AI Search Transforms Brand Visibility as Generative Engine Optimization Replaces Traditional SEO

The new rules of visibility in an AI-led search world

Szulc says this shift requires brands to think differently about visibility. For more than a decade, websites were primarily designed for human readers. Now organisations need parallel strategies for humans and for AI agents that crawl, summarise and interpret content in ways that are far more literal and dependent on structure. He says many of the long held best practices in SEO need to be revisited because large language models do not behave like conventional search crawlers. This transition is accelerating interest in generative engine optimisation, or GEO, which focuses on how brands appear inside AI generated answers rather than on a results page. The distinction may seem narrow, but it changes the underlying objective. Szulc says SEO has always been about promoting a website. GEO, by contrast, is about promoting the brand itself, because large language models are seeking authoritative information rather than directing users to specific pages. He says two elements matter most. The first is a mention, which ensures the brand is named when a model constructs an answer. The second is a citation, which provides a link back to the brand's own property. He says citations are crucial because they ensure that fresh and accurate information comes from the organisation rather than from a third party. As GEO matures, competition is emerging not just between brands, but also against third party publishers and even against outdated documents that still sit on an organisation's domain. Szulc gives the example where Adobe's own content team has used Adobe LLM Optimizer and discovered that large language models were surfacing information in old documentation, despite being buried within legacy sections of the website. He says this has become a common pattern across industries. If older content remains accessible, large language models can index and rely on it even if it no longer reflects current products or services. While many companies are rewriting pages and updating FAQs, deeper structural issues are emerging. James McCormick, who leads IDC's worldwide research on persuasive content and digital experience technologies, says some CMOs have seen organic traffic drops of 20 per cent or more. He says these declines have been a catalyst for senior leaders to examine how content is created, approved, and distributed across the enterprise. Large language models pull from whatever they can access - including product documentation, support articles, and outdated files and enterprises typically operate with content scattered across multiple systems. For generative engines, this fragmentation makes the organisation appear inconsistent because the machine cannot reconcile conflicting or incomplete information. McCormick draws a parallel with the early days of customer data management, when companies realised their data was split across marketing, sales and support. He says content is now going through the same transformation, and leaders are beginning to treat structured, machine-readable information as a core enterprise asset rather than a marketing deliverable. A practical example has emerged in retail. Several Australian retailers have discovered that generative engines are pulling product details from out of date documents rather than their updated catalogues. The result has been incorrect information about sizing, availability and specifications. McCormick says these mistakes matter because customers often assume AI generated answers are accurate, even when the underlying content is not. Both agree the response to generative visibility must be cross functional. McCormick says CMOs and CIOs are working more closely as they recognise that visibility inside generative systems is not a marketing problem alone. Marketing teams understand brand voice and customer expectations. Technology teams understand metadata, crawlability, integration and governance. Neither group can address generative visibility in isolation. Szulc says technical fundamentals are now as important as creative fundamentals. Many websites rely on lazy loading, deferred rendering and heavy JavaScript, but large language models cannot see content that loads in these ways. He says organisations need to assess which parts of their digital footprint are actually visible to AI agents and which elements remain hidden. He also notes that Adobe has built tools such as its LLM Optimizer to help organisations understand how their content appears inside generative engines, provides recommendations for how to improve brand visibility and automate the deployment of these recommendations. He positions this type of tooling as part of a broader industry move toward measuring and benchmarking machine-readable content in the same way organisations already measure human facing experiences. Both strategists outline practical steps that organisations can take immediately. Szulc says the first task is to understand how the brand currently surfaces. Teams can do this manually by entering prompts into multiple large language models, but he says most organisations quickly run out of bandwidth. Synthetic prompt monitoring is becoming a core technique because it reveals whether answers are accurate and whether outdated documents are influencing results. He says organisations should also focus on freshness. Large language models reward topical and detailed content, so annual updates and static pages are no longer sufficient. Szulc says brands need a steady program of topical refreshes and clear processes to harmonise content across business units. He recalls speaking with one organisation that had eight different teams producing support information, which led to inconsistent answers when customers asked for help through generative engines. McCormick says leaders should watch for indicators of maturity. Integrated content systems, consistent schemas, clear content ownership and cross functional teams dedicated to AI visibility are emerging hallmarks of organisations that have moved early. He says these structures help businesses identify information gaps before generative engines amplify them. Generative search is in an early stage and both experts at the coalface of its evolution expect rapid change as models become more transparent and tightly governed. And as platforms refine how they source and weight information, organisations will have clearer insights into how to improve their machine-readable presence. But the direction is clear. As AI systems mediate more customer interactions, the organisations that succeed will be the ones that treat content as structured data and visibility as an enterprise responsibility.

