VerticalScope is utilizing synthetic intelligence (AI) to show conversations throughout greater than 1,200 on-line communities into purchasing income, as declining search site visitors places strain on its conventional promoting enterprise.
The Toronto-based firm, which operates a Reddit-like community of fanatic boards containing greater than 2 billion user-generated posts, said in its Tuesday (Nov. 10) third-quarter 2026 outcomes that its new AI-powered commerce expertise contributed to a 29% enhance in affiliate commerce income from a 12 months earlier. The features got here at the same time as its month-to-month viewers shrank and total income declined 11%.
VerticalScope’s members personal the autos, tools and merchandise they talk about. The AI recommends merchandise inside these dialogue threads, and VerticalScope earns an affiliate fee when a reader follows a purchasing hyperlink and completes a qualifying buy.
The income has grown every quarter for the reason that characteristic launched. By August, affiliate commerce income on the boards was up 13% from a 12 months earlier and approaching a $1 million annual run charge, double the extent the corporate gave in May, VerticalScope said on its second-quarter name. The firm has not disclosed the particular mechanics of the purchasing expertise or how a lot income the AI generated independently.
AI Commerce Grows Despite Falling Traffic
VerticalScope’s month-to-month lively customers averaged 76.8 million throughout the third quarter, down from 83 million a 12 months earlier, and the corporate attributed the drop to decrease natural search site visitors. Advertising relies on these visits. Affiliate commerce relies on what a customer does after arriving.
The suggestions draw on what members have written about merchandise they personal. AI can repeat a product’s specs however “can’t tell you what it’s like to own something for 10 years,” CEO Chris Goodridge said on the corporate’s third-quarter earnings name.
VerticalScope is giving members extra methods to share what they personal, so it could present them a extra related expertise. It additionally plans to let distributors convey product catalogs immediately into the communities, Goodridge mentioned. Members may then store alongside recommendation from individuals who personal the product.
The similar strategy is operating inside the corporate. VerticalScope’s staff used agentic workflows to construct Pulse, a instrument that tracks every member’s exercise throughout communities and attain out to them to extend engagement.
Forum Data Becomes a Second Revenue Stream
The two billion posts now have a second set of consumers. VerticalScope signed its first two agreements with frontier AI labs in October and didn’t title them. The first is a non-exclusive license to coach fashions on information from a collection of communities, with charges primarily based on the quantity of content material delivered. The second pays VerticalScope when its content material contributes to an AI-generated reply. It began in November with a subset of communities, Goodridge mentioned on the decision.
AI techniques are already studying the boards at scale. AI firms, AI search engines like google and AI brokers made 115 million makes an attempt to entry the communities over the previous 30 days, Goodridge said. None of these visits depend as month-to-month lively customers. VerticalScope blocks any firm that tries with out an settlement.
Reddit Adds Shopping as Search Referrals Fall
Meanwhile, social platform Reddit is shedding search site visitors. Its search referrals fell by greater than 1 million every week on common in October, TechCrunch reported, and the corporate is shifting to a primarily logged-in expertise to guard its information from AI scraping.
Reddit started testing an AI purchasing expertise in February, PYMNTS reported. The check places product carousels with costs and buy hyperlinks in Reddit’s search outcomes. The merchandise come from group discussions.
According to the PYMNTS Intelligence report “From Prompt to Purchase: Who Wins the AI Shopper?”, about 61 million U.S. customers, or 23%, now begin their on-line retail analysis with AI. The report attracts on an August survey of two,191 U.S. customers. The sale usually lands some other place. Amazon closed 60% of respondents’ most up-to-date AI-assisted purchases. Only 2.5% of consumers named a direct hyperlink from the AI instrument as their predominant motive for getting the place they did.
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