Search engines have changed a lot over the years, but AI search has brought one of the biggest shifts we've seen in how people find information online.
Instead of scrolling through a page of search results, people can ask ChatGPT for product recommendations, use Google's AI Overviews to compare solutions, or have an entire conversation with Perplexity about which service provider is right for them.
And for businesses, that raises a pretty big question: How do you get AI to recommend YOUR business?
That's where AIO, or Artificial Intelligence Optimization, comes in. Also called Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) or Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), it's the practice of making your content and online presence easier for AI-powered search tools to find, understand, cite, and recommend.
The good news? You don't need to throw out everything you've learned about SEO. But you probably do need to rethink a few things.
Here's how to get started.
Key Takeaways:
- Traditional SEO still matters. AI search depends on accessible, relevant, trustworthy information, and many of the same practices that support organic rankings also support AI visibility.
- Clear content structure helps, but original insights, useful answers, and credible information matter more than simply formatting everything as a list.
- Your website isn't the only place AI may learn about your business. Third-party mentions, reviews, and other sources can help establish your brand's credibility.
What Is AI Search? What Does it Include?
Throughout this blog, I use "AI search" as a general term, but there are a few different ways people actually interact with AI-powered search tools. Before I dig into how you get cited, I think it’s important to quickly cover what those citations actually look like.
1. Conversational AI search platforms
Tools like ChatGPT, Google Gemini, and Perplexity let users ask questions in natural language, receive detailed responses, and ask follow-up questions without starting a completely new search.
For example, someone might ask, "What's the best CRM for a small manufacturing company?" Then follow up with, "Which of those options integrates with our existing software?" Or, "Can you recommend a company that could help us implement it?"
Depending on the platform and question, the AI may search the web for current information, cite sources, and recommend specific businesses.
These conversational tools often have an interface that looks more like a texting app than it does a search engine.
2. AI features within traditional search engines
Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode bring generative AI directly into the search experience.
AI Overviews can provide a summarized answer near the top of search results, often with links to supporting sources. AI Mode provides a more conversational experience where users can explore a topic through multiple questions.
It’s important to consider both of these types of AI search, but ultimately the fundamentals operate the same: AI search isn't just about ranking a web page in an ordered list anymore. It's more about whether your content is referenced in an answer, whether your business is mentioned as a potential solution, and whether the information AI presents is accurate.
What Factors Does AI Search Consider?
There's no single, universal algorithm for AI search. Different platforms retrieve information, evaluate sources, and generate responses in different ways. They also don't publicly disclose every factor involved in selecting sources.
However, several familiar principles still apply:
- Relevance: Does your content address what the user is asking?
- Depth and usefulness: Does it provide enough information to answer the question, including helpful context?
- Search intent: Does the content match what someone is trying to accomplish, whether that's learning something, comparing options, or choosing a provider?
- Credibility: Is the information accurate, and does it come from a source with relevant experience or expertise?
- Clarity: Can search tools and human readers understand what your content is saying?
- Accessibility: Can search engines and AI tools access and interpret the information on your website?
One of the biggest differences between traditional SEO and AI optimization is what visibility looks like. In traditional search, you're often trying to get a specific page to rank for a keyword. With AI search, you're also trying to make your business and content relevant to the questions people ask throughout their research process.
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How to Get Picked Up by AI Search
AI search is constantly changing, and nobody can promise that following a specific checklist will get your business recommended by ChatGPT or cited in Google's AI Overviews. But there are practical steps you can take to make your website and content better suited for AI-powered discovery.
1. Don’t throw out technical SEO fundamentals
Let's get one thing straight: SEO isn't dead. AI-powered search experiences still rely on web search systems and indexed content to find relevant information. That means the technical and content practices that support traditional search visibility remain valuable.
