Meta’s Muse AI agent can now phone US businesses for any paying subscriber, according to TechCrunch on Nov. 12.
For anyone running a high-ticket store, including the readers here at Ecommerce Paradise, that means a buyer’s software can now dial your sales line, ask about price and stock, and hang up without a human ever speaking to you. Your phone number just became an input for somebody else’s AI.
I covered Muse’s push into checkout earlier when Muse gained Shop Pay checkout. Calling is the next step. Below you get the facts, the history, my read on what it does to a store that closes sales by phone, and five moves for this week.
AI agents are about to call your sales line, so record every call. According to its site, Quo transcribes recorded calls and adds an AI summary, so you can see exactly what each caller asked. Get a business number with Quo →
Muse Now Calls US Businesses for Any Paying Subscriber
Meta’s consumer AI agent can now place calls to US businesses on a user’s behalf, reports TechCrunch’s Sarah Perez. Meta first tested the feature in September, and until now only select early adopters could request access. Any paying subscriber can use it today.
Plans start at $20 a month for 500 million Muse tokens per week, per TechCrunch. A $100 monthly plan covers 3 billion tokens for heavier users. Startup Fortune, reporting Nov. 13, adds that calling is excluded from the free tier and that neither TechCrunch nor Engadget says whether the $20 plan includes it.
Alexandr Wang, Meta’s Chief AI Officer and head of its Superintelligence Labs, pitched the feature on X. “let muse take care of all those calls you don’t want to make,” he wrote, and he listed insurance, cable, DMV and restaurant reservations as examples. Meta said last month that Muse has more than 10 million users, according to TechCrunch.
The calls reach your end with friction. TechCrunch reports that many businesses and receptionists hang up once they realize an AI agent is calling, and that more realistic voices may make the AI harder to detect. Citing Engadget, Startup Fortune says Muse tells the person who answers that it is calling for someone and transcribes the call, but it does not always say it is an AI.
The TechCrunch report does not describe any way for a business to verify the caller, opt out, or see caller ID details. It also does not say which businesses are supported or how many calls a user can make. Those gaps matter more to you than the price tag.
The timing matters for a store owner. Black Friday is two weeks out, and Amazon’s Black Friday week starts Nov. 19. Any new source of calls, human or not, will show up on your line when it is busiest.
Meta has company. Instinct added a phone-calling concierge for its users in September, and Google started testing Gemini calling on Pixel phones the same month. Both are covered in the next section.
How Muse Calling Went From a September Test to Paid Launch
Muse launched Sept. 8, according to Startup Fortune. By Sept. 15, RuntimeWire reported that Meta was privately testing agents that call “verified US business numbers,” and that a Meta employee had used Muse to contact Tesla dealerships. The article did not define “verified.”
On Sept. 16, Meta engineer Ryan Fox announced on X that the company had expanded the Muse beta for outbound calls to US businesses, per 404 Media. The same report, published Sept. 22, said Meta was also testing calls placed by human agents in call centers. An internal post read, “Muse is now able to hand requests to a trained human agent, who places the call and works it through.”
A Meta spokesperson told 404 Media that the company is working with merchants on the calling feature and will launch it only when it is ready and with proper disclosures. Later reports cited by Startup Fortune say a Meta executive called undisclosed human use a mistake and that the feature was pulled back. TechCrunch and Engadget do not mention human callers, so whether a paying user can still reach a person is unresolved.
The rivals moved fast. TechCrunch reported on Sept. 17 that Instinct launched Instinct Concierge, which can book restaurants that skip online reservations and fix cable bill problems. On Sept. 24, TechCrunch reported that Google’s Gemini “Call for Me” dials from the user’s own phone number and lets the user follow a live transcript. It started with Pixel 11 owners in the US who pay for Gemini.
