A few of the vital questions which are prime of thoughts for each SEOs and CMOs as we head right into a multi-search world are: The place is search going to develop? Is ChatGPT a risk or a chance? Is optimizing for giant language fashions (LLMs) the identical as optimizing for serps?
On this two-part interview collection, I attempt to reply these questions to supply some clear course and focus to assist navigate appreciable change.
What you’ll be taught:
- Ecosystem Evolution: Whereas it’s nonetheless a Google-first world, be taught the place native AI search platforms are rising and what this implies.
- Alternative vs. Risk: Why AI platforms create unprecedented model visibility alternatives whereas demanding new return on funding (ROI) considering.
- LLM Optimization Technique: Why web optimization has grow to be extra very important than ever, whatever the AI and Search platform, and the place particular nuances to optimize for lie.
- CMO Priorities: Why authority and belief alerts matter greater than ever in AI-driven search.
- Organizational Alignment: Why CMOs must combine advertising and marketing, PR, and technical groups for cohesive AI-first search methods.
The place Do You Suppose The Present Search Ecosystem May Develop In The Subsequent 6 Months?
To reply the primary query, I believe we’re witnessing one thing actually fascinating proper now. The search panorama is present process a elementary transformation that may speed up considerably over the following six months.
Whereas Google nonetheless dominates with about 90% market share, AI-powered search platforms are experiencing explosive progress that’s inconceivable to disregard.
Let me put this in perspective. ChatGPT is exhibiting 21% month-over-month progress and is on observe to hit 700 million weekly energetic customers.
Claude and Perplexity are posting comparable numbers at 21% and 19% progress, respectively. However here’s what has caught my consideration: Grok has seen over 1,000% month-over-month progress. Supply BrightEdge Generative Parser and DataCube evaluation, July 2025.
Certain, it’s ranging from a tiny base, however that trajectory makes it the darkish horse to look at. In the meantime, DeepSeek continues its gradual decline following its January surge, which highlights the volatility on this rising market. I’ll share extra on that later.
In A Google First World, Person Conduct Is Additionally Evolving On A number of AI Platforms
What is especially fascinating is how consumer conduct is evolving. Individuals are not simply switching from Google to AI search — they’re beginning to combine and match platforms primarily based on their particular wants. I’m seeing customers flip to:
- ChatGPT for deep analysis.
- Perplexity for fast details.
- Claude, after they want dependable info.
- Google when they need complete breadth.
Picture from BrightEdge, August 2025
The CMO AI And web optimization Mindset Shift
From a advertising and marketing perspective, this creates a large change in considering. web optimization isn’t just about Google anymore – although that’s nonetheless the place a lot of the focus must be.
Entrepreneurs might want to take into account optimizing for a number of AI engines, every with its personal distinct knowledge ingestion pipelines. For ChatGPT and Claude, you want clear, structured, cited content material that AI fashions can safely reuse. For Perplexity, timeliness, credibility, and brevity matter greater than conventional key phrase density.
It’s not about optimizing only for clicks; it’s about optimizing for affect and citations and ensuring you seem within the correct context on the proper second inside all these distinct forms of AI experiences.
The Search Bot To AI Person Agent Revolution
ChatGPT and its ChatGPT-Person agent are main the cost.
In July, BrightEdge’s evaluation revealed that ChatGPT’s Person Agent real-time web page requests almost doubled its exercise. In different phrases, it reveals that customers counting on real-time net searches to reply questions virtually doubled inside only one month.
For instance, suppose you want to examine “Apple Watch vs. Fitbit” from present critiques. In that case, the ChatGPT consumer agent is appearing as your looking assistant and working in your behalf, which is essentially completely different from conventional serps and crawlers.
Picture from BrightEdge, August 2025
In abstract, I consider the following six months will set up what I time period a “multi-AI search world.” Customers will grow to be more and more comfy switching between platforms fluidly primarily based on what they want in that second. The chance right here is huge for early adopters who determine cross-platform optimization.
Is The Rise Of AI Platforms Like ChatGPT An Alternative Or A Risk That CMOs Want To Be Conscious Of?
It’s all alternative.
Every AI platform is carving out its personal distinct id. Google is doubling down on AI Overviews and AI Mode. ChatGPT is making this fascinating transition from conversational Q&A into full net search integration.
Perplexity is cementing itself because the premier “reply engine” with its citation-first, mobile-focused method, and they’re planning deeper integrations with information suppliers and real-time knowledge.
Claude is increasing past dialog into contextual search with superior fact-checking capabilities, whereas Microsoft’s Bing Copilot is positioning itself as this search-plus-productivity hybrid that seamlessly blends doc era with net search.
The rise of AI platforms represents each a transformative alternative and a strategic problem that CMOs should navigate with sophistication and strategic foresight.
Be taught Extra: How Enterprise Search And AI Intelligence Reveal Market Pulse
CMOs And The Shift From Rating To Referencing And Citations
And that brings me to an enormous mindset shift: We’re shifting from “rating” to “referencing.” AI summaries don’t simply show the highest 10 hyperlinks; they reference and attribute websites throughout the reply itself.
Being cited inside an AI abstract may be extra impactful than simply rating excessive in conventional blue hyperlinks. So, CMOs want to start out monitoring not simply the place they rank, however the place and the way their content material will get referenced and cited by AI all over the place.
Technical Infrastructure Necessities And CMOs Leaning Into web optimization Groups
On the technical facet, structured knowledge and clear info structure are not nice-to-haves – they’re foundational. AI depends on this construction to floor correct info, so schema.org markup, clear technical web optimization, and machine-readable content material codecs are important.
