Nov 10 2025
A Step-By-Step AEO Guide For Growing AI Citations & Visibility via @sejournal, @fthead9

This post was sponsored by TAC Marketing. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

After years of trying to understand the black box that is Google search, SEO professionals have a seemingly even more opaque challenge these days – how to earn AI citations.

While at first glance inclusion in AI answers seems even more of a mystery than traditional SEO, there is good news. Once you know how to look for them, the AI engines do provide clues to what they consider valuable content.

This article will give you a step-by-step guide to discovering the content that AI engines value and provide a blueprint for optimizing your website for AI citations.

Take A Systematic Approach To AI Engine Optimization

The key to building an effective AI search optimization strategy begins with understanding the behavior of AI crawlers. By analyzing how these bots interact with your site, you can identify what content resonates with AI systems and develop a data-driven approach to optimization.

While Google remains dominant, AI-powered search engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude are increasingly becoming go-to resources for users seeking quick, authoritative answers. These platforms don’t just generate responses from thin air – they rely on crawled web content to train their models and provide real-time information.

This presents both an opportunity and a challenge. The opportunity lies in positioning your content to be discovered and referenced by these AI systems. The challenge is understanding how to optimize for algorithms that operate differently from traditional search engines.

The Answer Is A Systematic Approach

  • Discover what content AI engines value based on their crawler behavior.
    • Traditional log file analysis.
    • SEO Bulk Admin AI Crawler monitoring.
  • Reverse engineer prompting.
    • Content analysis.
    • Technical analysis.
  • Building the blueprint.

What Are AI Crawlers & How To Use Them To Your Advantage

AI crawlers are automated bots deployed by AI companies to systematically browse and ingest web content. Unlike traditional search engine crawlers that primarily focus on ranking signals, AI crawlers gather content to train language models and populate knowledge bases.

Major AI crawlers include:

  • GPTBot (OpenAI’s ChatGPT).
  • PerplexityBot (Perplexity AI).
  • ClaudeBot (Anthropic’s Claude).
  • Googlebot crawlers (Google AI).

These crawlers impact your content strategy in two critical ways:

  1. Training data collection.
  2. Real-time information retrieval.

Training Data Collection

AI models are trained on vast datasets of web content. Pages that are crawled frequently may have a higher representation in training data, potentially increasing the likelihood of your content being referenced in AI responses.

Real-Time Information Retrieval

Some AI systems crawl websites in real-time to provide current information in their responses. This means fresh, crawlable content can directly influence AI-generated answers.

When ChatGPT responds to a query, for instance, it’s synthesizing information gathered by its underlying AI crawlers. Similarly, Perplexity AI, known for its ability to cite sources, actively crawls and processes web content to provide its answers. Claude also relies on extensive data collection to generate its intelligent responses.

The presence and activity of these AI crawlers on your site directly impact your visibility within these new AI ecosystems. They determine whether your content is considered a source, if it’s used to answer user questions, and ultimately, if you gain attribution or traffic from AI-driven search experiences.

Understanding which pages AI crawlers visit most frequently gives you insight into what content AI systems find valuable. This data becomes the foundation for optimizing your entire content strategy.

How To Track AI Crawler Activity: Find & Use Log File Analysis

The Easy Way: We use SEO Bulk Admin to analyze server log files for us.

However, there’s a manual way to do it, as well.

Server log analysis remains the standard for understanding crawler behavior. Your server logs contain detailed records of every bot visit, including AI crawlers that may not appear in traditional analytics platforms, which focus on user visits.

Essential Tools For Log File Analysis

Several enterprise-level tools can help you parse and analyze log files:

  • Screaming Frog Log File Analyser: Excellent for technical SEOs comfortable with data manipulation.
  • Botify: Enterprise solution with robust crawler analysis features.
  • Semrush: Offers log file analysis within its broader SEO suite.
Screenshot from Screaming Frog Log File AnalyserScreenshot from Screaming Frog Log File Analyser, October 2025

The Complexity Challenge With Log File Analysis

The most granular way to understand which bots are visiting your site, what they’re accessing, and how frequently, is through server log file analysis.

Your web server automatically records every request made to your site, including those from crawlers. By parsing these logs, you can identify specific user-agents associated with AI crawlers.

Here’s how you can approach it:

  1. Access Your Server Logs: Typically, these are found in your hosting control panel or directly on your server via SSH/FTP (e.g., Apache access logs, Nginx access logs).
  2. Identify AI User-Agents: You’ll need to know the specific user-agent strings used by AI crawlers. While these can change, common ones include:
  • OpenAI (for ChatGPT, e.g., `ChatGPT-User` or variations)
  • Perplexity AI (e.g., `PerplexityBot`)
  • Anthropic (for Claude, though often less distinct or may use a general cloud provider UAs)
  • Other LLM-related bots (e.g., “GoogleBot” and `Google-Extended` for Google’s AI initiatives, potentially `Vercelbot` or other cloud infrastructure bots that LLMs might use for data fetching).
  1. Parse and Analyze: This is where the previously mentioned log analyzer tools come into play. Upload your raw log files into the analyzer and start filtering the results to identify AI crawler and search bot activity. Alternatively, for those with technical expertise, Python scripts or tools like Splunk or Elasticsearch can be configured to parse logs, identify specific user-agents, and visualize the data.

While log file analysis provides the most comprehensive data, it comes with significant barriers for many SEOs:

  • Technical Depth: Requires server access, understanding of log formats, and data parsing skills.
  • Resource Intensive: Large sites generate massive log files that can be challenging to process.
  • Time Investment: Setting up proper analysis workflows takes considerable upfront effort.
  • Parsing Challenges: Distinguishing between different AI crawlers requires detailed user-agent knowledge.

For teams without dedicated technical resources, these barriers can make log file analysis impractical despite its value.

An Easier Way To Monitor AI Visits: SEO Bulk Admin

While log file analysis provides granular detail, its complexity can be a significant barrier for all but the most highly technical users. Fortunately, tools like SEO Bulk Admin can offer a streamlined alternative.

The SEO Bulk Admin WordPress plugin automatically tracks and reports AI crawler activity without requiring server log access or complex setup procedures. The tool provides:

  • Automated Detection: Recognizes major AI crawlers, including GPTBot, PerplexityBot, and ClaudeBot, without manual configuration.
  • User-Friendly Dashboard: Presents crawler data in an intuitive interface accessible to SEOs at all technical levels.
  • Real-Time Monitoring: Tracks AI bot visits as they happen, providing immediate insights into crawler behavior.
  • Page-Level Analysis: Shows which specific pages AI crawlers visit most frequently, enabling targeted optimization efforts.
Screenshot of SEO Bulk Admin AI/Bots ActivityScreenshot of SEO Bulk Admin AI/Bots Activity, October 2025

This gives SEOs instant visibility into which pages are being accessed by AI engines – without needing to parse server logs or write scripts.

Comparing SEO Bulk Admin Vs. Log File Analysis

Feature Log File Analysis SEO Bulk Admin
Data Source Raw server logs WordPress dashboard
Technical Setup High Low
Bot Identification Manual Automatic
Crawl Tracking Detailed Automated
Best For Enterprise SEO teams Content-focused SEOs & marketers

For teams without direct access to server logs, SEO Bulk Admin offers a practical, real-time way to track AI bot activity and make data-informed optimization decisions.

Screenshot of SEO Bulk Admin Page Level Crawler ActivityScreenshot of SEO Bulk Admin Page Level Crawler Activity, October 2025

Using AI Crawler Data To Improve Content Strategy

Once you’re tracking AI crawler activity, the real optimization work begins. AI crawler data reveals patterns that can transform your content strategy from guesswork into data-driven decision-making.

Here’s how to harness those insights:

1. Identify AI-Favored Content

  • High-frequency pages: Look for pages that AI crawlers visit most frequently. These are the pieces of content that these bots are consistently accessing, likely because they find them relevant, authoritative, or frequently updated on topics their users inquire about.
  • Specific content types: Are your “how-to” guides, definition pages, research summaries, or FAQ sections getting disproportionate AI crawler attention? This can reveal the type of information AI models are most hungry for.

2. Spot LLM-Favored Content Patterns

  • Structured data relevance: Are the highly-crawled pages also rich in structured data (Schema markup)? It’s an open debate, but some speculate that AI models often leverage structured data to extract information more efficiently and accurately.
  • Clarity and conciseness: AI models excel at processing clear, unambiguous language. Content that performs well with AI crawlers often features direct answers, brief paragraphs, and strong topic segmentation.
  • Authority and citations: Content that AI models deem reliable may be heavily cited or backed by credible sources. Track if your more authoritative pages are also attracting more AI bot visits.

3. Create A Blueprint From High-Performing Content

  • Reverse engineer success: For your top AI-crawled content, document its characteristics.
  • Content structure: Headings, subheadings, bullet points, numbered lists.
  • Content format: Text-heavy, mixed media, interactive elements.
  • Topical depth: Comprehensive vs. niche.
  • Keywords/Entities: Specific terms and entities frequently mentioned.
  • Structured data implementation: What schema types are used?
  • Internal linking patterns: How is this content connected to other relevant pages?
  • Upgrade underperformers: Apply these successful attributes to content that currently receives less AI crawler attention.
  • Refine content structure: Break down dense paragraphs, add more headings, and use bullet points for lists.
  • Inject structured data: Implement relevant Schema markup (e.g., `Q&A`, `HowTo`, `Article`, `FactCheck`) on pages lacking it.
  • Enhance clarity: Rewrite sections to achieve conciseness and directness, focusing on clearly answering potential user questions.
  • Expand Authority: Add references, link to authoritative sources, or update content with the latest insights.
  • Improve Internal Linking: Ensure that relevant underperforming pages are linked from your AI-favored content and vice versa, signaling topical clusters.

This short video walks you through the process of discovering what pages are crawled most often by AI crawlers and how to use that information to start your optimization strategy.

Here is the prompt used in the video:

You are an expert in AI-driven SEO and search engine crawling behavior analysis.

TASK: Analyze and explain why the URL [https://fioney.com/paying-taxes-with-a-credit-card-pros-cons-and-considerations/] was crawled 5 times in the last 30 days by the oai-searchbot(at)openai.com crawler, while [https://fioney.com/discover-bank-review/] was only crawled twice.

