Large companies and advertising agencies have begun to actively adapt to the new reality in which users increasingly search for information not through Google, but through chatbots such as ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini. This is forcing brands to reconsider their promotion strategy, as traditional SEO seems to be giving way to optimization for AI.
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Tech startups including Profound and Brandtech have developed tools that help major websites track how often they are mentioned in neural network responses, including Google AI Overviews. Fintech company Ramp, job aggregator Indeed, and whiskey maker Chivas Brothers are already using such services. According to the Financial Times, the main goal is to retain the attention of millions of users who are increasingly less likely to click on links in search engines.
«“It’s about much more than just getting your site indexed in search results. It’s about getting your site recognized by large language models as a major and influential factor [in information searches],” said Jack Smyth, a partner at marketing technology group Brandtech. The new tools can predict the “sentiment” of an AI model toward a company by sending a bunch of text prompts to chatbots and analyzing the responses. It then ranks brands so they can be mentioned in chatbots.
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Interestingly, the trend is growing against the backdrop of the growing use of artificial intelligence (AI) in marketing. For example, Meta✴ and Google are already developing their own tools for targeted advertising, which, on the one hand, may reduce the demand for advertising agency services, but on the other hand, agencies will be able to offer clients new services.
A Bain & Company study found that 80% of users rely on AI answers for at least 40% of their queries, and 60% of search sessions end without clicking through to a website. It’s clear that organic search traffic is declining, posing serious risks to Google’s search business model. However, Google’s parent company, Alphabet, recently reported a 10% increase in search and advertising revenue to $50.7 billion in the first quarter.
Perplexity founder Denis Yarats believes that AI search is based on a fundamentally different approach, in which large language models (LLMs) analyze content more deeply, identify inconsistencies, and therefore, in order to meet the criteria, sites will have to offer the highest quality and most relevant content.
Brandtech has launched Share of Model, a product that helps brands analyze their presence in AI search, while $3.5 million-funded startup Profound offers a platform for tracking queries in neural networks.
«Traditional search has been one of the internet’s biggest monopolies, but now the walls of that castle are cracking,” said James Cadwallader, co-founder of Profound. “It’s like the transition from CDs to streaming.”