Why Brand Mentions in AI Are Becoming a Business Metric

GEO turns brand authority into a measurable asset for founders, operators and investors. As AI platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity become primary gateways for discovery, a new metric is rising in strategic importance: Generative Engine Optimization (GEO). This isn't just a marketing buzzword. GEO is emerging as a core indicator of brand authority and relevance in AI-driven ecosystems. For entrepreneurs and investors, understanding GEO offers a competitive edge. Founders can use GEO data to prioritize content investments, measure marketing ROI and spot whitespace for product positioning. Investors are using GEO visibility as an emerging due diligence signal. And for those building AI-native startups, understanding how LLMs surface information is essential to designing discoverable, scalable offerings. GEO isn't just something to monitor. It's a strategic lever. Entrepreneurs who harness it now can drive smarter go-to-market decisions, increase visibility where it matters most and stay ahead in an economy increasingly shaped by generative AI. Related: The Key to Better SEO Actually Comes From Your Customers -- Here's How When PR and marketing pros undertake GEO, the goal is to optimize content so that it shows up in AI-generated answers from ChatGPT, Google's Search Generative Experience (SGE) and similar tools. It's not the same as SEO. Practitioners of GEO are focused on creating content that is conversational and easy to understand. Content like this is more accessible to AI systems that are spinning up human-like responses. They prefer concise, well-structured and authoritative content (such as bulleted overviews in the introduction) that AI can interpret and blend without difficulty. Unlike SEO, the goal isn't to get clicks or increase search engine rankings. GEO's success metrics include mentions, citations and inclusion in AI answers and summaries. When product reviews in print magazines gave way to the internet, search engines became a sweet spot for brands to focus on. Everyone wanted to rank high in Google searches. The mid-90s saw the heyday of SEO; suddenly, everyone was looking to hire an SEO ninja to ensure their company was getting listed as high as possible on search pages. Keyword stuffing became the name of the game, although the backlash would eventually come. As tools like Google's AI Overviews and ChatGPT are changing how customers discover and trust information, it's pushing traditional searches to the sidelines. In fact, a new report from McKinsey found that half of consumers use AI-powered search today, and "by 2028, $750 billion in revenue will funnel through AI search." What's more, McKinsey also finds that brands unprepared for this shift "may experience a decline in traffic from the traditional search channels, anywhere from 20 to 50%." The takeaway is that GEO isn't just a marketing or PR concern, and it's not just hype that can be ignored; this is where content - and company - discovery is going. As I detailed in my last piece, GEO insights can be used to make smarter decisions about content investment, but that's not all. Related: Don't Fall for 'AI SEO' Gimmicks -- Here's What It Really Takes to Win in the Age of AI Search As more investors look beyond spreadsheets to assess brand strength and market potential, GEO visibility will increasingly complement traditional metrics. It's the public traction layer in the investment thesis. It's AI's turn to "eat the world," and GEO is part of the inevitable transitions that occur with any major technological shift. Content strategists and creators aren't trying to write like AI but rather for AI, using techniques like overviews and summaries to frame content for easy comprehension by generative AI tools. Clear, concise and authoritative website copy, articles and other content types are more important now than ever. PR and marketing teams can use data from GEO to find out what's working and adjust as necessary. Goodbye, search rankings; hello, discoverability. Organizations that prioritize this shift will gain a competitive advantage as generative AI continues to set the agenda.