GOALS:

– Diagnose technical SEO factors that could increase crawl frequency (e.g., internal linking, freshness signals, sitemap priority, structured data, etc.)

– Compare content-level signals such as topical authority, link magnet potential, or alignment with LLM citation needs

– Evaluate how each page performs as a potential citation source (e.g., specificity, factual utility, unique insights)

– Identify which ranking and visibility signals may influence crawl prioritization by AI indexing engines like OpenAI’s

CONSTRAINTS:

– Do not guess user behavior; focus on algorithmic and content signals only

– Use bullet points or comparison table format

– No generic SEO advice; tailor output specifically to the URLs provided

– Consider recent LLM citation trends and helpful content system priorities

FORMAT:

– Part 1: Technical SEO comparison

– Part 2: Content-level comparison for AI citation worthiness

– Part 3: Actionable insights to increase crawl rate and citation potential for the less-visited URL

Output only the analysis, no commentary or summary.

Note: You can find more prompts for AI-focused optimization in this article: 4 Prompts to Boost AI Citations.

By taking this data-driven approach, you move beyond guesswork and build an AI content strategy grounded in actual machine behavior on your site.

This iterative process of tracking, analyzing, and optimizing will ensure your content remains a valuable and discoverable resource for the evolving AI search landscape.

Final Thoughts On AI Optimization

Tracking and analyzing AI crawler behavior is no longer optional for SEOs seeking to remain competitive in the AI-driven search era.

By using log file analysis tools – or simplifying the process with SEO Bulk Admin – you can build a data-driven strategy that ensures your content is favored by AI engines.

Take a proactive approach by identifying trends in AI crawler activity, optimizing high-performing content, and applying best practices to underperforming pages.

With AI at the forefront of search evolution, it’s time to adapt and capitalize on new traffic opportunities from conversational search engines.

Leverage AI Insights

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by TAC Marketing. Used with permission.

In-Post Images: Image by TAC Marketing. Used with permission. 

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Nov 6 2025
Why AI Content All Sounds the Same & How SEO Pros Can Fix It via @sejournal, @mktbrew

This post was sponsored by Market Brew. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

If your AI-generated articles don’t rank but sound fine, you’re not alone.

AI has made it effortless to produce content, but not to stand out in SERPs.

Across nearly every industry, brands are using generative AI tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and more to scale content production, only to discover that, to search engines, everything sounds the same.

But this guide will help you build E-E-A-T-friendly & AI-Overview-worthy content that boosts your AI Overview visibility, while giving you more control over your rankings.

Why Does All AI-Generated Content Sound The Same?

Most generative AI models write from the same training data, producing statistically “average” answers to predictable prompts.

The result is fluent, on-topic copy that is seen as interchangeable from one brand to the next.

To most readers, it may feel novel.

To search engines, your AI content may look redundant.

Algorithms can now detect when pages express the same ideas with minor wording differences. Those pages compete for the same meaning, and only one tends to win.

The challenge for SEOs isn’t writing faster, it’s writing differently.

That starts with understanding why search engines can tell the difference even when humans can’t.

How Do Search Engines & Answer Engines See My Content?

Here’s what Google actually sees when it looks at your page:

  • Search engines no longer evaluate content by surface keywords.
  • They map meaning.

Modern ranking systems translate your content into embeddings.

When two pages share nearly identical embeddings, the algorithm treats them as duplicates of meaning, similar to duplicate content.

That’s why AI-generated content blends together. The vocabulary may change, but the structure and message remain the same.

What Do Answer Engines Look For On Web Pages?

Beyond words, engines analyze the entire ecosystem of a page:

These structural cues help determine whether content is contextually distinct or just another derivative variant.

To stand out, SEOs have to shape the context that guides the model before it writes.

That’s where the Inspiration Stage comes in.

How To Teach AI To Write Like Your Brand, Not The Internet

Before you generate another article, feed the AI your brand’s DNA.

Language models can complete sentences, but can’t represent your brand, structure, or positioning unless you teach them.

Advanced teams solve this through context engineering, defining who the AI is writing for and how that content should behave in search.

The Inspiration Stage should combine three elements that together create brand-unique outputs.

Step 1 – Create A Brand Bible: Define Who You Are

The first step is identity.

A Brand Bible translates your company’s tone, values, and vocabulary into structured guidance the AI can reference. It tells the model how to express authority, empathy, or playfulness. And just as important, what NOT to say.

Without it, every post sounds like a tech press release.

With it, you get language that feels recognizably yours, even when produced at scale.

“The Brand Bible isn’t decoration: it’s a defensive wall against generic AI sameness.”

A great example: Market Brew’s Brand Bible Wizard

Step 2 – Create A Template URL: Structure How You Write

Great writing still needs great scaffolding.

By supplying a Template URL, a page whose structure already performs well, you give the model a layout to emulate: heading hierarchy, schema markup, internal link positions, and content rhythm.

Adding a Template Influence parameter can help the AI decide how closely to follow that structure. Lower settings would encourage creative variation; higher settings would preserve proven formatting for consistency across hundreds of pages.

Templates essentially become repeatable frameworks for ranking success.

An example of how to apply a template URL

Step 3 – Reverse-Engineer Your Competitor Fan-Out Prompts: Know the Landscape

Context also means competition. When you are creating AI content, it needs to be optimized for a series of keywords and prompts.

Fan-out prompts are a concept that maps the broader semantic territory around a keyword or topic. These are a network of related questions, entities, and themes that appear across the SERP.

In addition, fan-out prompts should be reverse-engineered from top competitors in that SERP.

Feeding this intelligence into the AI ensures your content strategically expands its coverage; something that the LLM search engines are hungry for.

“It’s not copying competitors, it’s reverse-engineering the structure of authority.”

Together, these three inputs create a contextual blueprint that transforms AI from a text generator into a brand and industry-aware author.

Market Brew’s implementation of reverse engineering fan-out prompts

How To Incorporate Human-Touch Into AI Content

If your AI tool spits out finished drafts with no checkpoints, you’ve lost control of what high-quality content is.

That’s a problem for teams who need to verify accuracy, tone, or compliance.

Breaking generation into transparent stages solves this.

Incorporate checkpoints where humans can review, edit, or re-queue the content at each stage:

  • Research.
  • Outline.
  • Draft.
  • Refinement.

Metrics for readability, link balance, and brand tone become visible in real time.

This “human-in-the-loop” design keeps creative control where it belongs.

Instead of replacing editors, AI becomes their analytical assistant: showing how each change affects the structure beneath the words.

“The best AI systems don’t replace editors, they give them x-ray vision into every step of the process.”

How To Build Content The Way Search Engines Read It

Modern SEO focuses on predictive quality signals: indicators that content is likely to perform before it ever ranks.

These include:

  • Semantic alignment: how closely the page’s embeddings match target intent clusters.
  • Structural integrity: whether headings, schema, and links follow proven ranking frameworks.
  • Brand consistency and clarity: tone and terminology that match the brand bible without losing readability.

Tracking these signals during creation turns optimization into a real-time discipline.

Teams can refine strategy based on measurable structure, not just traffic graphs weeks later.

That’s the essence of predictive SEO: understanding success before the SERP reflects it.

The Easy Way To Create High-Visibility Content For Modern SERPs

Top SEO teams are already using the Content Booster approach.

Market Brew’s Content Booster is one such example.

It embeds AI writing directly within a search engine simulation, using the same mechanics that evaluate pages to guide creation.

Writers begin by loading their Brand Bible, selecting a Template URL, and enabling reverse-engineered fan-out prompts.

Next, the internal and external linking strategy is defined, which uses a search engine model’s link scoring system, plus its entity-based text classifier as a guide to place the most valuable links possible.

This is bolstered by a “friends/foes” section that allows writers to define quoting / linking opportunities to friendly sites, and “foe” sites where external linking should be avoided.

The Content Booster then produces and evaluates a 7-stage content pipeline, each driven by thousands of AI agents.

Stage Function What You Get
0. Brand Bible Upload your brand assets and site; Market Brew learns your tone, voice, and banned terms. Every piece written in your unique brand style.
1. Opportunity & Strategy Define your target keyword or prompt, tone, audience, and linking strategy. A strategic blueprint tied to real search intent.
2. Brief & Structure Creates an SEO-optimized outline using semantic clusters and entity graphs. Perfectly structured brief ready for generation.
3. Draft Generation AI produces content constrained by embeddings and brand parameters. A first draft aligned with ranking behavior, not just text patterns.
4. Optimization & Alignment Uses cosine similarity and Market Brew’s ranking model to score each section. Data-driven tuning for maximum topical alignment.
5. Internal Linking & Entity Enrichment Adds schema markup, entity tags, and smart internal links. Optimized crawl flow and contextual authority.
6. Quality & Compliance Checks grammar, plagiarism, accessibility, and brand voice. Ready-to-publish content that meets editorial and SEO standards.

Editors can inspect or refine content at any stage, ensuring human direction without losing automation.

Instead of waiting months to measure results, teams see predictive metrics: like fan-out coverage, audience/persona compliance, semantic similarity, link distribution, embedding clusters and more. The moment a draft is generated.

This isn’t about outsourcing creativity.

It’s about giving SEO professionals the same visibility and control that search engineers already have.

Your Next Steps

If you teach your AI to think like your best strategist, sameness stops being a problem.

Every brand now has access to the same linguistic engine; the only differentiator is context.

The future of SEO belongs to those who blend human creativity with algorithmic understanding, who teach their models to think like search engines while sounding unmistakably human.

By anchoring AI in brand, structure, and competition, and by measuring predictive quality instead of reactive outcomes, SEOs can finally close the gap between what we publish and what algorithms reward.

“The era of AI sameness is already here. The brands that thrive will be the ones that teach their AI to sound human and think like a search engine.”

Ready to see how predictive SEO works in action?

Explore the free trial of Market Brew’s Light Brew system — where you can model how search engines interpret your content and test AI writing workflows before publishing.

Get Started Here

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by Market Brew. Used with permission.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Oct 28 2025
The AI Search Visibility Audit: 15 Questions Every CMO Should Ask

This post was sponsored by IQRush. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

Your traditional SEO is winning. Your AI visibility is failing. Here’s how to fix it.

Your brand dominates page one of Google. Domain authority crushes competitors. Organic traffic trends upward quarter after quarter. Yet when customers ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, or others about your industry, your brand is nowhere to be found.