Some of the basics include:
- Using descriptive page titles and properly structured H1, H2, and H3 headings
- Writing content around your audience's questions and search intent
- Creating logical internal links between related pages
- Keeping important content accessible to search engine crawlers
- Maintaining accurate, useful information throughout your website
- Using relevant structured data where appropriate to help search engines interpret your content
You should also make sure your website clearly explains who you serve, what you offer, and how your products or services solve customer problems.
The technical side of this can get complicated, so I won't try to cover it all here. I have written more in-depth about the technical SEO fundamentals to follow in this article: What an AI-Ready Website Actually Means
The takeaway? Keep doing the SEO work that makes your website useful and accessible. Then build on that foundation.
2. Know who you’re talking to
One key thing to remember with AI search is that two people can ask the same question and get different answers. That's not entirely new: Google has personalized search results for years based on factors like location, language, and search history. But conversational AI tools like ChatGPT take that concept much further.
Depending on the tool and a user's settings, AI can draw on previous conversations, saved preferences, search activity, and other personal context to shape its responses. Even within a single conversation, the way someone asks a question, provides additional details, or follows up can change the recommendations they receive.
For example, two people might ask ChatGPT, "What's the best CRM for my business?"
One is a marketing director at a large company with a dedicated IT team and a complex sales process. The other is a small business owner who needs something affordable and easy to manage without technical support.
Same question. Very different needs. And potentially very different recommendations.
This is why knowing your buyer personas matters so much.
You can't create one piece of content about CRM software and expect it to be equally relevant to every possible customer. Instead, think about the people you're actually trying to reach. What problems are they solving? What matters most to them? What questions are they likely to ask as they narrow down their options?
The more clearly your content addresses those needs, the more relevant it may be when AI search tools encounter questions from people looking for exactly what you offer.
And here's the good news for smaller businesses: You don't necessarily have to be the biggest or most recognizable name in your industry to be a useful answer. A larger competitor might have broader visibility, but your content could be a better match for a particular customer's needs.
That's not a guarantee that AI will recommend you, but it is a possibility that’s much more attainable compared to traditional search.
3. Format your content so it’s easy to find and cite
It's tempting to think there's a magic formula for getting cited by AI. Not quite. However, it is true that some content formats make information easier for AI search tools to identify, extract, and reference. Clear headings, direct answers, lists, and tables can help organize information into sections that make sense on their own.
This kind of formatting can sometimes run counter to traditional SEO, where more was better. We’ve all encountered those online recipes that take 10 paragraphs to actually get into the ingredients and steps. There’s a reason for that: traditional search rewarded that extra context. Not so in the AI age.
Instead, answer the question early, and make it easy to scan and extract what a reader needs. Some useful formats to include are:
- Question-and-answer formats: Use a question as a heading, provide a direct answer, and expand on it with useful context.
- Numbered lists: Break down processes, steps, or recommendations into clearly labeled sections.
- Descriptive subheadings: Use H2 and H3 headings that tell readers and search tools what each section covers.
- Comparison tables: Organize differences between products, services, or approaches so they're easier to evaluate.
None of these formats guarantees an AI citation. And you certainly don't need to turn every blog into a giant FAQ. But what this does do is make your information easy to understand and reference without sacrificing the depth that makes it valuable in the first place. Use these formatting options where it makes sense for your content.
4. Give AI something worth citing
Here's where things get interesting. Traditionally, the SEO strategy was to look at the top-ranking articles for a topic, figure out what they’re doing, and create something similar (but hopefully better).
That approach has major limitations in the age of AI. If your content says essentially the same thing as 50 other websites, why would an AI tool need to reference yours?
A more useful approach is to publish information that adds something new to the conversation.
That might include:
- Original research, survey results, or industry data
- Case studies with measurable results
- Comparisons based on firsthand testing or experience
- Practical examples from customer projects
- Expert insights that explain why a recommendation makes sense
- Detailed answers to questions your sales or service teams hear regularly
You don't need a massive research budget to do this.