Earned Media Is Becoming the New Currency of A.I.-Driven Discovery

As generative A.I. pulls its answers from news coverage, earned media has become the defining factor in which brands rise to the top. Earned media has never been more valuable for generating brand awareness. Much like the rise of search engines in the mid-2000s, generative A.I. is fundamentally changing how people discover information. As with search engine optimization (SEO), generative engine optimization (GEO) calls for a shift in brands' visibility strategies, and in today's no-click search environment, earned media dominates the results. Sign Up For Our Daily Newsletter Sign Up Thank you for signing up! By clicking submit, you agree to our <a href="http://observermedia.com/terms">terms of service</a> and acknowledge we may use your information to send you emails, product samples, and promotions on this website and other properties. You can opt out anytime. See all of our newsletters The ubiquity of A.I.-driven search is clear. Since the rollout of A.I. Overviews -- the A.I.-generated summaries that now appear at the top of most Google search results -- Google searches increased nearly 50 percent, while website clicks dropped 30 percent overall. Meanwhile, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently disclosed that ChatGPT reaches more than 800 million weekly active users. Answers from generative search are overwhelmingly pulled from credible national and industry publications, rather than company-owned web pages. Research indicates that 89 percent of links cited by A.I. originate from earned media sources. In this new landscape, visibility hinges less on what brands publish and far more on what trusted third parties say about them. To position brands for prominence in A.I.-generated answers, communication professionals can start by embracing the following fundamentals. Shift from an SEO to a GEO mindset Traditional SEO works by optimizing keywords, backlinks and metadata to raise a brand's website to the top of search pages. In the past, incorporating search phrases into content was often enough to secure above-the-fold visibility. That model no longer holds on its own. With the introduction of Google's A.I. Overview, even well-optimized content may now sit a third of the way down the page. While SEO still contributes to brand authority and influences A.I. citations, owned content is no longer the prime driver of whether a brand appears in generative results. Instead, how a brand appears across the broader digital ecosystem matters far more in an A.I.-generated search environment. A.I. engines pull from third-party sources including community forums, social media posts, expert commentary and news coverage. The volume, narrative consistency, recency and quality of these references determine what brands are credible and worth citing. Unlike SEO, which provides levers brands can largely control, GEO partially depends on information outside of an organization's direct influence. This makes making mentions and commentary in news outlets, especially those that reinforce a brand's narrative, a strategic necessity. High-quality coverage that reinforces a brand's narrative and appears in reputable sources helps signal credibility to A.I. engines. Simply appearing in a conversation about an idea is no longer good enough. If an organization wants to "own" a concept, the messages must be accurate, easy to understand and reinforced consistently across a wide spectrum of authoritative sources. This requires a shift from tailoring content to an algorithm searching for keywords (a legacy SEO mindset) to crafting narratives with clear, direct answers to the questions their audiences are asking (a question-and-answer GEO mindset). A.I. engines pull from concise, well-explained summaries over keyword-dense pages when determining what information to elevate in results. Take a page out of the content marketer's playbook To increase visibility in generative search results, PR pros should use buyer questions to guide outreach and storytelling in the same way they inform content marketing. Understanding buyers' needs and pain points can reveal what terms they will search for. The questions content marketers use to inform their content plans are the same as those that PR professionals must prioritize for their media strategies: What are the biggest challenges buyers are trying to solve? What steps can they take to fix their most pressing issues? How can we help them? Successful content marketers maintain consistent messaging across assets. The same discipline is necessary for successful GEO. Regardless of the news story, organizational spokespeople must sing from the same songbook when quoted by reporters. A cohesive narrative repeated frequently across diverse sources builds authority. Over time, A.I. systems learn to associate companies with certain ideas and surface the brand when users ask related questions. Pick a narrative and commit Organizational consulting firm Korn Ferry's viral concept of "job hugging" is a recent example of an initiative with narrative consistency that yielded strong GEO results. The company's editorial team identified a subtle but significant behavioral trend: People were clinging to jobs even when they wanted to move on in their career journeys. The concept's resonance was instant and organic, prompting coverage from The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and CNBC, along with key trade