This is the AI visibility gap, which causes missed opportunities in awareness and sales.

“SEO ranking on page one doesn’t guarantee visibility in AI search.  The rules of ranking have shifted from optimization to verification.”

Raj Sapru, Netrush, Chief Strategy Officer

Recent analysis of AI-powered search patterns reveals a troubling reality: commercial brands with excellent traditional SEO performance often achieve minimal visibility in AI-generated responses. Meanwhile, educational institutions, industry publications, and comparison platforms consistently capture citations for product-related queries.

The problem isn’t your content quality. It’s that AI engines prioritize entirely different ranking factors than traditional search: semantic query matching over keyword density, verifiable authority markers over marketing claims, and machine-readable structure over persuasive copy.

This audit exposes 15 questions that separate AI-invisible brands from citation leaders.

Download the Full Audit

We’re sharing the first 7 critical questions below, covering visibility assessment, authority verification, and measurement fundamentals. These questions will reveal your most urgent gaps and provide immediate action steps.

Question 1: Are We Visible in AI-Powered Search Results?

Why This Matters: Commercial brands with strong traditional SEO often achieve minimal AI citation visibility in their categories. A recent IQRush field audit found fewer than one in ten AI-generated answers included in the brand, showing how limited visibility remains, even for strong SEO performers. Educational institutions, industry publications, and comparison sites dominate AI responses for product queries—even when commercial sites have superior content depth. In regulated industries, this gap widens further as compliance constraints limit commercial messaging while educational content flows freely into AI training data.

How to Audit:

  • Test core product or service queries through multiple AI platforms (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude)
  • Document which sources AI engines cite: educational sites, industry publications, comparison platforms, or adjacent content providers
  • Calculate your visibility rate: queries where your brand appears vs. total queries tested

Action: If educational/institutional sources dominate, implement their citation-driving elements:

  • Add research references and authoritative citations to product content
  • Create FAQ-formatted content with an explicit question-answer structure
  • Deploy structured data markup (Product, FAQ, Organization schemas)
  • Make commercial content as machine-readable as educational sources

IQRush tracks citation frequency across AI platforms. Competitive analysis shows which schema implementations, content formats, and authority signals your competitors use to capture citations you’re losing.

Question 2: Are Our Expertise Claims Actually Verifiable?

Why This Matters: Machine-readable validation drives AI citation decisions: research references, technical standards, certifications, and regulatory documentation. Marketing claims like “industry-leading” or “trusted by thousands” carry zero weight. In one IQRush client analysis, more than four out of five brand mentions were supported by citations—evidence that structured, verifiable content is far more likely to earn visibility. Companies frequently score high on human appeal—compelling copy, strong brand messaging—but lack the structured authority signals AI engines require. This mismatch explains why brands with excellent traditional marketing achieve limited citation visibility.

How to Audit:

  • Review your priority pages and identify every factual claim made (performance stats, quality standards, methodology descriptions)
  • For each claim, check whether it links to or cites an authoritative source (research, standards body, certification authority)
  • Calculate verification ratio: claims with authoritative backing vs. total factual claims made

Action: For each unverified claim, either add authoritative backing or remove the statement:

  • Add specific citations to key claims (research databases, technical standards, industry reports)
  • Link technical specifications to recognized standards bodies
  • Include certification or compliance verification details where applicable
  • Remove marketing claims that can’t be substantiated with machine-verifiable sources

IQRush’s authority analysis identifies which claims need verification and recommends appropriate authoritative sources for your industry, eliminating research time while ensuring proper citation implementation.

Question 3: Does Our Content Match How People Query AI Engines?

Why This Matters: Semantic alignment matters more than keyword density. Pages optimized for traditional keyword targeting often fail in AI responses because they don’t match conversational query patterns. A page targeting “best project management software” may rank well in Google but miss AI citations if it doesn’t address how users actually ask: “What project management tool should I use for a remote team of 10?” In recent IQRush client audits, AI visibility clustered differently across verticals—consumer brands surfaced more frequently for transactional queries, while financial clients appeared mainly for informational intent. Intent mapping—informational, consideration, or transactional—determines whether AI engines surface your content or skip it.

How to Audit:

  • Test sample queries customers would use in AI engines for your product category
  • Evaluate whether your content is structured for the intent type (informational vs. transactional)
  • Assess if content uses conversational language patterns vs. traditional keyword optimization

Action: Align content with natural question patterns and semantic intent:

  • Restructure content to directly address how customers phrase questions
  • Create content for each intent stage: informational (education), consideration (comparison), transactional (specifications)
  • Use conversational language patterns that match AI engine interactions
  • Ensure semantic relevance beyond just keyword matching

IQRush maps your content against natural query patterns customers use in AI platforms, showing where keyword-optimized pages miss conversational intent.

Question 4: Is Our Product Information Structured for AI Recommendations?

Why This Matters: Product recommendations require structured data. AI engines extract and compare specifications, pricing, availability, and features from schema markup—not from marketing copy. Products with a comprehensive Product schema capture more AI citations in comparison queries than products buried in unstructured text. Bottom-funnel transactional queries (“best X for Y,” product comparisons) depend almost entirely on machine-readable product data.

How to Audit:

  • Check whether product pages include Product schema markup with complete specifications
  • Review if technical details (dimensions, materials, certifications, compatibility) are machine-readable
  • Test transactional queries (product comparisons, “best X for Y”) to see if your products appear
  • Assess whether pricing, availability, and purchase information is structured

Action: Implement comprehensive product data structure:

  • Deploy Product schema with complete technical specifications
  • Structure comparison information (tables, lists) that AI can easily parse
  • Include precise measurements, certifications, and compatibility details
  • Add FAQ schema addressing common product selection questions
  • Ensure pricing and availability data is machine-readable

IQRush’s ecommerce audit scans product pages for missing schema fields—price, availability, specifications, reviews—and prioritizes implementations based on query volume in your category.

Question 5: Is Our “Fresh” Content Actually Fresh to AI Engines?

Why This Matters: Recency signals matter, but timestamp manipulation doesn’t work. Pages with recent publication dates, but outdated information underperforms older pages with substantive updates: new research citations, current industry data, or refreshed technical specifications. Genuine content updates outweigh simple republishing with changed dates.

How to Audit:

  • Review when your priority pages were last substantively updated (not just timestamp changes)
  • Check whether content references recent research, current industry data, or updated standards
  • Assess if “evergreen” content has been refreshed with current examples and information
  • Compare your content recency to competitors appearing in AI responses

Action: Establish genuine content freshness practices:

  • Update high-priority pages with current research, data, and examples
  • Add recent case studies, industry developments, or regulatory changes
  • Refresh citations to include latest research or technical standards
  • Implement clear “last updated” dates that reflect substantive changes
  • Create update schedules for key content categories

IQRush compares your content recency against competitors capturing citations in your category, flagging pages that need substantive updates (new research, current data) versus pages where timestamp optimization alone would help.

Question 6: How Do We Measure What’s Actually Working?

Why This Matters: Traditional SEO metrics—rankings, traffic, CTR—miss the consideration impact of AI citations. Brand mentions in AI responses influence purchase decisions without generating click-through attribution, functioning more like brand awareness channels than direct response. CMOs operating without AI visibility measurement can’t quantify ROI, allocate budgets effectively, or report business impact to executives.

How to Audit:

  • Review your executive dashboards: Are AI visibility metrics present alongside SEO metrics?
  • Examine your analytics capabilities: Can you track how citation frequency changes month-over-month?
  • Assess competitive intelligence: Do you know your citation share relative to competitors?
  • Evaluate coverage: Which query categories are you blind to?

Action: Establish AI citation measurement:

  • Track citation frequency for core queries across AI platforms
  • Monitor competitive citation share and positioning changes
  • Measure sentiment and accuracy of brand mentions
  • Add AI visibility metrics to executive dashboards
  • Correlate AI visibility with consideration and conversion metrics

IQRush tracks citation frequency, competitive share, and month-over-month trends across across AI platforms. No manual testing or custom analytics development is required.

Question 7: Where Are Our Biggest Visibility Gaps?

Why This Matters: Brands typically achieve citation visibility for a small percentage of relevant queries, with dramatic variation by funnel stage and product category. IQRush analysis showed the same imbalance: consumer brands often surfaced in purchase-intent queries, while service firms appeared mostly in educational prompts. Most discovery moments generate zero brand visibility. Closing these gaps expands reach at stages where competitors currently dominate.

How to Audit:

  • List queries customers would ask about your products/services across different funnel stages
  • Group them by funnel stage (informational, consideration, transactional)
  • Test each query in AI platforms and document: Does your brand appear?
  • Calculate what percentage of queries produce brand mentions in each funnel stage
  • Identify patterns in the queries where you’re absent

Action: Target the funnel stages with lowest visibility first:

  • If weak at informational stage: Build educational content that answers “what is” and “how does” queries
  • If weak at consideration stage: Create comparison content structured as tables or side-by-side frameworks
  • If weak at transactional stage: Add comprehensive product specs with schema markup
  • Focus resources on stages where small improvements yield largest reach gains

IQRush’s funnel analysis quantifies gap size by stage and estimates impact, showing which content investments will close the most visibility gaps fastest.

The Compounding Advantage of Early Action

The first seven questions and actions highlight the differences between traditional SEO performance and AI search visibility. Together, they explain why brands with strong organic rankings often have zero citations in AI answers.

The remaining 8 questions in the comprehensive audit help you take your marketing further. They focus on technical aspects: the structure of your content, the backbone of your technical infrastructure, and the semantic strategies that signal true authority to AI. 

“Visibility in AI search compounds, making it harder for your competition to break through. The brands that make themselves machine-readable today will own the conversation tomorrow.”
Raj Sapru, Netrush, Chief Strategy Officer

IQRush data shows the same thing across industries: early brands that adopt a new AI answer engine optimization strategy quickly start to lock in positions of trust that competitors can’t easily replace. Once your brand becomes the reliable answer source, AI engines will start to default to you for related queries, and the advantage snowballs.

The window to be an early adopter and take AI visibility for your brand will not stay open forever.  As more brands invest in AI visibility, the visibility race is heating up.

Download the Complete AI Search Visibility Audit with detailed assessment frameworks, implementation checklists, and the 8 strategic questions covering content architecture, technical infrastructure, and linguistic optimization. Each question includes specific audit steps and immediate action items to close your visibility gaps and establish authoritative positioning before your market becomes saturated with AI-optimized competitors.

