Full Answer

AI search engines don't scrape product pages the way Google crawls for keywords. They parse structured markup — JSON-LD specifically — and extract discrete fields they can compare across products. If the field isn't in the schema, it doesn't exist to the AI.

The fields that matter most for citation: product name, brand, price and currency, availability status, aggregate rating, review count, GTIN or MPN, shipping details, and return policy. ChatGPT Shopping and Google AI Mode both use these to build product comparisons and recommendations. A product page with a 50-word description and no structured pricing data won't enter the comparison pool — the AI has nothing to work with.

WooCommerce fills some of these by default through Yoast or RankMath's JSON-LD output, but it leaves critical gaps. Brand is often empty, GTIN fields aren't populated, and shipping and return policies rarely make it into the schema. These aren't cosmetic omissions — they're the difference between being cited and being invisible.

The fix is a [structured data audit against what AI engines actually need](https://seresa.io/blog/ai-data-readiness/schema-markup-for-woocommerce-why-ai-search-engines-cant-find-your-products), followed by filling each gap in your product schema. This is data infrastructure, not content marketing — and it compounds because every product you fix stays fixed.