publications like HR Brew and HR Dive. Both categories of outlets are frequently cited in generative searches when users ask about sector-specific insights. Now, when the term "job hugging" is searched, Korn Ferry's website and the articles quoting its executives appear in both Google's A.I. Overview and the organic search results below it. The recency of this coverage also plays a role in its visibility, as A.I. engines prioritize content written in the past twelve months, especially for queries related to advice or recent updates. This bias reinforces the need for a steady drumbeat of relevant media coverage that articulates a concept with consistent language and tone. Even a highly coveted front-page placement will have less impact on GEO visibility than a higher volume of niche and timely coverage. Double down on earned media in the era of A.I. Given the intersection of GEO and earned media, the value of PR has increased exponentially. Even a modest investment in media relations can go further than it did a year ago, which may be the strongest case for investing in PR since the early internet era. Marketing executives might consider shifting some paid-search dollars over to media relations. Earned media has historically been hard to measure because its influence is indirect, dispersed across channels and rarely captured by traditional digital attribution models, which are built for paid media. PR drives awareness and credibility that matter to business outcomes, but don't easily translate into trackable conversions. Today, testing category-level queries like, "How leading PR companies approach innovation" directly in A.I. engines can help a brand understand whether its thought leadership and earned media are influencing high-level narratives about PR industry innovation. As GEO improves, the organization should appear more frequently in the results. Determining exactly how many people are exposed to a brand through A.I. overviews is much harder in a no-click environment. That's why platforms like Semrush, Muckrack and Similarweb have launched A.I. visibility tools to pull the curtain back as far as search engines will allow. Exact measurements will likely have to wait until more advanced models are introduced. In the meantime, the relationship between GEO and earned media continues to evolve, shifting how information flows and trust is established. Brands that once dominated search results with strong SEO could fall below the fold unless they prioritize a GEO strategy. Sustaining visibility in the A.I. era calls everything into question, from how marketing budgets are distributed to narrative development to target media lists. The brands that treat generative visibility as a measurable asset rather than a byproduct will develop a meaningful competitive edge. May the best PR win. Alana Gold is Group Vice President at The Bliss Group, a 50-year-old marketing communications agency.

AI Optimisation (AIO): Why Your Brand Might Vanish From Search If You Ignore Thi...

Oh great - another acronym. Another marketing buzzword. Except this time, it's not fluff. This one actually decides whether your business still shows up when people stop "Googling" and start "ChatGPT-ing." Artificial intelligence is quietly rewriting the rules of search. It's changing how people find information, how answers are presented, and which businesses get seen. It's the biggest shake-up of the internet since Google first crashed the party 25-plus years ago - and this time, the algorithm actually talks back. That said, "AI vs Search" isn't a cage match. Current data shows traditional search remains the cornerstone of desktop discovery while AI tools have normalised as an additional stop in the journey, not a replacement. People still use Google a lot, and AI has become another step in how they search. However, when Google shows an AI Overview, fewer people click the usual links, both organic or ads. If your brand is named inside that AI box, you're more likely to get the click. In other words, SEO and AIO are companions, and the goal is to show up in both places. "Even as AI tools gain traction, traditional search continues to anchor desktop browsing behavior." - EN Datos, State of Search Q3 2025 (PDF) Recent tests show that when an AI Overview appears, click-through rates to regular results drop a lot for both organic and paid. However, brands mentioned in the Overview see a lift. (Search Engine Land: Google AI Overviews drive 61% drop in organic CTR, 68% in paid) But what does AIO really mean for your business? And how is it different from SEO? Let's break it down. No jargon, no AI guru nonsense, just plain English. (And if you're curious how we broke down SEO in the same style, check that post here: What is SEO?) So, what the heck is AIO (Artificial Intelligence Optimisation)? If SEO (Search Engine Optimisation) is about showing up in Google, then AIO (Artificial Intelligence Optimisation, to give it the full name) is about showing up in AI-generated answers - the new "front page of the internet." Tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, and Google's AI Overviews don't give you ten blue links anymore. They summarise the internet and choose who gets quoted. Kind of like a teacher's pet situation for brands. You'll see a few other jargon cousins floating around too: TL;DR - they're all working toward the same outcome: earning presence in AI answers and in search features, because people increasingly bounce between