How content producers can outplay generative AI search

by Natalie Khoo

With AI Overviews and other GenAI-based searches on the rise, your audience isn’t stopping by your homepage as often. Instead, they’re landing directly on the pages that match their search intent. 

If you haven’t started optimising for GenAI search yet, don’t panic – you still have time. We’ve pulled together our learnings to break down what's a must, where to start, and a few tricks to help you get ahead.

Key takeaways:

• AI overviews in Google are increasingly being triggered for informational queries, and this percentage being delivered is predicted to grow.

• Search via GenAI platforms like ChatGPT and Perplexity are projected to eclipse Google as the most common search method by 2027.

• Senior leaders in the digital marketing space need to rethink ROI and KPIs in the context of zero-click search results, in which users are finding the answers they need without needing to visit an organisation’s website.

• At the same time, SEO is not dead. Good SEO practices give you an advantage when it comes to showing up in AIO and GenAI search results.

• Content creators should be prioritising research on what GenAI is saying about their organisation and industry, and using responses to identify opportunities.

 Let’s take a closer look at AIOs (AI Overviews)

The rate of AI overviews featured in Google is consistently increasing, with informational queries accounting for 88% of the triggers. Examples include: 

• Definitions: What does hand foot and mouth disease look like?

• Comparisons: How is hand foot and mouth different to eczema?

• Clarifications: Can I catch hand foot and mouth disease from my toddler?

(You can tell I have kids at home, right?)

Not surprisingly, the categories being disrupted the most are those full of facts: science, health, people and society.

What this means is: if you’re a national health body, like the Better Health Channel or Dementia Australia, it’s likely you’re experiencing a drop in organic traffic for information-heavy fact-based pages. Why? Because people are finding answers they need without needing to click through to your website.

So how do we measure ROI moving forward?

GenAI tools like ChatGPT are likely to overtake Google as users’ primary search tool by 2027. Further,it’s predicted this trend will cause a 25% drop in traditional search volume as early as 2026. Yikes!

So, the big question that digital marketing managers are grappling with is this: Is a drop in CTRs so bad if we’re still showing up in AIOs and Gen-AI based search? I say no. Visibility still counts as top-of-the-funnel awareness, and that’s worth something.

Unfortunately, some senior leaders think otherwise. They believe that impressions aren’t as valuable as CTRs, and interactions are only valid if users are interacting with an organisation’s website. This just isn’t true.

We need to be honest about which KPIs hold value in this era of zero-click search behaviour. Impressions still build brand equity. The tricky part is measuring ROI as a direct effect of an AIO or GenAI-based response.

While Google Search Console and some other tools can tell you how you’re performing in AIOs, there is currently no way to tell how many impressions you’re getting within ChatGPT search. How our brands are showing up in chats is a mystery.

While we figure that out, here are some other KPIs that may be better indicators of website performance today:

• Changes in ranking

• Changes in search volume

• Changes related to branded VS non-branded keywords

• Changes in traffic to less information-heavy pages on your website

• Changes in time on site and bounce rate overall

  
  

Yes, good SEO still matters (start here!)

While a first-page ranking is not as critical as it used to be for generating traffic, organisations still need a website that can be easily indexed. This means applying best-practice SEO strategies such as:

• Thinking about what your audience wants to know

• Creating clear and concise content that directly addresses those queries

• Incorporating relevant SEO keywords into your copy in a conversational way

• Developing high-quality FAQs that help you show up for long-tail search queries

• Ensuring your website architecture and HTML mark-up make sense for those trying to navigate it (therefore also helping bots crawl your site more effectively).

If you tick all these boxes, you’re in a good place to move forward.

Branded search strategy is back, baby

When it comes to growth, many have looked to non-branded keywords as the answer. Ranking for non-branded keywords (i.e. best superannuation company) versus branded keywords (i.e. AustralianSuper) casts a wider net and enables you to reach a bigger audience that may not be as familiar with your organisation.

But in the age of AIOs and GenAI search, there is one thing that you can’t afford to forget: responses are often scraped from a range of sources… Sometimes ones you don’t own, like user-generated reviews and Reddit threads. 

Combine that with the fact that consumers are increasingly looking to ChatGPT for unbiased information, and your brand might be at risk. If you think there’s someone out there saying bad things about your organisation, it’s best to have a plan in place to control as much brand content as you possibly can.

3 ways to start optimising content in a GenAI-search world

 1. Check yourself

Ask GenAI tools like ChatGPT to tell you what it knows about your brand. Hot tip: This is best done when you’re not logged in within your own account, so its answers are not swayed by what it might have already learned.

Hopefully, the content you have on your website and relevant LinkedIn pages accurately convey everything you want the public to know. Here are some grabs of what ChatGPT 4.0 told me about Avion. Phew, it’s all pretty solid.

If your website does not already convey what you want people to know, GenAI will struggle getting the proposition right. It may even rely on vague associations, like untrusted forums, to create a response. This is where you take action: clean up your website and associated social media accounts immediately. Ensure your elevator pitch is perfect, so that ChatGPT can get it right too.

2. Check your competitors

Now that you know what GenAI is saying about your brand, take a look at what it’s saying about your competitors. You can see how your products and/or services stack up or explore public sentiment. Here are a couple of grabs below, based on comparing ethical superannuation funds.

“Hey ChatGPT. Which superannuation company offers the most ethical investments, and how do they compare?”

“Hey ChatGPT. What are people saying about these brands? Which has the most positive sentiment?”

What you really need to pay attention to is

• Is GenAI getting this information right? For example, if I’m Australian Ethical Super, I want to ensure that 6.6% is in fact the actual expected 10-year return. If this is not accurate, I would start trawling every single place our predicted returns could be published and start correcting whatever I can ASAP.

  
  

• What can I improve, and what information is missing? For example, if I’m Future Super, I would take on board that member sentiment is “mixed to negative” and start publishing more positive customer stories. I would also notice that employee sentiment is “not specified”, so I would prioritise a strategy to improve NPS and find opportunities to publish more EVP-related content or positive anecdotes from staff.

3. Enrich your content and increase the likelihood of CTRs with storytelling

If you want to stand out, consider what relevant stories you can publish. First-person narratives and original perspectives are incredibly valuable; they are a refreshing break from fact-based content. They also cater better to readers who might be seeking support in specific contexts (i.e. a young person experiencing bullying looking for information that helps them better manage their mental health).

In summary: The goal post has moved – but so can we

Senior leaders in marketing need to rethink success metrics beyond CTRs while continuing to implement best-practice UX-led SEO strategies.

Content creators need to start looking for inspiration beyond high-volume keyword searches. They should be regularly reviewing branded AIO and Gen-AI responses for opportunities and owning as much branded information online as they can.

If you’d like to learn more about optimising your content for AI search, let’s chat. Book a call with me directly or reach out via the contact form below.

Image credits: Illustration by pch.vector on Freepik. Custom GIF by Purenoiserecords on Tenor.