With forecasts of being the primary search tool for 90% of US citizens by 2027, it’s clear that from discovery to decision, AI search is already central to how users access information.
These platforms are no longer just conversations. They're shaping perceptions, influencing behavior, and determining visibility. But while AI-driven search is rewriting brand visibility, it doesn't mean a complete rewrite of your visibility strategy.
There are many aspects of AI search optimization or generative AI optimization (GAIO) that fit smoothly within your existing SEO and content strategies. Here are some steps you can take to immediately level up your visibility strategy and drive organic discovery.
Establish a Logical Content Structure
Overall, the thrust of your content strategy will stay the same. Create content that’s valuable to your audience, matches their intent, and builds your authority.
But now, consider your new audience: the AI models. Remember that your content acts as a training ground and will shape AI search in some way. Therefore, make sure you’re showing AI your brand’s expertise, authority, and relevance.
To ensure it’s easily recognizable by LLMs, structure your content into natural clusters connected to comprehensive pillar pages. This will help ensure that you’re accounting for potential follow up questions and covering a wider search journey, while demonstrating further expertise on the topic.
So that AI can efficiently process and retrieve your content, when appropriate, structure it in clear formats like:
- FAQs (hint: research common AI prompts as a guide)
- Bullet points
- Step-by-step guides
- Tables
- Infographics
Additionally, try to use clear, natural language and simple sentence structures when discussing products, features, or anything related to your brand. This ensures associations and positioning are clearly highlighted.
Build Authority Through Content
Once again, this process can tie in closely with your established search practices.
To cement topical authority in AI search, start by identifying the core topics and the leading voices in your industry. Make note of their range of content and the similarities.
From this, focus on content gaps across your site (and within your industry) to strengthen your position. Be sure to leverage widely recognized names, concepts, and experts in your niche to boost credibility.
Naturally, publishing research-driven insights and thought leadership content will also help you earn citations and reinforce your authority in AI-trusted spaces.
Staying relevant also means proactively tracking, and even engaging, in real-time industry conversations. Monitor trending discussions across places like Reddit and YouTube, before using these to identify opportunities for your brand to provide valuable input.
The more your brand is involved in authoritative, current conversations, the more AI will associate you with those topics—and the greater authority you’ll earn.
Reprioritise your Approach to Technical SEO
As with content creation, your approach to technical SEO can remain consistent. However, some elements are now even more vital. Your site’s structure must act as a roadmap that enables both AI and users to effortlessly access and understand your content.
With this in mind, structured data like schema markup is critical for AI recognition and retrieval. Use schema markup to reinforce relationships across your site and make it easier for AI to process and retrieve your key information.
A flow on from this? The ability for rich results in search engines. This means visibility and potentially higher CTR: a study found users click rich results 58% of the time vs. 41% for non-rich.
To help AI crawl your content use clean HTML and limit (or avoid) JavaScript reliance for any key content: many AI crawlers are unable to render Javascript. You can also allow AI crawlers like GPTBot, ChatGPT-User, and PerplexityBot in your robots.txt file.
You can run a simple check of whether AI is able to crawl your site by asking it and checking the source:
Regularly check for crawl issues such as broken links and blocked resources. Use structured XML sitemaps to provide additional guidance toward your most valuable content.
Don't forget about site speed as your performance can directly impact AI retrieval. Optimizing images and scripts, leveraging CDNs, and continuously improving Core Web Vitals will ensure that your site loads quickly, delivers a smooth experience, and is more easily parsable. Plus, a faster site leads to better SEO performance and higher conversion rates.
Factor in Further Search Formats
Another reason for optimizing your content and media assets? The additional shift towards multimodal search. Google Lens captures billions of monthly searches (and rising), so attention must be given to these platforms.
As an entry point for visual search, ensure you’re adding descriptive file names, clear alt text to visuals, and include transcripts for video content to aid AI comprehension. Be sure to also apply OpenGraph tags as they simplify AI interpretation of social media content.
Key for voice search is following conversational tones and phrasing, as these queries will literally follow user speech patterns. Ask the question out loud: that’s your long-tail keyword.
In both cases, incorporating structure will also help. Schema markup is again an enabler for AI retrieval, and can be used to signpost key sections like FAQs, or specific data like product reviews and pricing.
Collaborate with Other Channels for Greater Authority
Now we’re broadening the scope, but a wider focus is needed for your visibility strategy. AI search has definite impacts on brand teams and other marketing teams like PR.
Leverage your brand and digital PR channels to shape AI’s understanding. When AI scans the digital landscape, it should consistently recognize your brand as a credible and authoritative voice.
Analyze which publications AI frequently references for your topics and strategically pursue positive coverage there. Build relationships with media, influencers, and key industry voices who drive meaningful conversations. Prioritize earning contextual brand mentions in these key spaces while staying actively engaged in surrounding discussions to reinforce your brand’s industry leadership.
Ensuring brand consistency across all channels strengthens AI visibility and recognition. Standardize your messaging, descriptions, and positioning wherever your brand is mentioned online, reinforcing your narrative clearly and through repeated connections with key industry topics and voices.
Follow AI Responses Closely
Continuing to create content that aligns with evolving user intent requires regular monitoring of AI-generated responses to understand how search behavior is shifting.
Identify and close content gaps based on AI’s current understanding of your topics, refine and expand existing content to provide clear, concise, and comprehensive answers, and optimize for long-tail queries and natural, question-based language. Identify which platforms use hybrid or search-first approaches, or which queries trigger Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) search results. Then, prioritize keeping any content included as a source updated, to maintain visibility and accuracy.
To position your brand as a thought leader, focus on publishing original research, data-backed insights, and expert commentary that AI and industry leaders naturally cite. Reinforce your credibility by referencing reliable sources and making expert opinions clearly visible in your content.
Finally, keeping your content fresh and relevant is non-negotiable. Stay on top of real-time discussions through platforms like Reddit and social media to track emerging trends and update your content accordingly.
Measure Your AI Search Success
Traditional SEO metrics like rankings, CTR, and traffic won’t tell the story, as many AI search queries result in zero-click interactions.
To gauge performance, look beyond rankings and focus on impressions and AI-driven visibility. Tracking your mentions in AI search platforms—as well as AI features like AI Overviews, knowledge panels, featured snippets—can provide an initial picture of your brand visibility and how you're appearing in search.
Since search behavior is shifting, tracking branded engagement rather than just organic traffic is crucial. A rise in branded searches, direct traffic, and returning visitors indicates that AI-driven discovery is successfully driving awareness.
To truly elevate your strategy, you’ll need detailed tracking of AI search platforms. Seek insights for mentions, sentiment and competitors across leading platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity. Each platform will show variations between the responses and favored sources
Elevate Your Enterprise Visibility with AI Search
The future of search is AI-driven, and brands that adapt now will own the next era of online visibility.
By refining content structure, reinforcing authority, and tracking AI-generated responses, you ensure your brand stays top of mind, both for users and for AI models shaping search results. Prioritizing technical SEO, multimodal content optimization, and strategic collaborations will further solidify your position as a trusted industry voice.
Now is the time to act. Audit your content for AI-readiness, refine your technical performance, and start tracking how AI search is surfacing your brand. The brands that move now will define the new rules search. Make sure yours is one of them.