engines and AI tools during research. Think of AIO as SEO's cooler, slightly scarier younger sibling - the one who actually gets invited to parties. Why AIO actually matters (and why marketers should panic a little)? Search behaviour is evolving, but the latest data suggests evolution, not collapse. People are going from 'Just Google it' to also 'Ask ChatGPT' in the same breath. AI usage is climbing (ChatGPT now a top destination from search), while search activity per user remains steady with Google still dominant. The real shift is how many searches end on the results page (zero-click), and which destinations search sends people to (YouTube, Reddit, Amazon, Wikipedia stay on top). What that means in practice: The difference is brutal: Google gives you ten choices. AI gives you one, maybe two. If your business isn't one of them? You're not just invisible, you're irrelevant. Worse, if your competitor is the one quoted, then congrats - you just handed them your authority on a silver platter. Bottom line: don't panic, re-balance. Keep your SEO foundations strong and invest in AIO so you're chosen in both places: search features and AI answers. "Stateside, organic results remain the primary outcome of Google searches, though their share has edged slightly lower... Overall, the number of searches per user across all search engines remains stable, indicating consistent search behavior." You don't need to be technical to get the basics. AIO is built on principles you may recognise from SEO, but adapted for how AI interprets and serves content: 1. Content and Author Authority AI rewards content that's consistent, credible, and clearly human. That means no half-hearted blog posts or ChatGPT cut and paste jobs. You need: Example: An accounting firm shouldn't post one "tax tips" article and call it a day. They need a content library that screams "we live and breathe this stuff" - audits, compliance, business structures, finance strategy, the works. Topic clusters = digital authority. That's how you tell AI "Hey, we're not tourists here. We run the joint." 2. Structured Data AI doesn't read like humans. It scans, classifies, and connects. Structured data, such as schema markup and metadata, helps AI interpret your content. Think of it as adding name tags to everything in your digital filing cabinet so the AI librarian can actually find your stuff. However, structure isn't just technical, it's also about how you write. AI loves short paragraphs, subheads, and question-answer formats. Basically, write like you're explaining something to a smart but impatient intern. Do this by: The goal is to make your content easy for AI to understand and quote accurately. When your brand appears on reputable websites, industry sites or publications, government pages, or widely cited blogs, it strengthens your credibility. Even Reddit threads are shaping AI answers now. (Yes, seriously. Reddit.) This is the new reputation economy: credibility by association. AIO? It's like trying to get into the syllabus of next year's AI school - it takes time. Large Language Models (LLMs) update slowly. If you publish new content today, it might take months, or years, before it filters into an AI model's dataset. Translation: AIO isn't instant. Meanwhile, AI tools are already part of user journeys today and ChatGPT shows up among top search destinations, so the sooner you publish credible, structured content, the more often you'll be considered for those AI "shortlists." If SEO is gardening, AIO is tree planting. It's slower, messier, but once it takes root, it lasts. And remember: Search still sends huge volumes to durable ecosystems, like YouTube, Reddit, Amazon, Wikipedia. Being useful there increases your odds of being referenced everywhere, including AI answers. In short: If you want AI systems to see you, you need to show up where they're already looking. AI can only find you where you've already made yourself visible. If you're not out there, you're not in the mix. Also, here's the twist: AI answers aren't static. They remix every time someone asks. So you're not optimising for "rankings" anymore - you're optimising for "repeat appearances." "In this world, our carefully produced content serves a different purpose: to educate the LLM and get into its training data to be available for 'remixes'." - Reynolds, Stinnett & Shirk, (What is Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) & how does it impact SEO?) What that means is that people receive different summaries, even for the same queries run just minutes apart. These AI tools constantly 'remix' what they know. For businesses, that unpredictability is both a challenge and an opportunity. A challenge, because you can't expect one piece of content to "lock in" your visibility the way a strong SEO ranking might. But also an opportunity, because every remix gives you another chance to be pulled to the top of the charts. Each question is a new audition. The more your brand's name, content, and tone appear across trusted sources, the more likely AI keeps picking you. You're not chasing one #1 spot anymore... you're trying to become the chorus everyone else keeps quoting. So, what can businesses do right now? If you're making marketing decisions for a business, you don't need to know the ins and outs of LLMs or understand how AI is coded. You just need to make your brand recognisable and trustworthy to it. Look at your current content and be brutally honest. Is it helpful or hollow? Does it sound like a person or a brochure? Cull the fluff. Rewrite what's worth saving. Publish what teaches, not sells. 