Notes from the work · Tag

#beyond-the-four-walls

An open studio door at dusk, with a trail of magenta dots running from the sidewalk up to a phone, a calendar and a payment card

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

Your next customer won't visit your website. Their assistant will.

In six weeks this fall, Meta launched an agent that buys things, Amazon blocked it, and agent orders more than quadrupled. Part 1 of Beyond the Four Walls: what changes when the customer stops walking in and starts sending software.

David SteelOctober 10, 20267 min read

A grid of small storefront doors, almost all closed and grey, with a single magenta door slightly open

Benchmarks · Beyond the Four Walls

We scanned 98 fitness and wellness websites. None was ready for agents.

Gyms, studios, med spas, salons and recovery chains, scored on whether an AI assistant can find them, understand them and book. The median was 46 out of 100. Not one site lets an agent book a class or appointment.

David SteelOctober 10, 20266 min read

A studio front door with a velvet rope, where a small robot holds up a glowing magenta badge to a front desk while a crowd of grey shadow bots waits behind the rope

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

Who gets through the door: bot walls, verified agents and the new front desk

Banks, card networks and Cloudflare spent the last year building ways for an AI agent to prove who it is. Most local business websites are still checking everyone at the door the old way. Part 9 of Beyond the Four Walls.

David SteelOctober 10, 202610 min read

A studio front desk with a booking form on a screen, and a small paper robot hand holding a pen to fill in the form while a customer relaxes in the waiting area

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

The browser is becoming the assistant. Your booking form is its next test.

Google, Microsoft, Anthropic, Perplexity and Opera have all put an agent inside the browser that can click, type and fill in forms. OpenAI built one and shut it down. Part 8 of Beyond the Four Walls: what that means for the form on your website.

David SteelOctober 10, 202610 min read

A front desk where the appointment book has turned into a search box, with a magenta dotted line running from the box straight to an open treatment room, past the shop window

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

Google's AI Mode wants to book the appointment, not just find you

Google can already call a salon for prices, book through three beauty and wellness platforms, and take payment for a hotel inside a chat. Part 7 of Beyond the Four Walls: why your Business Profile now matters more than your homepage.

David SteelOctober 10, 202610 min read

A small boutique studio storefront standing in the shadow of a vast warehouse, with a single magenta dotted path leading from a phone to the studio's own front door

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

Amazon wants to be where the agent buys. What is your Amazon?

Amazon built its own shopping agent, sent it to buy on other brands' sites, and fought to keep outside agents off its own. Part 6 of Beyond the Four Walls: what that playbook teaches a gym, studio or spa.

David SteelOctober 10, 202610 min read

A boutique studio front desk where a small robot arm holds the phone and a second robot arm hands out a printed ad, while the owner's appointment book sits just out of reach on the far side of the counter

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

Meta wants its AI to answer your leads. Whose rules will it follow?

Meta is automating both ends of local marketing: machines that buy the ads and machines that answer the people who click them. Part 5 of Beyond the Four Walls: what that means for a gym, a studio or a med spa.

David SteelOctober 10, 202610 min read

A studio front desk with an old tip jar, and a line of tiny robots each dropping a single small coin into it

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

Micropayments never worked for people. Machines just gave them a reason.

The web reserved a "Payment Required" code in 1997 and never used it. Now Coinbase, Cloudflare, Stripe and Visa are building rails for software that pays a few cents at a time. Part 4 of Beyond the Four Walls.

David SteelOctober 10, 20269 min read

A small robot hand and a human hand both reaching for the same card reader on a studio front desk, with a magenta checkmark glowing above the screen

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

Stripe is rebuilding checkout for robots. Your intro offer is next in line.

In one year Stripe co-wrote a shopping protocol with OpenAI, gave agents their own wallet, and quietly made checkout pages for 7.8 million businesses readable by software. Part 3 of Beyond the Four Walls: what that means for the studio or spa that takes payments online.

David SteelOctober 10, 20269 min read

A cutaway of a boutique studio wall showing the pipes behind it, with one magenta pipe running from a reception desk out to a phone on the sidewalk

AI and Agents · Beyond the Four Walls

The plumbing nobody explained: five files that decide if an AI can book you

robots.txt, structured data, llms.txt, MCP and WebMCP, in plain English, and which ones a gym, studio or spa should fix first. Part 2 of Beyond the Four Walls.

David SteelOctober 10, 20269 min read

See your own locations in it.

Book a walkthrough with David Steel. Bring last month's lead count and one location you are worried about.

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