Download the Full Audit

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by IQRush. Used with permission.

In-Post Images: Image by IQRush. Used with permission.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Oct 24 2025
Holiday Email Deliverability: 4 Expert Tips To Reach More Inboxes

This post was sponsored by Campaign Monitor. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

Does it seem like fewer emails are getting delivered?

Are bounce rates and spam numbers too high for your liking?

Your well-crafted campaigns are at risk.

They are at risk of missing the mark if deliverability isn’t a priority.

Why Are My Email Delivery Scores So Low?

Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and year-end sales push email volume to record highs, prompting mailbox providers (MBPs) like Gmail and Yahoo to tighten spam filters and raise the bar for acceptable sending practices.

How Can I Ensure Marketing Emails Reach Inboxes?

To help your emails reach subscribers when it matters most, our email deliverability experts outline four practical tips for safeguarding inbox placement, without sounding “salesy” or relying on quick fixes.

1. Understand & Strengthen Deliverability For Better Results

What Is Email Deliverability?

Email deliverability refers to whether your message actually reaches the recipient’s inbox.

What Determines Email Deliverability?

Each time an email is sent, the email passes through two critical stages.

Stage 1: Delivery.

  1. Your email is sent to an MBP (e.g., Gmail, Outlook).
  2. It is either accepted or rejected.

Rejections can be hard bounces (invalid addresses) or soft bounces (temporary issues like a full mailbox).

Stage 2: Inbox placement.

Once accepted, MBPs decide whether to:

  1. Place your email in the inbox.
  2. Route it to promotions.
  3. Filter it as spam.

What Causes Marketing Emails To Be Marked As Spam?

The judgment to flag an email as spam depends on:

During peak season, email volume can double or triple, especially around Black Friday/Cyber Monday.

MBPs must guard against spammers, so legitimate senders face stricter scrutiny.

Understanding these mechanics helps marketers avoid being mistaken for unwanted senders and improves inbox placement.

For a deeper dive into how email deliverability works, check out this full guide.

2. Build & Maintain a Strong Sender Reputation

Mailbox providers rely on sender reputation to separate trusted messages from spam.

What Is Sender Reputation?

Two factors determine sender reputation:

  • Audience Engagement. High open and click rates send positive signals. MBPs also track how long recipients read messages, whether they add you to contacts, or delete without opening.
  • List Quality. Permission and relevance are critical. New holiday sign-ups should go through a compliant opt-in process, supported by a welcoming automation that sets expectations.

How Do I Get A Better Sender Reputation?

To keep your reputation strong:

  • Re-engage inactive subscribers early, well before the holiday surge.
  • Remove dormant contacts if they stay unresponsive.
  • Honor unsubscribe requests promptly.

Maintaining this “good standing” ensures your campaigns consistently reach the inbox.

For practical steps, explore best practices for building healthy lists: https://www.campaignmonitor.com/resources/guides/building-an-email-list/

3. Don’t Over-Spice Your Email Program

It’s tempting to send more emails to more people as the holidays approach.

However, sudden changes can trigger spam filters.

MBPs closely monitor sending patterns, and abrupt spikes can undo months of good reputation.

Do:

  • Keep your cadence steady and test any new segments early.
  • Maintain clear, bot-protected signup forms and offer preference options so users can “opt down” rather than unsubscribe entirely.

Don’t:

  • Send to old or inactive lists, or change your sending domain in Q4.
  • Ignore warning signs like falling open rates or rising complaints.

For guidance on email frequency and audience expectations, see Campaign Monitor’s insights on email engagement: https://www.campaignmonitor.com/resources/guides/email-engagement/

4. Monitor Key Metrics Like a Hawk

Even seasoned marketers may see deliverability metrics fluctuate during the holidays. Careful monitoring helps catch issues before they escalate:

  • Bounce rates: Hard bounces above 2% call for immediate action.
  • Complaint rates: Aim for 0.1% or lower to avoid spam folder placement.
  • Opt-out rates: A sudden rise means your frequency or content may need adjustment.
  • Open rates by domain: Consistency across Gmail, Yahoo, and others indicates healthy inbox placement.
  • Reputation signals: Tools like Gmail Postmaster reveal if your domain is being flagged.

Remember that mailbox providers increasingly use AI and machine learning to evaluate sender behavior and content quality. Authentic engagement is key. To learn more about measuring success, visit Campaign Monitor’s email marketing benchmarks: https://www.campaignmonitor.com/resources/guides/email-marketing-benchmarks/

How To Use These Tips To Create High-Deliverability Holiday Email Campaigns

Landing in the inbox is a privilege, not a guarantee, so always be sure to:

  1. Secure explicit opt-in and send only wanted content.
  2. Keep your sender reputation strong with healthy engagement and clean lists.
  3. Avoid sudden changes in cadence or audience.
  4. Watch key metrics and adapt quickly when anomalies appear.

These steps help marketers navigate heavy holiday email traffic while maintaining trust and engagement with subscribers.

Campaign Monitor’s tools can further support these efforts by simplifying list management, automating welcome journeys, and providing detailed reporting, without overcomplicating your workflow.

By combining smart strategy with careful monitoring, you’ll set the stage for a successful holiday season where every email has the best chance to shine in the inbox.

Start reaching more inboxes this holiday season

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by Campaign Monitor. Used with permission.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Oct 15 2025
The AI Search Effect: What Agencies Need To Know For Local Search Clients

This post was sponsored by GatherUp. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

Local Search Has Changed: From “Found” to “Chosen”

Not long ago, showing up in a Google search was enough. A complete Google Business Profile (GBP) and a steady stream of reviews could put your client in front of the right customers.

But today’s local search looks very different. It’s no longer just about being found; it’s about being chosen.

That shift has only accelerated with the rise of AI-powered search. Instead of delivering a list of links, engines like ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, and Perplexity now generate instant summaries. Changing the way consumers interact with search results, these summaries are the key to whether or not your client’s business gets seen at all.

Reality Check: if listings aren’t accurate, consistent, and AI-ready, businesses risk invisibility.

AI Search Is Reshaping Behavior & Brand Visibility

AI search is already reshaping behavior.

Only 8% of users click a traditional link when an AI summary appears. That means the majority of your clients’ potential customers are making decisions without ever leaving the AI-generated response.

So, how does AI decide which businesses to include in its answers? Two categories of signals matter most:

Put simply, if a client’s listings are messy, incomplete, or outdated, AI is far less likely to surface them in a summary. And that’s a problem, considering more than 4 out of 5 people use search engines to find local businesses.

The Hidden Dangers of Neglected Listings

Agencies know the pain of messy listings firsthand. But your clients may not realize just how damaging it can be:

  • Trust erosion: 80% of consumers lose trust in businesses with incorrect or inconsistent.
  • Lost visibility: Roughly a third of local organic results now come from business directories. If listings are incomplete, that’s a third of opportunities gone.
  • Negative perception: A GBP with outdated hours or broken URLs communicates neglect, not professionalism.

Consider “Mary,” a marketing director overseeing 150+ locations. Without automation, her team spends hours chasing duplicate profiles, correcting seasonal hours, and fighting suggested edits. Updates lag behind reality. Customers’ trust slips. And every inconsistency is another signal to search engines, and now AI, that the business isn’t reliable.

For many agencies, the result is more than frustrated clients. It’s a high churn risk.

Why This Matters More Than Ever to Consumers

Consumers expect accuracy at every touchpoint, and they’re quick to lose confidence when details don’t add up.

  • 80% of consumers lose trust in a business with incorrect or inconsistent information, like outdated hours, wrong addresses, or broken links.
  • A Google Business Profile with missing fields or duplicate entries signals neglect.
  • When AI engines surface summaries, they pull from this. Inconsistencies make it less likely your client’s business will appear at all.

Reviews still play a critical role, but they work best when paired with clean, consistent listings. 99% of consumers read reviews before choosing a business, and 68% prioritize recent reviews over overall star ratings. If the reviews say “great service” but the business shows the wrong phone number or closed hours, that trust is instantly broken.

In practice, this means agencies must help clients maintain both accurate listings and authentic reviews. Together, they signal credibility to consumers and to AI search engines deciding which businesses make the cut.

Real-World Data: The ROI of Getting Listings Right

Agencies that take listings seriously are already seeing outsized returns:

  • A healthcare agency managing 850+ locations saved 132 hours per month and reduced costs by $21K annually through listings automation, delivering a six-figure annual ROI.
  • A travel brand optimizing global listings recorded a 200% increase in Google visibility and a 30x rise in social engagement.
  • A retail chain improving profile completeness saw a 31% increase in revenue attributed to local SEO improvements.

The proof is clear: accurate, consistent, and scalable listings management is no longer optional. It’s a revenue driver.

Actionable Steps Agencies Can Take Right Now

AI search is moving fast, but agencies don’t have to be caught flat-footed. Here are five practical steps to protect your clients’ visibility and trust.

1.  Audit Listings for Accuracy and Consistency

Start with a full audit of your clients’ GBPs and directory listings. Look for mismatches in hours, addresses, URLs, and categories. Even small discrepancies send negative signals to both consumers and AI search engines.

I know you updated your listings last year, and not much has changed, but unless your business is a time capsule, your customers expect real-time accuracy.

2.  Eliminate Duplicates

Duplicate listings aren’t just confusing to customers; they actively hurt SEO. Suppress duplicates across directories and consolidate data at the source to prevent aggregator overwrites. Google penalized 6.1% of business listings flagged for duplicate or spam entries in Q1 alone, underscoring how seriously platforms are taking accuracy enforcement.

3.  Optimize for Engagement

Encourage clients to respond authentically to reviews. Research shows 73% of consumers will give a business a second chance if they receive a thoughtful response to a negative review. Engagement isn’t just customer service; it’s a ranking signal.

4.  Create AI-Readable Content

AI thrives on structured, educational content. Encourage clients to build out their web presence with FAQs, descriptive product or service pages, and customer-centric content that mirrors natural language. This makes it easier for AI to pull them into summaries.

5.  Automate at Scale

Manual updates don’t cut it for multi-location brands. Implement automation for bulk publishing, data synchronization, and ongoing updates. This ensures accuracy and saves agencies countless hours of low-value labor.

