AI Helps Retailers Bring Digital Personalization to Physical Stores

Propmodo Technology

Greetings,

A recent Redfin study found that allowing sellers to pre-market their homes before listing could increase housing supply by 6 to 12 percent by reducing pricing uncertainty and encouraging more homeowners to sell. The data suggests these homes sell faster and with fewer price cuts, but the findings come at a moment when the industry is split over private listings. Zillow has been actively restricting “pocket listings” that are not quickly shared on the MLS, arguing they limit transparency and access for buyers, while Compass has built its strategy around those same private and “coming soon” listings, even suing Zillow over what it called a “Zillow ban.”

That fight has escalated recently as Compass struck a deal to push its private listings onto Redfin, potentially adding hundreds of thousands of off-MLS listings to the platform. The result is a fragmented marketplace where some platforms emphasize openness while others lean into exclusivity. That context makes Redfin’s study harder to separate from strategy, since the same pre-marketing approach it says could boost supply is also at the center of one of the biggest power struggles in the listing portal business.

This week we are exploring how AI is helping physical stores deliver the kind of personalization shoppers once only expected online, and why that shift could reshape the future of retail real estate. As brands like Ulta, Sephora, and Starbucks connect loyalty data, in-store technology, and human interaction more effectively, brick-and-mortar locations are becoming smarter, more relevant, and harder to dismiss as relics of a pre-digital era. The bigger question is no longer whether stores can survive e-commerce, but which retailers are using AI well enough to give customers a reason to keep coming back.

Let’s go!

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Propmodo Technology is edited by Franco Faraudo with contributions from readers like you and the Propmodo team.

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