2. Think in topics, not keywords. Keywords are yesterday's game. Topic authority is the new currency. Build clusters of interconnected articles that explore your main themes deeply and from multiple angles. Instead of one post on "employee wellness," create a cluster: legal obligations, case studies, tools, leadership strategies. Add schema markup, alt text, metadata - yes, it's still important. They all help machines understand and identify the content on your site. But also: write like AI is your nosy neighbour. A clean site structure makes everything clear, labelled, and easy to quote. 4. Earn mentions, not just backlinks. In traditional SEO, backlinks were the goal. In AIO, mentions are the new backlinks and are just as valuable. Aim to be referenced by industry sites, media outlets, and trusted directories. If others are saying your name online (for good reasons), you're halfway to credibility. 5. Track your AI Visibility. Emerging analytics tools now track when and where your brand appears in AI answers. They're not perfect, but early adopters will learn faster. Think of it as SEO analytics 2.0 - still awkward, but essential. 6. Be consistent (and patient). No quick wins here. This can't be overstated. AIO is a slow build and you won't "rank" tomorrow. The impatient marketers will give up before it starts paying off, but that's your edge. Those early investments will matter as AI models evolve. Common myths about AIO (and truths nobody likes to admit) Topical authority doesn't care about your budget. It cares about your brains. Jane Cozens sums this up nicely in Search Engine Land: "Unlike domain authority, topical authority isn't based on your website's size or links. Small or new sites can build it by creating focused, comprehensive content. This makes high topical authority an attainable goal for all websites, regardless of your background or available resources. - Jane Cozens, Topical authority: How to become the go-to resource on your topic Treat AIO as a new distribution layer that selects and summarises your work, while SEO remains the foundational system that ensures you're discoverable and technically sound. Instead of each competing to be the main character, they're complementary and reliable sidekicks. Think Batman and Robin. Both SEO and AIO are jumping into the Batmobile together, excitedly yelling "Let's go get 'em!". You still need SEO. It builds the foundation, but if you only optimise for Google, you'll miss growing on-SERP opportunities and the AI answer layer that many users now trust during research. The smart move? Keep SEO humming along, but start tuning into how AI actually hears you. Because that's where the real conversations, and conversions, are happening now. The brands that will thrive in this next phase: It's easy to feel like the ground is shifting under your feet. (Because, honestly, it is. The internet has the stability of a toddler on a sugar high.) AIO sounds new, and in some ways it is. But the fundamentals haven't changed: create content people actually value, build authority that isn't fake, and make sure machines understand you as clearly as humans do. At Insight Online, we've seen every digital "revolution" that was supposed to change everything, and then watched half of them fizzle out. From early SEO to mobile-first, from "voice search is the future" to now AI discovery, one thing has always stayed true: the brands that start adapting early and invest with intention always come out on top. Each digital wave of change rewards the same traits: adaptability, clarity, and credibility. The rest is just noise. AIO is simply the next chapter. Not a replacement, but an evolution. Ignore it, and you'll be that person still bragging about ranking #1 for a keyword no one's typed since 2022. So if you want your brand to stay visible not just on Google but in AI-generated answers, or what we're now calling 'the new front page of the internet', now's the time to act. AI Optimisation isn't just a hype - it's survival. It's not about chasing algorithms, it's about earning trust from both people and machines. If SEO helps people find you, AIO makes sure AI doesn't forget you exist. The future of visibility isn't ten blue links. It's one credible mention. And you sure as hell want it to be yours. Talk to Insight Online about Artificial Intelligence Optimisation (AIO)

How to be GEO-ready in 2026 | Marketing | Campaign India

The future of discovery won't be a search result. It will be a conversation, one where AI decides whose voice to amplify. For nearly two decades, search behaved like a predictable highway. Brands placed the right signboards, keywords, metadata, backlinks, and waited for the right people to drive past. That world is fading. Consumers are no longer searching. They are asking. And instead of scanning lists of ten blue links, they are receiving direct answers from AI tools such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini, and now fully agentic AI native browsers like ChatGPT Atlas and Perplexity Comet. For brands, this is more than a technological shift. It is a shift in how discovery happens and who mediates it. Traditional SEO optimises for clicks; AI SEO, or GEO (generative engine optimisation) optimises for brand trust. The brands that understand this early will define the next decade of discovery. From being found