The AI Opportunity: Agencies as Strategic Partners

For agencies, the rise of AI search is both a threat and an opportunity. Yes, clients who ignore their listings risk becoming invisible. But agencies that lean in can position themselves as strategic partners, helping businesses adapt to a disruptive new era.

That means reframing listings management not as “background work,” but as the foundation of trust and visibility in AI-powered search.

As GatherUp’s research concludes, “In the AI-driven search era, listings are no longer background work; they are the foundation of visibility and trust.”

The Time to Act Is Now

AI search is here, and it’s rewriting the rules of local visibility. Agencies that fail to help their clients adapt risk irrelevance.

But those that act now can deliver measurable growth, stronger client relationships, and defensible ROI.

The path forward is clear: audit listings, eliminate duplicates, optimize for engagement, publish AI-readable content, and automate at scale.

And if you want to see where your clients stand today, GatherUp offers a free listings audit to help identify gaps and opportunities.

👉 Run a free listings audit and see how your business measures up.

Run A Free Listings Audit

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by GatherUp. Used with permission.

In-Post Images: Image by GatherUp. Used with permission.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Sep 24 2025
From SEO To GEO: How Can Marketers Adapt To The New Era Of Search Visibility? via @sejournal, @Semji_fr

This post was sponsored by Semji. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

For three decades, SEO has been the cornerstone of digital visibility.

Keywords, backlinks, and technical optimization determined whether your brand appeared at the top of search results.

However, the landscape is shifting, and it’s likely that if you’re reading this article, you already know it.

Download The Full Guide

With generative AI tools like ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, or Perplexity, users no longer rely solely on lists of blue links.

Instead, searchers and researchers receive synthesized, conversational answers that draw content from high-authority sources.

The message is clear: ranking alone is no longer enough.

To be visible in the age of AI, marketers need a complementary discipline, Generative Engine Optimization (GEO).

To do so, you need concrete methods and best practices to add GEO efficiently into your strategy.

What Is Generative Search Optimization (GEO)?

Generative Search Optimization (GEO) is the practice of ensuring that your content is selected, understood, and cited by large language models (LLMs) and generative engines.

How Does GEO Differ From Traditional SEO?

Traditional search engines use bots to crawl webpages and rank them.

LLMs synthesize patterns from massive pre-ingested datasets. LLMs and answer engines don’t index; they use them as their conversational padding.

What Is A Pre-Ingested Data Set?

Pre-ingested datasets are content that is pulled from websites, reviews, directories, forums, and even brand-owned assets.

This means your visibility no longer depends only on keywords

What Do I Need To Do To Show Up In AI Overviews & SERPs?

To increase your visibility in LLMs, your content must be:

Put simply: GEO ensures your brand shows up in the answers themselves as well as in the links beneath them.

How To Optimize For LLMs In GEO

Optimizing for LLMs is about aligning with how these systems select and reuse content.

From our analysis, three core principles stand out in consistently GEO-friendly content:

1. Provide Structure & Clarity

Generative models prioritize content that is well-organized and easy to parse. Clear headings, bullet points, tables, summaries… help engines extract information and recompose it into human-like answers.

2. Include Trust & Reliability Signals

LLMs reward factual accuracy, consistency, and transparency. Contradictions between your site, profiles, and third-party sources weaken credibility. Conversely, quoting sources, citing data, and showcasing expertise increase your chances of being cited!

3. Contextual & Semantic Depth Are Key

Engines rely less on keywords and more on contextual signals (as it has been more and more the case with Google these last years–hello BERT, haven’t heard from you in a while!). Content enriched with synonyms, related terms, and variations is more flexible and better aligned with diverse queries, which is especially important as AI queries are conversational, not just transactional.

3 Tips For Creating GEO-Friendly Content

In the GEO guide we’re sharing with you in this article, 15 tips are delivered–here are 3 of the most important ones:

1. Be Comprehensive & Intent-Driven

LLMs favor complete answers.

Cover not just the main query but related terms, variations, and natural follow-ups.

For example, if writing about “content ROI,” anticipate adjacent questions like “How do you measure ROI in SEO?” or “What KPIs prove content ROI?”!

By aligning with user intent, not just keywords, you increase the likelihood of your content being surfaced as the “best available answer” for the LLMs.

Learn how to do this.

2. Showcase E-E-A-T Signals

GEO is inseparable from trust. Engines look for identifiable signals of credibility:

  • Author bylines with expertise.
  • Real-world examples, roles, or case insights.
  • Transparent sourcing of statistics and references.
  • And many more opportunities to prove your credibility and authority.

Think of it as content that doesn’t just “read well,” but feels safe to reuse by the LLMs.

3. Optimize format for machine & human readability

Beyond clarity, formats like FAQs, how-tos, comparisons, and lists make your content both user-friendly and machine-friendly. Many SEO techniques are just as powerful and efficient in GEO:

  • Add alt text for visuals.
  • Include summaries and key takeaways in long-form content.
  • Use structured data and schema where relevant.

This dual optimization increases both discoverability and reusability in AI-generated answers.

Why It’s Essential To Optimize For LLMs

Skeptical about GEO? Consider this: 74% of problem-solving searches now surface AI-generated responses, and AI Overviews already appear in more than 1 in 10 Google queries in the U.S. AI Overviews, Perplexity summaries, and Gemini snapshots are becoming default behaviors in information-seeking. The line between “search” and “chat” is blurring.

The risk of ignoring GEO is not just lower traffic—it’s invisibility in the answer layer where trust and decisions are increasingly formed.

By contrast, marketers who embrace GEO can:

  • Defend brand presence where AI engines consolidate attention.
  • Create future-forward SEO strategies as search continues to evolve.
  • Maximize ROI by aligning content with both human expectations and machine logic.

In other words, GEO is not a trend: it’s a structural shift in digital visibility, where SEO remains essential but is no longer sufficient. GEO adds the missing layer: being cited, trusted, and reused by the engines that increasingly mediate how users access information.

GEO As A New Competitive Advantage

The age of GEO is here. For marketing and SEO leaders, the opportunity is to adapt faster than competitors—aligning content with the standards of generative search while continuing to refine SEO.

To win visibility in this environment, prioritize:

  • Auditing your current content for GEO readiness.
  • Enhancing clarity, trust signals, and semantic richness.
  • Monitoring your presence in AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and other generative engines.

Those who invest in GEO today will shape how tomorrow’s answers are written.

Want to explore the full framework of GEO?

Download the complete guide on Generative Engine Optimization

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by Semji. Used with permission.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Sep 23 2025
SERP Visibility Decline: How To Grow Brand Awareness When Organic Traffic Stalls

This post was sponsored by AdRoll. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

Text‑heavy AI Overviews blocking your brand?

The “People Also Ask” that you could scroll through forever, effectively hiding position 1?

Knowledge panels and rich snippets hogging the view?

The majority of people who entered a search query never made it past the top of the search result page (SERP) in 2024.

For users, these updates to Google’s SERPs are technically efficient.

For you, changes like AI Overviews are another strategy to master, and at worst, a direct competitor for attention.

So how do you increase brand awareness and search presence when Google is taking away your bids for top-of-funnel (TOFU) content?

The Rise of Zero-Click: Why Rankings Don’t Equal Traffic Anymore

As search evolves, AI-powered summaries now appear in more than 13% of queries.

This resulted in nearly 60% of Google searches ending without a click last year, dramatically shrinking the traditional flow of search traffic to a website.

Not only are you fighting for space against the usual blue links, you’re now competing with AI-generated answers that package everything up before a user even considers a click.

Which means that “we made it to the top” moment doesn’t guarantee anyone actually sees your brand.

So, even if your brand earns a top ranking, it may never translate into visibility. That’s the reality of today’s zero-click environment, and it is what creates the awareness gap — a challenge that every marketer now has to solve.

What Is Zero Click?

A “zero-click” search happens when a user gets their answer directly on the search results page through featured snippets, knowledge panels, or AI-generated overviews without ever clicking through to a website.

For users, it’s fast and convenient. For brands, it means fewer chances for visitors to actually land on your site, even when you’ve earned a top ranking. Think of it as Google (and increasingly, AI) keeping people inside its own ecosystem rather than sending them out to explore yours.

This is where the awareness gap comes in.

What Is The Awareness Gap?

The awareness gap is the space in which your content is seen, but it is not tied to your brand.

Even if your brand appears in these results, you may never see the traditional signals like traffic or time on site that prove your influence. People might recognize your name or absorb part of your story, but that exposure is not reflected in your metrics.

The gap is the difference between being seen and being measured, and closing it requires a new playbook for visibility and recall.

How Zero-Click Reshapes Discovery

The zero-click trend is most disruptive at the very start of the customer journey. Your website used to be Rome; eventually, all roads led there. Now? Fewer and fewer organic roads exist. That means the earliest brand touchpoints are disappearing.

Here’s what that means for marketers today:

  • Fewer chances for discovery. If users never click, they never see your story. All things that shape early perception, such as your messaging, your visuals, your value props, get skipped.
  • SEO loses some steam. While organic optimization still matters for long-term discoverability (hello, LLMs absorbing and citing content), its ability to drive top-of-funnel awareness isn’t what it used to be. In a zero-click world, amazing content may rank, but still never get seen.
  • Competition gets fiercer. If you’ve relied heavily on organic strategies alone, competitors who invest in paid ads are now likely to edge you out. Ads still sit above AI overviews in many results, and that’s prime real estate that’s hard to ignore.
  • Research shifts elsewhere. With crowded SERPs and often confusing AI answers, users are taking their research off of traditional search platforms to other places. Social media, communities, and unowned channels are becoming important sources for educational content that feels clearer and more trustworthy.

Bottom line: the early doors to discovering your brand are closing faster than they’re opening. It takes a new mix of channels to ensure you’re still part of the conversation.

3 Steps to Reclaim Top-of-Funnel Presence

So what’s a marketer to do? Is all hope lost?

Show up where they are still landing: relevant active sites that deliver clear ad space to your target audience.

Advertising offers a direct and reliable solution to the awareness gap.

Unlike organic results, paid campaigns guarantee an immediate and prominent presence on SERPs and other digital platforms. That means eyeballs on your ads, even if a user doesn’t click on them.

Consider paid campaigns as a type of insurance policy against brand invisibility on the SERP.

