01The systems in the way
A listing changes in the PIM and has to reach four marketplaces, each with its own schema, its own rate limits and its own idea of what a valid product is. Supplier data arrives as flat files. Returns arrive as email. The work is high-volume, low-judgement and almost entirely manual, which is the exact profile that should have been automated years ago.
| System | What it gives you |
|---|---|
| POS | vendor API |
| Marketplace | rate limited |
| PIM | no API |
| Supplier EDI | flat files |
| Loyalty | legacy DB |
| Returns | email queue |
02Why the usual approaches stall
Marketplace integrators handle the big channels and stop. Anything involving the PIM, which has no API, or the returns inbox, which is unstructured text, falls back to a person with a spreadsheet.
If a human can do it in a browser or a terminal, an agent can do it — at volume, with an audit trail. That is the whole basis of how we approach retail & e-commerce: we treat the systems you already run as the integration surface, rather than waiting for an API that is never going to ship.
03What an agent actually does here
Worked example
A catalogue agent keeps listings synchronised across marketplaces, watches competitor pricing, and clears the returns queue overnight — respecting each marketplace’s rate limits rather than fighting them.
This is a reference design drawn from the problems we are asked about most often in retail & e-commerce — not a case study of delivered client work. Where we have shipped a build, we say so plainly and put you in touch with the client.
04Constraints we design to
- Rate limits and marketplace terms are treated as design constraints, not obstacles
- Price changes can require human approval above a threshold you set
- Every listing change is logged and reversible
- Runs in your cloud tenant or ours, in the region you need
Tell us which system is the problem
Describe the workflow that is done by hand today and the system that blocks it. We will come back within one working day with an initial read on feasibility — including if the honest answer is that an agent is the wrong tool.
Scope your agent →