Google’s approach to the business side is the one to compare. When it launched “Let Google Call” in November 2025, TechCrunch reported that stores that had not opted out first hear a disclosure that it is “an AI calling on a customer’s behalf,” and the AI proceeds only if the person answering agrees. Retailers can opt out of those calls. Nothing comparable has been reported for Muse.
The pattern across the industry is clear. Banks, airlines and card issuers are restricting AI agents on their side, as I tracked when United banned AI agents from booking. Amex did the same when its terms barred AI agents from cardmember logins. Meanwhile the agents keep arriving at the front door of small stores.
What AI Agent Calls Mean for a High-Ticket Store’s Phone Line
My read is that this is a small volume problem today and a real process problem if you ignore it. The phone is where high-ticket orders close, and my advice has not changed: put your number on every page. Now some of the people dialing that number will be software working for a buyer.
Those calls will ask the cheap questions first. Is it in stock, what is the price, how fast does it ship to my ZIP, what does the warranty cover. Those are the calls that cost your team time and rarely convert if a person answers them badly, but they decide whether you land on the buyer’s shortlist if you answer them well.
Here is hypothetical math to size it. Say your store takes 60 inbound calls on a weekday and each AI call runs six minutes. At 5 percent AI callers you get 3 calls, about 18 minutes a day, or roughly 1.5 hours a week. At 15 percent you get 9 calls, 54 minutes a day, or about 4.5 hours a week. These numbers are invented to show the shape. Nobody has published how many store calls Muse produces.
My rule of thumb has two thresholds. Under about 5 percent of inbound calls, treat AI callers like any other caller and keep your normal script. Past about 15 percent, build a fast lane with a short script, a written answer sheet and an email follow-up, so your best closer is not reciting shipping times. Those cutoffs are my judgment, not data.
The bigger risk is hanging up. TechCrunch says receptionists already do it. If your team hangs up on a buyer’s agent, you lose a quote request you never knew existed. Train people to ask for the customer’s name, ZIP and product model, then offer to email a quote. That works for a human caller and for an agent.
Treat the transcripts as free research. Every recorded agent call shows what a buyer’s software thinks matters most, usually price, stock and delivery date. Use that list to rewrite your product page headers and your Google Shopping feed titles, because the same questions drive human shoppers too.
If you sell under MAP agreements with suppliers, quote only your advertised price on the phone, exactly as it appears on the site. An agent that records a lower number than your listing creates an argument you do not need, and a transcript makes it easy to prove what your team said. My supplier rules have not changed because the caller changed.
The counterpoint is real. Muse is a consumer product, and the examples Meta’s own executive gave were insurance, cable, the DMV and restaurant reservations. High-ticket categories like patio, HVAC, mobility and furniture may see almost none of these calls for months. One reported disclosure gap also cuts both ways, because you may never know which callers were agents. I would not rebuild anything around volume that does not exist yet.
The security angle deserves a firm rule, though. A caller you cannot verify should not get order details, card information or account changes, whether it is a person or an agent. I laid out the dispute side of that in my guide to chargeback prevention for high-ticket stores. Verify through the email on the order, every time.
AI is also changing the front end of the funnel. Google’s AI answers already favor some furniture brands over others, as the numbers in Ashley’s lead over Walmart in AI answers showed. My bet is that a store that answers clearly, in writing and by phone, earns more citations and more calls than one that does not.
Most store owners I talk to do not want to run phone operations at all. If that is you, my team builds and runs high-ticket stores through the turnkey done-for-you service, so the phone line, the follow-up and the store itself are handled by people who do this daily.
More AI callers means more work around the phone, the ads and the suppliers behind it. Want my team to scale the store you already have? See the scaling service →
5 Phone Line Moves to Make Before AI Callers Reach Your Store
You do not need a rebuild. Here are five small changes, and most take under an hour. Do them in this order, because each one makes the next easier.
- Put price, stock status, shipping time and warranty in plain text on every product page. An agent or a person should be able to confirm the basics without dialing. My guide on turning Google Shopping clicks into sales shows where those facts belong.