Remember: early impressions = stronger recall later in the funnel. The power of showing up first cannot be overstated. Even if a user doesn’t click on your ad, the exposure to your name, logo, or key message fosters familiarity. Early recognition makes your brand more memorable when it comes time to convert.

Step 1: Implement An Awareness-Focused Advertising Strategy

If you’ve made it this far, you’re likely nodding along: zero-click is here, and advertising has to play a bigger role. But where do you start? The good news is you don’t need to overhaul everything overnight. Instead, think of paid as a strategic layer that enhances the visibility you’ve already worked hard to build organically.

Here’s the first step in making that shift in a way that feels purposeful, not scattered:

Leverage common queries

Run search and display ads tied to common zero-click queries. Many of the searches most impacted by zero-click are informational: “what is,” “how to,” and “why does” questions that rarely result in clicks. Instead of letting that traffic disappear into AI overviews, run search and display campaigns against these queries. Your brand may not get the click, but it will get the visibility, ensuring you stay part of the conversation even when Google is trying to keep people on the page.

Connect with tomorrow’s customers today. AdRoll makes brand awareness ads work for you. Get started with a demo.

Use what you already know

Build awareness campaigns in categories where your brand already shows up. If you’ve earned a featured snippet or knowledge panel, don’t leave it unsupported. Pair that organic placement with a targeted ad so your brand appears twice on the same page. This kind of overlap creates a halo effect: users perceive your brand as both authoritative and unavoidable. It’s one of the fastest ways to reinforce recall.

Enhance, don’t replace SEO

Paid advertising isn’t a substitute for strong organic presence, it’s an amplifier. Use ads to reinforce your authority and extend the reach of your organic work, not cover for it. Think of the two channels as partners: SEO earns you credibility, while ads guarantee visibility. Together, they create a more holistic visibility strategy that keeps you top of mind across formats and touchpoints. And don’t forget: LLMs and AI overviews are still learning from organic signals. If your content isn’t strong, your ads won’t carry the same weight.

At the end of the day, this isn’t about abandoning what has always worked. It’s about making sure your brand shows up where discovery is actually happening, whether that’s in a blue link, a snippet, or a sponsored placement.

Step 2: Measure Zero-Click Strategies The Right Way

Here’s the tricky part: in a zero-click world, traditional metrics don’t always tell the whole story. If you’re only watching organic traffic, it may look like your efforts are failing. But the reality is that influence is happening upstream, before a user ever lands on your site.

Here’s what to measure instead:

  • Branded search volume. If more people are searching for your brand name specifically, you know your awareness strategy is working. This is often the clearest leading indicator of recall.
  • Visibility share. Track how often your brand appears in SERPs, featured snippets, AI overviews, and paid placements, even if it doesn’t result in a click.
  • Impression lift. Ads may not drive immediate conversions, but consistent exposure increases recognition. Measuring impressions alongside recall surveys can help connect the dots.
  • Engagement on unowned channels. As research moves to social and communities, track where your educational content sparks conversations and shares outside of your own site.

The key is to shift from measuring traffic to measuring presence. Visibility in high-authority spaces, whether through organic or paid efforts, is the new top-of-funnel KPI.

Step 3: Connect The C-Suite To Zero-Click Strategies

Of course, metrics only matter if your leadership team understands them. However, many executives are still trained to see organic traffic as the gold standard. So when traffic dips, even for reasons outside your control, it can look like a problem.

This is where your role as translator becomes critical. You need to reframe the conversation from clicks to visibility, from pageviews to presence. The message to the C-suite should sound less like an apology and more like a strategic shift:

  • A decline in organic traffic doesn’t equal a decline in influence. Zero-click means users may never land on your site, but they’re still seeing your brand. Visibility is impact.
  • Your brand may actually be showing up more often. The problem is measurement, not presence. Snippets, AI overviews, and social conversations don’t show up in traffic charts, but they absolutely shape perception.
  • Advertising fills the gap. Paid campaigns guarantee your brand isn’t invisible at the exact moment prospects are forming their first impressions, making it the perfect complement to organic efforts.

The way to make this stick with leaders is through narrative. Show them that early impressions are building brand memory. Connect branded search growth to that recall. Paint the picture that what looks like “less traffic” is often “more visibility in new places.”

Executives care about competitive positioning and long-term growth, not just line graphs. So remind them: being the brand people remember when it’s time to buy is the real win. Presence is what creates that memory, and memory is what drives future pipeline.

Zero-Click Isn’t the End. It’s Your Advantage If You Move First

Zero-click isn’t the end of marketing as we know it. It’s just the latest evolution in how people discover and remember brands. The marketers who win will be the ones who adapt their strategies, blending organic authority with paid presence, reframing their KPIs, and helping their companies understand what visibility really means today.

The awareness gap is real, but it’s also an opportunity. By rethinking how you measure, how you communicate results, and how you show up at the top of the funnel, you can set your brand up to thrive in an environment where discovery no longer depends on a click.

And this is only Part 1. In Part 2, we’ll dig into the real secret weapon in a clickless world: recall. Because the brands that stay top of mind are the ones that get chosen later. Advertising’s biggest power isn’t in driving a click, it’s in building the kind of recognition that lasts.

Check back soon on the AdRoll website for Part 2: How to Build Recall in a Clickless World.

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Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by AdRoll. Used with permission.

In-Post Images: Image by AdRoll. Used with permission.

Ecommerce MGMT 0 Comments
Sep 10 2025
GEO: How To Position Your Agency As An AI Search Authority

This post was sponsored by Visto. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

Clients keep asking a new question: “Are we visible in AI search?”

This is the reality: Google’s AI Overviews are reducing organic traffic by 30-70% for many businesses.

In fact, we’re seeing that SEO agencies that incorporate GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) tactics into their SEO strategy and offerings are charging $4,000/month for these additional menu services.

However, when it comes to GEO, a newly evolved and still-evolving branch of SEO, answering the AI visibility question is:

  • Less about grand strategy.
  • More about a quick field check.

But if you skip the check and jump straight to fixes, you risk solving the wrong problem.

Phase 1. Perform An AI Visibility Audit To Confirm If There Is A Visibility Gap

Start with a simple AI Visibility Audit:

  1. Select five to 10 key phrases that align with the business’s goals.
  2. Search those phrases across Google’s AI Overviews, Bing Copilot, Perplexity, and ChatGPT.
  3. Look at the AI answer first, not the classic blue links.
  4. Do you show up? Are you cited? Which competitors are visible and cited? Notate this for each phrase.
  5. Notate down which competitors are cited and where any links point; take screenshots to showcase in any presentations.

Once you identify which phrases you display and those you do not, you can begin to build a comprehensive audit, repeating the steps as you would for keyword research or, traditionally, People Also Ask research.

The Easy Way: Use this AI Visibility audit and bring the snapshot to your next client call. It gets you out of the “we think” zone and into “here’s what we saw today.”

Phase 2. Interpret Your AI Visibility From The Audit Results

Once you have your audit results in hand, it’s time to determine where you stand:

  • Highly visible: Your brand is named inside the answer. Great. Assess what’s working, and expand upon it.
  • Partially visible: Your content fuels the answer, but the brand is missing. That erodes authority over time.
  • Absent: The answer engines are leaning on other sources. That’s your gap, and your opportunity.

Notice how some of this is traditional ranking talk, and other facets are new.

So, it’s time for a new lens here.

Look at GEO as more of a traffic channel, as opposed to a new technique: Do we show up in the answer people actually read?

This is where agencies need to act fast. If you’re not helping clients with GEO now, they’ll find someone who will.

Phase 3. Showcase The Real Problem Behind Falling Organic Traffic

In this step, it’s time to connect the dots for everyone outside of your SEO team.

How will clients or bosses handle a change to your reporting?

What is the best way to convince a stakeholder that they need additional SEO services to stay ahead during the GEO boom?

How To Clarify The AI Addition To SEO For Clients & Stakeholders

This is how to turn a vague “traffic is down” conversation into “here’s where we’re missing in the answer and what we’ll fix.”

Within your audit presentation, the AI Search findings should follow this structure:

  1. Rule out serving issues that can tank crawl or clicks. Do not include these in the report during this part of the conversation.
  2. Split branded from non-branded terms, as AI answers often cluster around certain intents. Display this information broken out.

Pro Tip: Leverage a side-by-side comparison. The left side could include the AI answer with your brand’s status. The right side a quick look at on-site metrics for those same topics.

Phase 4. Consider The Perfect Mix Of Traditional SEO & GEO

Once your audit is approved, and a contract is in place to expand your SEO offerings to include GEO techniques, it’s time to apply the perfect mix of traditional SEO and GEO to improve visibility in the areas you’ve identified in the audit.

From a high level, there are two constraints that change the game, especially when adding GEO tactics to your SEO offerings:

  • Speed (“time to first token”). AI systems have to answer fast. Crawlers are impatient, so pages that surface the right answer early tend to win the tie.
  • Context window. Models skim and compress. Think skim-friendly, middle-school clarity: straightforward headings, unambiguous entities, and no padding.

That’s why old habits can backfire. You’re optimizing for clarity, entities, and extractability, not density.

How Do I Approach SEO & GEO The Right Way?

The way we think about it is this: if SEO is about ranking for keywords, GEO is about showing up for prompts.

How Does A Prompt Differ From Keywords?

When someone types a prompt, modern AI doesn’t just “look up” one thing. It:

  1. Breaks the prompt into sub-questions.
  2. Runs background searches.
  3. Shortlists a small set of pages worth crawling right now.

From our perspective, that’s the bridge between SEO and GEO: your classic search visibility still matters, but only as a feeder into which sources the AI decides to read.

What To Focus On When Incorporating GEO Into Your SEO Strategies

You will see overlaps here; that’s because there are slight changes to traditional methods that you’ll need to consider when optimizing for answer engines.

What to focus on, from a traditional SEO angle:

  • On-page SEO: answer-first structure, clean headings, scannable evidence.
  • Technical SEO (or GEO for Answer Engines): Fast paths to answers; crawlability that supports quick fetches.
  • Content gaps your competitors are filling in AI answers. We’re consistently surprised by how often the “nearly there” pages win. If the AI crawler already understands a page, one sharp paragraph and a clearer H1 can push it over the top.
  • Link analysis to strengthen credible citations.
  • Competitor analysis of who’s being named in answers (and why).
  • Sentiment analysis to catch how your brand is described when it’s mentioned.

