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Reference

Querytail Glossary

Yann Douchin··Updated ·5 min read

This glossary distinguishes current Querytail product names from historical shorthand and industry protocols.

It describes concepts, not a list of guaranteed integrations or measured outcomes.

The current Querytail terms come first. Broader industry concepts and former labels follow.

AI Product Data Platform

Querytail’s shared platform for collecting, structuring and enriching product data for AI use. It contains Sourcing Agent, Product Engine and Merchant Console and serves Brand Agent, Brand Discovery and Brand Copilot.

AI-Ready Product Data

The platform’s result promise: structured, enriched product data, approved by the merchant and ready for the selected AI uses. It is a result, not the name of a separate product.

Product Engine

The component that structures and enriches product information collected from the catalog and relevant sources, preparing source-linked proposals for merchant review.

Sourcing Agent

The component that collects relevant product information from permitted sources and links it to its provenance for Product Engine to use.

Merchant Console

The merchant-facing workspace used to manage product knowledge and its activation, rather than a payment or customer-data ownership system.

Mirror Catalog

The merchant-specific body of approved product knowledge made available to authorized uses. It is not the merchant's source catalog or a second storefront.

Brand Agent

The on-site AI shopping guide that helps customers understand and compare products using the merchant's approved knowledge.

Brand Discovery

The activation surface focused on making approved product knowledge usable for discovery across AI assistants, without guaranteeing a particular answer or rank.

Brand Copilot

The activation surface that helps merchant teams consult product knowledge through their existing AI workspaces.

Agent Cards

In the A2A protocol, an Agent Card is a JSON metadata document describing an agent service, its capabilities, interfaces and security requirements. A public card can be discovered at /.well-known/agent-card.json. It is not a product listing. An AI-readable product record is a separate way to organize merchant-approved product knowledge.

AI-Powered Shopping Assistant

An interface that helps shoppers compare products and ask contextual questions.

Querytail's current name for its on-site experience is Brand Agent.

Agentic Commerce

Commerce in which AI systems help people discover, assess or purchase products, with the transaction and accountability depending on the implementation.

Agentic Commerce Clearing (ACC)

A concept used in earlier Querytail writing for coordinating agent-led transactions. It is distinct from the merchant's checkout and payment responsibilities.

Agentic Commerce Protocol (ACP)

An OpenAI protocol for structured product data and commerce flows in ChatGPT.

Participation and checkout capabilities depend on OpenAI's requirements and merchant integration.

AI Commerce Layer

A broad category for software that connects product knowledge to AI-led shopping experiences.

Querytail describes its own offer more precisely through AI Product Data Platform and its activation surfaces.

AI Hallucination

A plausible but unsupported AI statement, such as a made-up product compatibility claim.

Source-linked knowledge and clear limits can reduce risk but cannot guarantee perfect answers.

Audit Trail

A record of what information, approval or system action supported a decision.

Its scope depends on the tools actually deployed.

Buyer Intelligence

Patterns in questions, objections and comparison criteria that can help improve product knowledge without equating every question with a purchase.

Conversion Engine

An earlier commercial label for improving the path from product understanding to purchase, not a separate current Querytail module.

Demand Gateway

A historical term for the point where shopper intent enters a merchant's experience, not a promise of a proprietary gateway integration.

Distribution Gateway

A historical term for making approved product knowledge available to relevant channels, not a universal feed or guaranteed placement in AI answers.

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)

The work of making product information clear, structured and accessible to AI answer engines while measuring visibility without promising rankings or citations.

In-Chat Checkout

A purchase completed inside a conversational interface.

OpenAI's checkout specification is an industry example. The merchant's order and payment responsibilities depend on the specific integration.

Invisibility Gap

A descriptive term for the risk that a product is absent or poorly represented in AI answers.

It is not a measured Querytail performance metric.

LLM Distribution

The preparation and publication of product information for AI-accessible channels, subject to each assistant's discovery and ingestion rules.

Merchant of Record

The party identified as seller under the relevant commercial and payment arrangement, which should not be confused with an AI interface or payment processor.

Query Lake

An earlier term for learning from product questions and gaps, not a claim that every visitor interaction is stored or measured.

Querytail platform

An older umbrella label.

The current offer centers on AI Product Data Platform, with Brand Agent, Brand Discovery and Brand Copilot as activation surfaces.

Revenue Maximizer

A legacy marketing label for better product guidance, not a promise of a quantified revenue uplift or a current product name.

Semantic Firewall

An internal shorthand for governing AI product answers through approved, source-linked knowledge and clear limits. It is not the name of a separate Querytail offer.

No architecture can guarantee zero hallucinations.

Solitude Gap

The gap between a shopper's need for advice and the information a self-service product page provides.

Its size varies by product and visitor.

Trust Layer

A conceptual label for the boundary between AI advice and the merchant's checkout and payment systems. It does not establish PCI certification.

Universal Commerce Protocol (UCP)

An open commerce protocol for agents, platforms and businesses.

A merchant's participation depends on its chosen integrations.

An answer or recommendation delivered inside an AI or search interface without requiring a conventional results-page click.

Whether it sends traffic to a merchant varies.

Assisted Net Revenue (ANR)

A historical name for revenue attributed to orders that involved an assistant. It describes an association, not the additional revenue caused by that assistant.

Proof Engine

A legacy label for measuring commercial impact.

Causality requires a properly designed comparison and evidence, not a blanket claim of permanent holdouts on every deployment.

AP2 (Agent Payments Protocol)

An open protocol for authorizing agent-led payments, separate from Querytail's current product-knowledge offer.

To see how the current offer applies to your catalog, request a demo.

For brands and specialist retailers whose products require advice

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