to being referenced Traditional SEO was built on a simple equation: rank high, earn the click, drive the conversion. AI-led discovery works differently. When a user asks an AI assistant something, the model synthesises an answer. Pulling from sources that appear, it forms an answer that is clear, structured, updated, consistent, and credible. In this world, visibility is no longer about position. It is about confidence. The confidence an AI system has in your content. This marks the birth of what I call the AI shelf. A place where brands compete not for rankings but for citability. Agentic AI represents the next significant shift. These systems do not just answer. They act. They can compare products, interpret instructions, break down reviews, summarise specs, recommend alternatives, fill forms, add items to cart, as well as complete multi-step workflows. Some of these capabilities already exist at scale, while others are evolving quickly. What agentic AI means for brands The implication is clear. Consumers may experience your brand through an AI agent before they ever visit your website. That means: Here is where the idea of 'slow marketing' becomes important. Slow Marketing is not about moving slowly. It is about moving intentionally. It is about designing for clarity, credibility, and trust rather than chasing fast gains that collapse under scrutiny. When brands rush into AI without thought, three risks emerge: Misrepresentation through improvisation - If your brand story is unclear, the AI fills the gaps. Unlike an incorrect campaign message, this misinterpretation does not vanish when your budget ends. It repeats, scales, and persists. Automation without value - Agentic AI is powerful, but if the experience feels mechanical, shallow or disconnected from consumer needs, the brand comes across as opportunistic. GEO consistently rewards content that solves, not sells. Trust erosion that compounds over time - Trust is slow to build and easy to lose. If an AI agent misguides a user by recommending the wrong variant or misrepresenting features, the negative impact multiplies. The same flawed interpretation may show up repeatedly. In a world where AI responses become repetitive reference points, poor design leads to compounding damage. Four pillars for GEO readiness Based on research and current best practices, four pillars matter most. Two are core to current AI behaviour. Two are emerging as agentic systems expand. Interaction design that feels human - AI is increasingly the first voice a consumer hears from your brand. Brands must define tone, clarity, boundaries, and preferred explanations. This is no longer brand communication, but brand mediation. Your first impression is delivered by a machine. Design that moment. Content built for AI citations - Every major study on generative search highlights the same pattern. AI systems cite content that is clean, structured, and semantically rich. This includes clear hierarchy, FAQs, updated information, schema markup, definitions and glossaries, consistent terminology, product specs and comparison tables. If your content is easy to understand and easy to verify, AI models are far more likely to cite it. This is where brands win the 'AI shelf'. Unlock agentic value, not agentic automation - Agentic AI should enhance consumer decision making, not accelerate the brand agenda. Ask: Does this reduce friction? Does this build clarity? Does this remove confusion? Does this help the user decide better? Agentic experiences must feel like guidance, not gimmicks. Measure and co-own the narrative - Measurement in AI SEO is still evolving, but new signals are becoming important. How often is your brand cited? Are citations accurate? What tone does the AI adopt when describing you? Are agent-led actions safe and correct? Agencies and brands must co-own governance. This is not a campaign to optimise. It is a system to steward. The first step to putting these pillars in place is to audit your AI visibility. Ask AI tools such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini frequently asked questions about your industry. For example, "Which brand offers X?", "How to choose Y?", "What's the best option for Z?". Audit how your brand appears in the generated answers and how accurately you are represented. Avoid publishing more content before repairing existing clarity. Clean, structured content wins the AI shelf. Volume without structure is invisible. Once this is done, monitor how AI interprets your brand. Look for tone issues, hallucinations, incorrect comparisons, and misaligned product descriptions. Refine content and structure to correct them. This is a living system, not a one-time task. The brands that build clarity, trust and structured information today will dominate the AI shelf tomorrow, just as early movers dominated websites in the 2000s, social platforms in the 2010s, and content ecosystems in the 2020s. Except this time, the advantage compounds faster, because AI learns. For brand leaders, the equation shifts from 'Rank → Click → Convert' to 'Cite → Engage → Complete'. The question is no longer 'How do we rank?' but 'How do we become worth referencing?'. And the answer begins with the timeless foundations of slow marketing: clarity, credibility, and consistency. Because speed creates reach, but trust creates relevance. And relevance is what AI will amplify across ChatGPT Atlas, Perplexity Comet, and any other AI-native browsers rising in the future.