What to focus on, from the GEO perspective:

  • The semantic space AI explores vs. the entity mapping in your content.
  • Technical GEO (or SEO for Answer Engines): Fast paths to answers; crawlability that supports quick fetches.
  • Content gaps your competitors are filling in AI answers.

The Easy Way: Visto can consolidate these checks into a single workflow, allowing you to baseline quickly and track progress without needing a dozen tools.

Phase 5. Implement GEO Tactics Into Your SEO Strategy To Regain & Grow Visibility

Step 1. Provide Answers Upfront

Within traditional SEO, this refers to improving readability.

Your goal here is to give the answer engine what it needs as quickly as a good support team would:

  • Lead your most important pages with the plain-English answer your buyer is after.
  • One or two sentences up top, then the detail and sources.

If the reader needs to scroll to find the point, the crawler will likely give up at that same point.

Step 2. Strengthen Entity Clarity

Next, make the page unambiguous with consistent:

  • Product names.
  • Categories.
  • Specs.
  • Simple schema to help the system map your entity to the right concepts.

Think of this as labeling the shelves in a small shop. If the labels are clear, the model finds what it came for without guessing.

Step 3. Implement Technical GEO

Then handle the technical side of GEO. AI crawlers care about time to the first useful token, so shorten the path to the answer.

Tighten titles and H1s, move key facts above the fold, and keep interstitials from blocking the first read. The AI crawler has a limited context window and reads fast. Help it skim the right lines.

Step 4. Assess Comparison Coverage

If your customers compare options, publish a straightforward comparison that highlights only the differences people ask about.

What we’ve seen is that honest tables and short “who it’s for” notes get cited more than glossy positioning.

Step 5. Manage Links & Sentiment

Finally, reinforce what supports the page. Link credible sources to the version you want cited. Check how your brand is described in the existing answers. If the tone is off, correct the original source you’re referencing.

Then, regularly review your metrics: presence, named mentions, and competitor share. GEO isn’t a set-and-forget channel, so a light monthly review helps prevent drift.

Visto’s platform automates much of this tracking, giving agencies the tools to prove value with measurable, prompt-level insights and easy-to-share reports.

Examples: Learn From Early GEO Adopters Who Are Rebuilding Traffic

“In the first two quarters, we have seen an 88% year-over-year increase in organic traffic and a 42% YoY increase in unique pageviews from organic traffic.“

Agencies using a platform like Visto’s see their clients’ brands referenced more in AI answers after tightening entities and updating a handful of high-value pages.

The agencies succeeding are those positioning themselves as AI search authorities now, not waiting to see how things shake out.

Get Started With Visto

Visto helps agencies measure AI visibility and manage the work.

Built specifically for marketing agencies, the platform shows where your brand appears in AI answers, summarizes citations across engines, and highlights the pages most likely to move the needle.

Visto provides:

  • Direct access to GEO experts who understand agency needs.
  • Consistent product updates aligned with the latest AI search trends.
  • The ability to influence the roadmap with your input.
  • Education and support to confidently lead your clients through the AI shift.
  • Sales enablement tools that are purpose-built for marketing agencies to prospect clients.
  • A focus on actionability and optimization, in addition to visibility and analytics.

Don’t wait for your clients to ask why they’re invisible in AI search. Position your agency as the AI search authority they need right now.

Special Offer: For SEJ readers, sign up for three months free access and start prospecting and serving clients.

SIGN UP NOW

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by Visto. Used with permission.

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Sep 4 2025
8 Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) Strategies For Boosting AI Visibility in 2025 via @sejournal, @samanyougarg

This post was sponsored by Writesonic. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

AI search now makes the first decision.

When? Before a buyer hits your website.

If you’re not part of the AI answer, you’re not part of the deal. In fact, 89% of B2B buyers use AI platforms like ChatGPT for research.

Picture this:

  • A founder at a 12-person SaaS asks, “best CRM for a 10-person B2B startup.”
  • AI answer cites:
    a TechRadar roundup,
    a r/SaaS thread,
    a fresh comparison,
    Not you.
  • Your brand is missing.
  • They book demos with two rivals.
  • You never hear about it.

Here is why. AI search works on intent, not keywords.

It reads content, then grounds answers with sources. It leans on third-party citations, community threads, and trusted publications. It trusts what others say about you more than what you say about yourself.

Most Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) tools stop at the surface. They track mentions, list prompts you missed, and ship dashboards. They do not explain why you are invisible or what to fix. Brands get reports, not steps.

We went hands-on. We analyzed millions of conversations and ran controlled tests. The result is a practical playbook: eight strategies that explain the why, give a quick diagnostic, and end with actions you can ship this week.

Off-Page Authority Builders For AI Search Visibility

1. Find & Fix Your Citation Gaps

Citation gaps are the highest-leverage strategy most brands miss.

Translation: This is an easy win for you.

What Is A Citation Gap?

A citation gap is when AI platforms cite web pages that mention your competitors but not you. These cited pages become the sources AI uses to generate its answers.

Think of it like this:

  • When someone asks ChatGPT about CRMs, it pulls information from specific web pages to craft its response.
  • If those source pages mention your competitors but not you, AI recommends them instead of your brand.

Finding and fixing these gaps means getting your brand mentioned on the exact pages AI already trusts and cites as sources.

Why You Need Citations In Answer Engines

If you’re not cited in an answer engine, you are essentially invisible.

Let’s break this down.

TechRadar publishes “21 Best Collaboration Tools for Remote Teams” mentioning:

  • Asana.
  • Monday.
  • Notion.

When users ask ChatGPT about remote project management, AI cites this TechRadar article.

Your competitors appear in every response. You don’t.

How To Fix Citation Gaps

That TechRadar article gets cited for dozens of queries, including “best remote work tools,” “Monday alternatives,” “startup project management.”

Get mentioned in that article, and you appear in all those AI responses. One placement creates visibility across multiple search variations.

Contact the TechRadar author with genuine value, such as:

  • Exclusive data about remote productivity.
  • Unique use cases they missed.
  • Updated features that change the comparison.

The beauty? It’s completely scalable.

Quick Win:

  1. Identify 50 high-authority articles where competitors are mentioned but you’re not.
  2. Get into even 10 of them, and your AI visibility multiplies exponentially.

2. Engage In The Reddit & UGC Discussions That AI References

Social platformsImage created by Writesonic, August 2025

AI trusts real user conversations over marketing content.

Reddit citations in AI overviews surged from 1.3% to 7.15% in just three months, a 450% increase. User-generated content now makes up 21.74% of all AI citations.

Why You Should Add Your Brand To Reddit & UGC Conversations

Reddit, Quora, LinkedIn Pulse, and industry forums together, and you’ve found where AI gets most of its trusted information.

If you show up as “trusted” information, your visibility increases.

How To Inject Your Brand Into AI-Sourced Conversations

Let’s say a Reddit thread titled “Best project management tool for a startup with 10 people?” gets cited whenever users ask about startup tools.

Since AI already cites these, if you enter the conversation and include your thoughtful contribution, it will get included in future AI answers.

Pro Tip #1: Don’t just promote your brand. Share genuine insights, such as:

  • Hidden costs.
  • Scaling challenges.
  • Migration tips.

Quick Win:

Find and join the discussions AI seems to trust:

  • Reddit threads with 50+ responses.
  • High-upvote Quora answers in your industry.
  • LinkedIn Pulse articles from recognized experts.
  • Active forum discussions with detailed experiences.

Pro Tip #2: Finding which articles get cited and which Reddit threads AI trusts takes forever manually. GEO platforms automate this discovery, showing you exactly which publications to pitch and which discussions to join.

On-Page Optimization For GEO

3. Study Which Topics Get Cited Most, Then Write Them

Something we’re discovering: when AI gives hundreds of citations for a topic, it’s not just citing one amazing article.

Instead, AI pulls from multiple sites covering that same topic.

If you haven’t written about that topic at all, you’re invisible while competitors win.

Consider Topic Clusters To Get Cited

Let’s say you’re performing a content gap analysis for GEO.

You notice these articles all getting 100+ AI citations:

  • “Best Project Management Software for Small Teams”
  • “Top 10 Project Management Tools for Startups”
  • “Project Management Software for Teams Under 20”

Different titles, same intent: small teams need project management software.

When users ask, “PM tool for my startup,” AI might cite 2-3 of these articles together for a comprehensive answer.

Ask “affordable project management,” and AI pulls different ones. The point is that these topics cluster around the same user need.

How To Outperform Competitors In AI Generated Search Answers

Identify intent clusters for your topic and create one comprehensive piece on your own website so your own content gets cited.

In this example, we’d suggest writing “Best Project Management Software for Small Teams (Under 50 People).”

It should cover startups, SMBs, and budget considerations all in one authoritative guide.

Quick Win:

  • Find 20 high-citation topic clusters you’re missing.
  • Create comprehensive content for each cluster.
  • Study what makes the top versions work, such as structure, depth, and comparison tables.
  • Then make yours better with fresher data and broader coverage.

4. Update Content Regularly To Maintain AI Visibility

AI platforms heavily favor recent content.

Content from the past two to three months dominates AI citations, with freshness being a key ranking factor. If your content appears outdated, AI tends to overlook it in favor of newer alternatives.

Why You Should Keep Your Content Up To Date For GEO Visibility

Let’s say your “Email Marketing Best Practices” from 2023 used to get AI citations.

Now it’s losing to articles with 2025 data. AI sees the date and chooses fresher content every time.

How To Keep Your Content Fresh Enough To Be Cited In AIOs

Weekly refresh for top 10 pages:

  • Add two to three new statistics.
  • Include a recent case study.
  • Update “Last Modified” date prominently.
  • Add one new FAQ.
  • Change title to “(Updated August 2025)”.

Bi-weekly, on less important pages:

  • Replace outdated examples.
  • Update internal links.
  • Rewrite the weakest section.
  • Add seasonal relevance.

Pro Tip: Track your content’s AI visibility systematically. Certain advanced GEO tools alert you when pages lose citations, so you know exactly what to refresh and when.

5. Create “X vs Y” And “X vs Y vs Z” Comparison Pages

Users constantly ask AI to help them choose between options. AI platforms love comparison content. They even prompt users to compare features and create comparison tables.

Pages that deliver these structured comparisons dominate AI search results.

