ChatGPT is taking the world by storm. It reported in November 2024 100 million weekly users, despite being only one of the popular generative AI platforms.
No business should ignore those channels, as consumers increasingly turn to genAI for product and brand recommendations.
Yet showing up in AI answers is tricky, and the tactics vary among platforms.
In August 2024, Seer Interactive, a marketing agency, compared the leading “answer engines.”
“Answer Engines: AI vs. SEO” from Seer Interactive. Click image to enlarge.
Here’s my version.
| Structure | Organic Search | ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot | Perplexity, Google AI Overviews | Claude, DeepSeek, Llama |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Knowledge sources | Search index, knowledge graph | Training data + search data + memory | Search index | Training data |
| Output | Citations, ads, search features | Answers + citations | Answers + citations | Answers (few links) |
| Optimization tactics | Content, backlinks, branding | Content, backlinks, branding | Google & Bing indexes + top ranking | Branding |
Foundational search optimization tactics apply to genAI. Sites should be indexed and visible in Google and Bing to appear in answers on the leading platforms — ChatGPT, Gemini, Google’s AI Overviews, Microsoft Copilot, and Perplexity.
However, some AI-optimizaiton tactics are more important than others in my experience.
Fast, Light, Simple
AI crawlers that access a site will learn about the business and its purpose but may not link to it. Generative AI platforms often repurpose content without referencing the source. Antropic’s Claude, Meta’s Llama, and now DeepSeek rarely include links.
Thus allowing those AI crawlers on a site is debatable. My advice to clients is this: Google has monetized our content for years, but we’ve all benefitted from the visibility. So I usually suggest optimizing for AI platforms rather than blocking them.
The best AI-optimized sites are fast, light, and usable with JavaScript disabled. AI crawlers are immature, more or less. Most cannot render JavaScript and abort crawling slow-loading sites.
No Fluff
For years, Google’s machine learning favored featured snippets from pages with clear, concise, factual answers — even when the page itself wasn’t ranking organically near the top.
Recent case studies prove the point. One comes from search optimizer Matt Diggity, who shared examples on X of the ranking benefits in Google from brevity and clarity.
Search optimizer Matt Diggity posted on X the results from his “natural language processing” text. Click image to enlarge.
Matt’s findings apply to all writing, including generative AI platforms.
In short, AI optimization aligns with commonsense organic search tactics. Optimizing for one will likely help the other.