Let's say you're a commercial remodeling contractor. Instead of publishing another generic article about the benefits of office remodeling, you could explain how you helped a customer compare remodeling costs against relocation costs, what factors influenced their decision, and what the project involved.
That's information someone can't necessarily find on every other contractor's website. And don't underestimate the value of your own personality and perspective.
Clear writing matters, but that doesn't mean stripping every bit of personality out of your content. Your experience, opinions, and the way you explain things can help distinguish your business from everyone else publishing on the same topic.
This is particularly relevant now that AI makes it so easy to produce generic content at scale. If every business is using the same tools to generate the same basic explanations, there's not much reason to choose one source over another.
Does that mean you shouldn't ever use AI to help create content? Of course not. Use AI to help research, organize, draft, or edit. But bring your own knowledge to the finished product. Share what you've learned, explain why you recommend certain approaches, and provide the details only someone with your experience could offer.
Related Content: What AI Search Actually Rewards (Spoiler: It's Not AI Content)
5. Build your brand's credibility beyond your website
Your website is an important source of information about your business. But it's also a source you control. If you say you're the best company in your industry, that's one thing. If customers, industry publications, professional organizations, and other reputable sources consistently recognize your expertise, that's a different story.
AI-powered search tools can draw on information from multiple sources when answering questions or recommending businesses. That makes your broader online presence part of your AI optimization strategy.
Some ways to strengthen that presence include:
- Keeping your business information accurate and consistent across relevant directories and profiles
- Earning mentions and links from credible industry publications
- Encouraging customers to leave authentic reviews on relevant platforms
- Participating in industry discussions, interviews, podcasts, and other professional communities
- Publishing case studies and customer success stories that demonstrate your experience
- Making sure your business's services, specialties, and areas of expertise are clearly represented across your online profiles
You're giving potential customers more reasons to trust you, while also giving AI more information to draw from when someone asks about businesses like yours.
6. Know what to track
If you're investing time and money into AI optimization, you should have some way to evaluate whether it's working. Which, right now, is admittedly very tricky.
Traditional search reporting gives us familiar metrics like rankings, impressions, clicks, and organic traffic. But with AI search, someone might get the information they need without ever visiting your website. And even when they do visit, it isn't always easy to identify AI search as the source.
So, how do you measure success? For starters, look beyond website traffic. Pay attention to lead volume, lead quality, and conversion rates. If you're getting fewer visitors but a higher percentage of qualified leads, that could be a good sign you're reaching the right people. It doesn't necessarily prove AI search is responsible, but it's worth paying attention to.
You can also use tools like Search Generative AI performance in Search Console, Semrush's AI Visibility Toolkit, and HubSpot's AI visibility tools to monitor brand mentions, citations, and how your visibility compares to competitors across supported AI search platforms.
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Neither approach tells the whole story on its own. But together, they can help you understand whether your business is showing up in AI search and, more importantly, whether you're attracting the right customers.
Final Thoughts
AI search has changed how people discover businesses, research solutions, and make purchasing decisions. But it hasn't changed the underlying goal of search: helping people find useful, trustworthy information.
Getting found in AI search starts with being worth finding. The businesses that adapt and succeed will be the ones making their expertise easier to discover, providing genuinely useful answers, building credibility across the web, and paying attention to how their audience searches.
AI Optimization Services to Help Your Business Get Found
Not sure where your business stands when it comes to AI search? Or how to turn everything we've covered into an actual strategy?
BizzyWeb helps businesses improve their visibility across traditional and AI-powered search through technical SEO, content strategy, website optimization, and AI visibility analysis.
We'll help you identify where your business has opportunities to show up, what might be holding it back, and how to build a stronger presence in AI search.
BizzyWeb is a Minneapolis-based digital marketing and web design agency that helps companies get the high-quality leads they need to grow and thrive. Our tactics include inbound marketing, SEO, advertising, web design, content creation, and sales automation. We are an accredited HubSpot Diamond Partner and offer full-service HubSpot onboarding, enablement, and strategy for new and current users.