Common questions flooding AI platforms:

  • “Slack vs Microsoft Teams for remote work”
  • “HubSpot vs Salesforce for small business”
  • “Asana or Monday for creative agencies”

AI can’t answer these without citing detailed comparisons. Generic blog posts don’t work. Promotional content gets ignored.

Create comprehensive comparisons like: “Asana vs Monday vs ClickUp: Project Management for Creative Teams.”

How To Create Comparisons That Have High Visibility On SERPs

Use a content structure that wins:

  • Quick decision matrix upfront.
  • Pricing breakdown by team size.
  • Feature-by-feature comparison table.
  • Integrations.
  • Learning curve and onboarding time.
  • Best for: specific use cases.

Make it genuinely balanced:

  • Asana: “Overwhelming for teams under 5”
  • Monday: “Gets expensive with add-ons”
  • ClickUp: “Steep learning curve initially”

Include your product naturally in the comparison. Be honest about limitations while highlighting genuine advantages.

AI prefers citing fair comparisons over biased reviews. Include real limitations, actual pricing (not just “starting at”), and honest trade-offs. This builds trust that gets you cited repeatedly.

Technical GEO To Do Right Now

6. Fix Robots.txt Blocking AI Crawlers

Most websites accidentally block the very bots they want to attract. Like putting a “Do Not Enter” sign on your store while wondering why customers aren’t coming in.

ChatGPT uses three bots:

  • ChatGPT-User: Main bot serving actual queries (your money maker)
  • OAI-SearchBot: Activates when users click search toggle.
  • GPTBot: Collects training data for future models.

Strategic decision: Publications worried about content theft might block GPTBot. Product companies should allow it, however, because you want future AI models trained on your content for long-term visibility.

Essential bots to allow:

  • Claude-Web (Anthropic).
  • PerplexityBot.
  • GoogleOther (Gemini).

Add to robots.txt:

User-agent: ChatGPT-User
Allow: /
User-agent: Claude-Web
Allow: /
User-agent: PerplexityBot
Allow: /

Verify it’s working: Check server logs for these user agents actively crawling your content. No crawl activity means no AI visibility.

7. Fix Broken Pages For AI Crawlers

Just like Google Search Console shows Googlebot errors, you need visibility for AI crawlers. But AI bots behave differently and can be aggressive.

Monitor AI bot-specific issues:

  • 404 errors on important pages.
  • 500 server errors during crawls.
  • Timeout issues when bots access content.

If your key product pages error when ChatGPT crawls them, you’ll never appear in AI responses.

Common problems:

  • AI crawlers triggering DDoS protection.
  • CDN security blocking legitimate bots.
  • Rate limiting preventing full crawls.

Fix: Whitelist AI bots in your CDN (Cloudflare, Fastly). Set up server-side tracking to differentiate AI crawlers from regular traffic. No errors = AI can cite you.

8. Avoid JavaScript For Main Content

Most AI crawlers can’t execute JavaScript. If your content loads dynamically, you’re invisible to AI.

Quick test: Disable JavaScript in your browser. Visit key pages. Can you see the main content, product descriptions, and key information?

Blank page = AI sees nothing.

Solutions:

  • Server-side rendering (Next.js, Nuxt.js).
  • Static site generators (Gatsby, Hugo).
  • Progressive enhancement (core content works without JS).

Bottom line: If it needs JavaScript to display, AI can’t read it. Fix this or stay invisible.

Take Action Now

People ask ChatGPT, Claude, and Perplexity for recommendations every day. If you’re missing from those answers, you’re missing deals.

These eight strategies boil down to three moves: get mentioned where AI already looks (high-authority sites and Reddit threads), create content AI wants to cite (comparisons and fresh updates), and fix the technical blocks keeping AI out (robots.txt and JavaScript issues).

You can do all this manually. Track mentions in spreadsheets, find citation gaps by hand, and update content weekly. It works on a smaller scale, consumes time, and requires a larger team.

Writesonic provides you with a GEO platform that goes beyond tracking to giving you precise actions to boost visibility – create new content, refresh existing pages, or reach out to sites that mention competitors but not you.

Plus, get real AI search volumes to prioritize high-impact prompts.

Track & Boost your AI Visibility with Writesonic

Image Credits

Featured Image: Image by Writesonic. Used with permission.

In-Post Image: Image by Writesonic. Used with permission.

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Sep 3 2025
What To Expect AT NESS 2025: Surviving The AI-First Era via @sejournal, @NewsSEO_

This post was sponsored by NESS. The opinions expressed in this article are the sponsor’s own.

For anyone who isn’t paying attention to news SEO because they feel it isn’t their relevant niche – think again.

The foundations of SEO are underpinned by publishing content. Therefore, news SEO is relevant to all SEO. We are all publishers online.

John Shehata and Barry Adams are the experts within this vertical and, between them, have experience working with most of the top news publications worldwide.

Together, they founded the News and Editorial SEO Summit (NESS) in 2021, and in the last four years, the SEO industry has seen the most significant and rapid changes since it began 30 years ago.

I spoke to both John and Barry to get their insights into some of the current issues SEOs face, how SEO can survive this AI-first era, and to get a preview of the topics to be discussed at their upcoming fifth NESS event to be held on October 21-22, 2025.

You can watch the full interview at the end of this article.

SEO Repackaged For The AI Era

I started out by commenting that recently, at Google Search Central Live in Thailand, Gary Illyes came out to say that there is no difference between GEO, AEO, and SEO. I asked Barry what he thought about this and if the introduction of AI Mode is going to continue taking away publisher traffic.

Surprisingly, Barry agreed with Google to say, “It’s SEO. It’s just SEO. I fully agree with what the Googlers are saying on this front, and it’s not often that I fully agree with Googlers.”

He went on to say, “I have yet to find any LLM optimization strategy that is not also an SEO strategy. It’s just SEO repackaged for the AI era so that agencies can charge more money without actually creating any more added value.”

AI Mode Is A Threat To Publisher Traffic

While AI Overviews have drawn significant attention, Barry identifies AI Mode as a more serious threat to publisher traffic.

Unlike AI Overviews, which still display traditional search results alongside AI-generated summaries, AI Mode creates an immersive conversational experience that encourages users to continue their search journey within Google’s ecosystem.

Barry warns that if AI Mode becomes the default search experience, it could be “insanely damaging for the web because it’s just going to make a lot of traffic evaporate without any chance of recovery.”

He added that “If you can maintain your traffic from search at the moment, you’re already doing better than most.”

Moving Up The Value Chain

At NESS, John will be speaking about how to survive this AI-first era, and I asked him for a preview of how SEOs can survive what is happening right now.

John highlighted a major issue: “Number one, I think SEOs need to move up the value chain. And I have been saying this for a long time, SEOs cannot be only about keywords and rankings. It has to be much bigger than that.”

He then went on to talk about three key areas as solutions: building topical authority, traffic diversification, and direct audience relationships.

“They [news publishers] need to think about revenue diversification as well as going back to some traditional revenue streams, such as events or syndication. They also need to build their own direct relationships with users, either through apps or newsletters. And newsletters never got the attention they deserve in any of the different brands I’m familiar with, but now it’s gaining more traction. It’s extremely important.”

Quality Journalism Is Crucial For Publishers

Despite the AI disruption, both John and Barry stress that technical SEO fundamentals remain important, but to a point.

“You have to make sure the foundations are in place,” Barry notes, but he believes the technical can only take you so far. After that, investment in content is critical.

“When those foundations are at the level where there’s not much value in getting further optimization, then the publisher has to do the hard work of producing the content that builds the brand. The foundation can only get you so far. But if you don’t have the foundation, you are building a house on quicksand and you’re not going to be able to get much traction anyway.”

John also noted that “it’s important to double down on technical elements of the site.” He went on to say, “While I think you need to look at your schema, your speed, all of the elements, the plumbing, just to make sure that whatever channel you work with has good access and good understanding of your data.”

Barry concluded by reaffirming the importance of content quality. “The content is really what needs to shine. And if you don’t have that in place, if you don’t have that unique brand voice, that quality journalism, then why are you in business in the first place?”

The AI Agents Question

James Carson and Marie Haynes are both speaking about AI agents at NESS 2025, and when I asked Barry and John about the introduction of AI agents into newsrooms, the conversation was both optimistic and cautious.

John sees significant potential for AI to handle research tasks, document summarization, and basic content creation for standardized reporting like market updates or sports scores.

“A lot of SEO teams are using AI to recommend Google Discover headlines that intrigue curiosity, checking certain SEO elements on the site and so on. So I think more and more we have seen AI integrated not to write the content itself, but to guide the content and optimize the efficiency of the whole process.” John commented.

However, Barry remains skeptical about current AI agent reliability for enterprise environments.

“You cannot give an AI agent your credit card details to start shopping on your behalf, and then it just starts making things up and ends up spending thousands of your dollars on the wrong things … The AI agents are nowhere near that maturity level yet and I’m not entirely sure they will ever be at that maturity level because I do think the current large language model technology has fundamental limitations.”

John countered that “AI agents can save us hundreds of hours, hundreds.” He went on to say, “These three elements together, automation, AI agents, and human supervision together can be a really powerful combination, but not AI agent completely solo. And I agree with Barry, it can lead to disastrous consequences.”

Looking Forward

The AI-first era demands honest acknowledgment of changed realities. Easy search traffic growth is over, but opportunities exist for publishers willing to adapt strategically.

Success requires focusing on unique value propositions, building direct audience relationships, and maintaining technical excellence while accepting that traditional growth metrics may no longer apply.

The future belongs to publishers who understand that survival means focusing on their audience to build authentic connections that value their specific perspective and expertise.

Watch the full interview below.

If you’re a news publisher, or an SEO, you cannot afford to miss the fifth NESS on October 21-22, 2025.

SEJ readers have a special 20% discount on tickets. Just use the code “SEJ2025” at the checkout here.

Headline speakers include Marie Haynes, Mike King, Lily Ray, Kevin Indig, and of course John Shehata and Barry Adams.

Over two days, there are 20 speakers representing the best news publishers such as Carly Steven (Daily Mail), Maddie Shepherd (CBS), Christine Liang (The New York Times), Jessie Willms (The Guardian), among others.

Check out the full schedule here.

Featured Image: Shelley Walsh/Search Engine Journal/ NESS

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