Three Ways to Rank in AI Answers
Consumers are increasingly using AI to make buying decisions. Are you being found for those searches?
More and more of our clients report that they are starting to get leads from ChatGPT or sometimes other generative AI platforms.
How are they doing it?
The thing is, there are no really specific AI optimization tactics. SEO fundamentals are still at work here. You still need to be relevant to your industry and you need to be known.
Some of the priorities may have shifted though. But first, let’s talk about different AI solutions that are out there and what to prioritize for each one:
AI Answers and Different Platforms that Give Them
Seer Interactive offered a great comparison of the different AI technologies we are dealing with right now. I have adjusted their comparison a bit:
Here’s what you need to start doing if you want to be surfaced in AI answers.
Branding
If you look at the chart again, building a strong recognizable brand is the answer to being findable in all the AI solutions.
AI training data relies on what we, people, talk about. If your brand is nowhere to be discussed or described online, AI platforms won’t know about it.
Brand marketing is not easy, and it should be done differently based on your niche and business model. Brand-driven link-building is usually a good answer in most cases. But there are many other tactics you can (and should) experiment with.
We can discuss your specific brand marketing tactics on one of our free roundtables. Let me know if you are interested.
Further reading: How to Turn Your Site into a Google Brand
Technical considerations
Not all AI can crawl the web. Those that can are very much reluctant to do it. Crawling is very resourceful and takes a lot of time and energy.
If you want AI platforms to crawl your site efficiently, keep in mind that your site needs to be light and fast. AI crawlers cannot render javascript yet. Your site needs to be usable with javascript disabled.
A quick disclaimer here: Even if AI crawlers access your site, there’s no guarantee they will cite your content when including it in their answers. But it is much more likely that they will know more about you and your brand. It is your decision.
Further reading: Will Your Brand Be Found by ChatGPT, SGE & Other Generative AI Engines?
Schema is always helpful as it makes it easier for AI bots to extract essential information from your site.
Content considerations
LLM models like and understand clear and concise writing style. They don’t like fluff. Matt Diggity shared his own case study on how factual and clear writing can help your content be surfaced in AI answers:
What else could help?
Q&A / FAQ format (think optimizing for featured snippets again!) Read this: Google's Answer Engine: Question Research in the Age of AI Overviews
Expert quotes from people AI may already know (think Knowledge Graph optimization)
Highly trusted references to official GOV sources (think EEAT optimization)
None of these is specific to AI optimization, just like I said. Those have been fundamental SEO and usability recommendations for years. So shifting your optimization priorities to these tactics will likely help you rank higher as well. Let us know if you need help!
