limits on messages, conversations and AI tokens per day, and add a shop-wide daily token cap if you want a firm ceiling on provider costs.
The installation and setup guide walks through every option on these screens.
How to confirm it is working
- Status tab: readiness checks, the Website Brain’s state, AI tokens used today, and diagnostics you can copy into a support ticket. If the provider plugin or key is missing, the status card tells you which.
- Activity tab: every assistant action and every refusal, each with its reason, plus 30-day counts of conversations, carts built, checkout handoffs and the orders that followed, with their totals.
- Conversations tab (if you turn on saved conversations): the questions asked most often, the ones that need your attention, and searches that found no product. That last list is a ready-made to-do list for your catalogue.
Privacy and cost controls
Both assistants are off until you switch them on. With no AI provider key, the plugin sends nothing off your server. The shopping assistant still works in that mode, answering by quoting your store’s own information in English, Spanish, French, German, Italian, Portuguese or Dutch. When the page’s language is installed, answers follow it, which helps on WPML and Polylang sites.
Once you add a key and switch an assistant on, the shopper’s message and the store information used to answer it go to the provider you chose, under that provider’s terms. A key stored in the plugin is encrypted with your site’s security keys. Visitors are identified for chat limits by a one-way hash of their IP address, never the address itself. Saved conversations are off by default. When you turn them on, email addresses are removed, shoppers are told in the chat window, and transcripts are deleted after the number of days you set. The plugin makes no calls to a zorem server and collects no telemetry.
What it does not do
- It does not take payment. Checkout stays on your normal WooCommerce checkout page.
- It does not create, list or reveal discount codes. It only applies a code the shopper already has.
- It does not show order details to guests, or show anyone’s orders except their own.
- The Add to basket button on product cards appears for simple, in-stock products only.
- The store assistant cannot edit products, change orders or issue refunds.
- Returns and exchanges in the chat require Zorem Returns. Without it, the assistant can explain your returns policy but not file a request.
- It only knows what is in your catalogue, settings and the pages you let it read. If your returns page is out of date, its answers will be too.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need an OpenAI or other AI API key?
Not for the shopping assistant. Without a key, it answers by quoting your store’s own information in seven languages. Connecting Google Gemini, OpenAI or Anthropic through their WordPress AI provider plugins gives more natural, conversational replies. The admin store assistant does need a model. Provider usage is billed by the provider, separately from your licence.
Can the assistant make up prices or delivery dates?
Prices come only from your catalogue, and policy answers come from the pages and settings you let it read in the Website Brain. Without a model, it quotes that information directly. With a model, it is instructed to answer from the same sources. If it can’t help, it offers your email, WhatsApp or contact page.
How do I stop AI costs from running away?
Per-shopper limits are on by default and cap messages, conversations and AI tokens per day, with a higher allowance for logged-in customers than for guests. You can also set a shop-wide daily token cap. The Status tab shows tokens used today, so you can check usage before your provider’s invoice arrives.
Can I show the chat only on certain pages?
Yes. You can limit it to shop, product, category, cart and checkout pages, hide it on Cart, Checkout or My account, or list URL paths to exclude, such as /blog. To show it only on chosen pages, turn off “On every page” and place the [zorem_shopping_assistant] shortcode where you want it.
Does it work with AI Agent OS?
It works on its own or alongside it. With both installed, they share one Website Brain, so the same knowledge, rules and AI provider are used by both. Nothing else is shared, and each assistant keeps its own narrow set of tools. For what AI Agent OS adds, see six AI agent jobs worth running on your WooCommerce store.
How long does the launch discount last?
Code AISA40 takes 40% off AI Shopping Assistant until 30 November 2026. Licences are available for one, five or ten sites, and every purchase comes with a 14-day money-back guarantee.
Give shoppers somewhere to ask
Shoppers who can’t find a product or an answer don’t usually email you. They leave. AI Shopping Assistant lets them ask in their own words, answers from your catalogue and pages, and puts products in a real cart that goes through your usual checkout. It starts switched off, works without an AI key, and logs every action so you can see exactly what it did.
Read the full documentation, or try the WooCommerce AI shopping assistant on your store with 40% off until 30 November.
Use code AISA40 at checkout. Valid until 30 November 2026.
Give shoppers somewhere to ask
Shoppers who can’t find a product or an answer don’t usually email you. They leave. AI Shopping Assistant lets them ask in their own words, answers from your catalogue and pages, and puts products in a real cart that goes through your usual checkout. It starts switched off, works without an AI key, and logs every action so you can see exactly what it did.
Read the full documentation, or try the WooCommerce AI shopping assistant on your store with 40% off until 30 November.