Picture from BrightEdge, August 2025
Manufacturers, The CMO, And The Authority And Belief Premium
Right here is one thing that’s changing into vital: Authority and model belief matter greater than ever. AI tends to tug from websites it considers authoritative, reliable, and steadily cited. This places a premium on long-term brand-building, thought management, and fame administration throughout all digital channels.
You should deal with these E-E-A-T alerts (Expertise, Experience, Authoritativeness, Trustworthiness) for each people and AI algorithms.
The CMOs’ web optimization And AI Aggressive Benefit
The CMOs who’re proactively adapting to those shifts – rethinking measurement, technical web optimization, model belief, and cross-team integration – are those positioning their enterprises for continued visibility and affect.
The transfer to AI-driven search is speedy, however savvy enterprise entrepreneurs are seeing this as a chance to deepen model engagement and grow to be a trusted supply for each human customers and AI engines.
It’s difficult, however the potential upside for manufacturers that get this proper is big.
It’s a entire new mind-set about ROI.
Be taught Extra: How AI Search Ought to Be Shaping Your CEO’s & CMO’s Technique
Do You Suppose Optimizing For LLMs Is The Similar As Search Engines, As Google Suggests?
Following Google Search Central Stay in Thailand, and Gary’s recommendation that SEOs don’t must optimize for GEO, I believe that Gary’s completely proper, and placing any acronym debates behind us, foundational web optimization stays the identical, significantly with Google search.
web optimization has by no means been extra very important, and AI is accelerating the necessity for specialists on this space. Your web site nonetheless must be quick, mobile-friendly, and technically sound. Engines like google and AI programs alike must crawl and index your content material effectively. Technical optimizations like correct URL buildings, XML sitemaps, clear code, and quick loading occasions are nonetheless paying dividends.
The CMO, web optimization, And LLM Optimization Fundamentals
Now, once we discuss optimizing for all LLMs, there’s a similarity within the actuality that success nonetheless lies in core web optimization – primarily technical web optimization – and content material fundamentals.
Sturdy inside linking helps AI crawlers perceive how your pages join. Make sure that all pages are simply crawlable. Reply associated questions all through your content material utilizing clear headings, schema markup, and FAQ sections, and determine what persons are making an attempt to perform to provide them the reply and be the cited supply in AI outcomes.
LLM Platform-Particular Differentiation
Nevertheless, as extra manufacturers are being found and interpreted throughout a number of AI platforms, additionally it is very important to know that every has its personal interface, logic, and manner of shaping model perceptions.
Every platform has developed distinct strengths: ChatGPT Search gives a complete narrative context. Perplexity shines with visible integration and associated content material. Google AI Overview excels at structured, hierarchical info.
Here’s a nuanced instance. When customers ask comparability questions like “what’s the most effective?,” ChatGPT and Google’s approaches are comparable. However when customers ask action-oriented questions like “how do I?,” they half methods dramatically. ChatGPT acts like a trusted coach for decision-making, whereas Google AI stays the analysis assistant.
Picture from BrightEdge, August 2025
Belief Sign Variations
Totally different platforms additionally present distinct belief sign patterns. Google AI Overviews tends to quote assessment websites and group sources like Reddit, asking “what does the group suppose?”.
ChatGPT seems to favor retail sources extra steadily, asking, “the place can you purchase it?”. This implies these platforms are creating completely different approaches to belief and authority validation.
Three-Section AI Optimization Framework For The CMO And Advertising Groups
Here’s a framework for organizations to comply with.
- Begin by monitoring your AI and model presence throughout a number of AI engines. Monitor how your visibility evolves over time via citations and mentions throughout AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and past.
- Subsequent, deal with understanding variations in model mentions throughout key prompts. Shortly establish which prompts from ChatGPT, AI Overviews, and different AI serps generate model mentions so you possibly can optimize your content material effectively.
- Lastly, dive deeper into particular prompts to know why AI programs advocate manufacturers. Using sentiment evaluation gives exact insights into which model attributes every AI engine favors.
Be taught Extra: The Triple-P Framework: AI & Search Model Presence, Notion & Efficiency
The CMO: AI, Search, And Cross-Group Integration Considering
One factor I’m seeing work nicely is tighter integration throughout advertising and marketing and communications groups. Paid and natural methods should align greater than ever as a result of advertisements and natural AI overviews typically get introduced collectively – your messaging, branding, and focused intent should be totally constant.
Plus, your PR and content material groups want higher coordination as a result of off-site mentions in media, critiques, and authoritative websites straight affect who will get cited in AI summaries.
Conclusion: Embracing The Multi-AI Search Transformation
The CMOs who’re proactively adapting to the shifts are positioning their organizations for sustained aggressive benefit on this evolving panorama.
Large Image, to place this all in perspective.
The three Large Questions From CMOs On AI And Search
- AI would kill Google: No, it has turbocharged it.
- web optimization is useless: No, it’s truly extra necessary than ever. AI is reshaping search, which implies we have to perceive what this transformation entails. Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) builds upon core web optimization foundations and requires extra built-in, higher-quality technical approaches.
- Every little thing adjustments? The extra issues change, the extra they keep the identical.
In Half 2 of this collection, matters lined will embrace the way forward for conventional SERP search and the way agentic web optimization would possibly change the search funnel. Find out how these adjustments affect the function of web optimization and all groups that fall beneath the CMO remit.
Extra Sources:
Featured Picture: jd8/Shutterstock
