paulaccornero.com
Selling to the Machine
The executive education programme for the age when the customer is an algorithm.
The executive education programme for the age when the customer is an algorithm.
For more than a century, commercial strategy assumed a human at the other end of the transaction. That assumption is dissolving. AI agents are not only a tool that businesses use. They are increasingly the customer. They search, evaluate, compare, and purchase on behalf of human principals. They are, in effect, a procurement officer that never sleeps, carries no brand loyalty, and cannot be charmed.
AIO®-Commerce is the emerging commercial category that names this era. AIO®-Commerce is not an update to existing marketing practice. It is a structural rethink of how brands, retailers, and service businesses must be built, priced, and managed when the primary buyer is algorithmic. Selling to the Machine is the programme that teaches it.
Developed by Paul F. Accornero from his academic research programme and more than 25 years of global commercial operations experience, the curriculum spans twelve modules: from the first principles of agentic commerce to agent intent optimisation, commercial policy and revenue growth, the marketing shift from persuasion to computation, and the governance required when machines transact at scale.
Commercial strategy, offer design, and brand management for the age when AI agents act as the primary purchasing decision-makers on behalf of human principals. Grounded in academic research under peer review and three decades of global commercial operations experience, spanning revenue operations across four continents.
Typically delivered across a two- to three-day residential block, or as a modular series across a semester programme.
For leadership teams that need one decisive intervention rather than the full programme. Every workshop and module is bookable on its own and delivered at your offices, off-site, or within an institutional programme.
The programme was designed for the executive who owns revenue and must rethink the entire go-to-market architecture when the buyer becomes a machine.
For MBA and Executive MBA cohorts who need the frameworks, not the hype. AIO-Commerce is the commercial discipline for the next decade.
Custom delivery for senior teams preparing for the agentic transition: commercial functions, business unit heads, and cross-functional leadership groups.
Paul F. Accornero is the researcher who established the demand-side theory of agentic commerce, with work published in the California Management Review (FT50), Forbes, and AACSB Insights. He spent more than 25 years in the global C-suite of consumer goods companies, most recently as Group Chief Commercial Officer with P&L responsibility exceeding €3.5bn across more than 120 markets. He is the author of The Algorithmic Shopper (St. Martin’s Press, 2027) and the founder of The AI Praxis. All programs are derivative works registered with the United States Copyright Office under registration number TXu 2-507-027 (effective 12 July 2025, Paul F. Accornero).
The curriculum draws directly on his academic research programme (30 works on SSRN, top 2% of downloaded authors), his registered intellectual property portfolio, and three decades of global commercial operations experience across four continents. He is a guest lecturer at Harvard and an invited peer reviewer for the Journal of the Academy of Marketing Science (FT50).