- Record and transcribe every inbound call, and tag where it came from. Use the business number from the box above so you can read what each caller asked, and review ten transcripts this week to count how many sound like agents.
- Write a short script for “I’m calling for a customer” calls. Ask for the customer’s name, ZIP and product model, then send a quote by email. Log each one in a free CRM, and my walkthrough on setting up HubSpot for a high-ticket store covers it. You can start with HubSpot there.
- Give simple questions a faster lane than the phone. Tidio handles live chat and AI support for price and stock questions. A virtual assistant hired through OnlineJobs.ph can cover the phone during your off hours.
- Write one verification rule and tape it to every desk. No order details, card numbers or account changes for an unverified caller. Confirm through the email on the order, then act.
If your phone process is a mess today, book a call with me through the discovery page and we will go through it together. Fix the process first, because AI callers only make a weak one more obvious.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is Meta Muse?
Muse is Meta’s consumer AI agent, launched Sept. 8 according to Startup Fortune. Meta said last month that it has more than 10 million users, per TechCrunch.
How much does Muse calling cost?
TechCrunch says any paying subscriber can use calling, with plans from $20 a month for 500 million tokens per week and a $100 plan for 3 billion. Startup Fortune notes it is unclear whether the $20 plan includes calling.
Will Muse tell my team it is an AI?
Not always. Citing Engadget, Startup Fortune says Muse says it is calling for someone and transcribes the call, but does not always state that it is an AI. Google’s Let Google Call discloses it to stores that have not opted out, per TechCrunch.
Can I block AI agent calls to my store?
No business-side controls have been reported for Muse. Google lets retailers opt out of Let Google Call. Until Meta adds something, set your own policy and script, as covered in my guide to high-ticket sales follow-up.
Does this matter if my store takes orders only online?
Less, but not zero. High-ticket buyers often want a human before they spend thousands, which is why I recommend a phone number on the site. Start with my high-ticket dropshipping guide if you are still choosing the model.
Where do I find a high-ticket niche that sells by phone?
Grab my free high-ticket niches list first. Then read the breakdown of 150+ niches to see which ones buyers call about.
Not sure your store is ready for AI callers and AI shoppers? Want 1-on-1 coaching to launch or fix your high-ticket store? Get the coaching details →
Muse calling is early, and the rules for businesses on the receiving end are still unwritten. Watch the call transcripts on your own line and adjust from there. Subscribe to the YouTube channel for daily breakdowns. More breaking news coming through the day.
Related Articles
If this was useful, these go deeper:
- PayPal Opens Checkout to Meta’s Muse AI Shopping Agent
- Home Depot Wants AI Shopping Agents to Prove Who They Are
- Shopify Fall Edition: Fraud Rules and AI Shopping Controls
- Why High Ticket Google Ads Need a Complete Conversion System
- OpenAI Opens ChatGPT Business Profiles and Free Agents
Trevor Fenner is an ecommerce entrepreneur and world traveler from Seattle, Washington, and the founder of Ecommerce Paradise, a platform focused on helping entrepreneurs build and scale profitable high-ticket ecommerce and dropshipping businesses. With over a decade of hands-on experience, Trevor specializes in high-ticket dropshipping strategy, niche and product selection, supplier recruiting and onboarding, Google & Bing Shopping ads, ecommerce SEO, and systems-driven automation and scaling. Through Ecommerce Paradise, he provides free education via in-depth guides like How to Start High-Ticket Dropshipping, advanced training through the High-Ticket Dropshipping Masterclass, and fully done-for-you turnkey ecommerce services for entrepreneurs who want a faster, more hands-off path to growth. Trevor is known for emphasizing sustainable, real-world ecommerce models over hype-driven tactics, helping store owners build scalable, sellable, and location-independent brands.
He maintains homes in Seattle and Bali, spends most of the year overseas, and usually returns to Seattle for about a month each summer.
