Most searches in 2026 will be answered by AI before anyone clicks on your site. That means your traffic could tank even if you’re ranking number one right now. But here’s the good news. I’ve been doing SEO since 2001. I survived Panda, Penguin, RankBrain, and every other major shakeup Google has thrown at us. And every single time, the people who adapt early typically come on top. So today, I’m breaking down the five strategies you need to rank and stay relevant in this new AI-powered search role. Let’s dive in.
Strategy 1: Focus on Entities and Topical Depth, Not Just Keywords:
Strategy one. Here’s something that might surprise you. If your traffic’s been dropping even though you’re doing SEO, right? This is probably why. A recent study analyzed over 1,500 Google search results and found no consistent correlation between keyword density and ranking. In fact, higher ranking pages actually had lower keyword density on average. Another study by WLDM, ClickStream, and Searching Journal looked at over 250,000 search results and found that topical authority is now the strongest on-page ranking factor, even stronger than domain traffic.
So, what does that mean for you? Google’s AI isn’t just looking for pages that mention a keyword 20 times. It is looking for pages that demonstrate a real understanding of how ideas connect, relate, and build on each other. Think about it like this. You’re in a meeting. It’s easy to tell who’s just throwing around buzzwords versus who actually knows their stuff, right? AI works the same way. It spots surface-level content instantly and rewards the people who show genuine expertise.
Build Topical Depth (Pillar & Sub-Pages):
Here’s how to actually do this. One, build topical depth. Create one pillar page, let’s say the complete guide to running shoes, and link to subtopics like best running shoes for flat feet, trail running shoes, and how cushioning prevents injuries. That interlinking signals to Google that you fully understand the topic. It makes you the trusted authority and boosts the rankings for all the related pages.
Use Semantic Variety (Related Entities):
Two, use semantic variety. Tools like Surfer SEO and Google’s NLP API show you the related concepts and entities Google connects to your topic, brands, locations, techniques, and people. Weave those naturally into your content so AI naturally understands the full context of what you’re talking about.
Strategy 2: Build Author and Brand Authority (E.A.T. for AI):
But there’s one layer of authority most people completely overlook. Without it, your content will always struggle to get visibility. Strategy two, build author and brand authority. E.A.T. for AI. Most marketers tell you to make good content. And that’s fine advice, but have you ever noticed that even your best content sometimes gets zero traction?
Here’s why. Average content from an authority outperforms great content from a nobody almost every time. There’s actually a famous psychology study where people were twice as likely to follow instructions when a person giving them wore a doctor’s coat, even when they weren’t even an actual doctor.
A’s algorithm mimics the same human bias. They rank and quote content from recognized authorities because trust reduces risk for both the platform and the user. Google’s overviews and perplexity don’t just ask what this page says? They ask who said it, and we can trust it. The same way you wouldn’t trust medical advice from some random dude on the internet. AI is hesitant to promote content from someone unverified with no credentials.
Show Your Experience (Bios, Credentials, Case Studies):
Number one, show your experience. Add author bios, credentials, and firsthand stories. Google’s AI looks for real-world proof that you know what you’re talking about. Don’t just say you’re an expert. Prove it with case studies, results you’ve gotten, and specific examples from your work.
Earn Brand Mentions (Podcasts, News, Industry Sites)
Two, earn brand mentions. Get featured on podcasts, blogs, or even news outlets. Even a single mentions strengthen your authority footprint. And here’s something interesting from our data. When companies get cited in news or industry-specific sites, they see a massive boost in how often AI platforms quote them. When we looked at what gets cited most, it’s blogs and getting cited on news or industry-specific sites. This is all versions of blogging, right?
Be Consistent (Align across Platforms):
Three, be consistent. Align your author name, bios, and tone across every platform. YouTube, LinkedIn, your website. AI is looking at all this to determine if you’re legit. But here’s the problem. Even if you build that authority, it won’t matter if AI can’t find and quote your content in the first place.
Strategy 3: Optimize for Featured and Summarized Results:
Strategy three. Number one ranking blog posts are losing traffic right now because people aren’t searching the way they did 4 years ago. AI is answering their questions before they even click on a site.
AI Drives Conversions (High-Intent Users):
And here’s what everyone gets wrong. They look at their analytics and say, “AI isn’t driving traffic.” Yeah, no crap. But you know what? AI is driving conversions. We ran a study with companies investing in both traditional SEO and AI optimization. The AI platforms weren’t driving even 1% of the traffic. But look at the conversion numbers. AI was responsible for 9.7% revenue in B2B companies and 11.4% in BTOC companies.
You’re not going to get the traffic you’re looking for from AI platforms, but the conversion rate is insane. And here’s why. Most people use AI platforms for top-of-funnel research. When we looked at the data, the majority of LLM users aren’t even researching products or services initially, but certain percentages are researching products, and roughly 14% or more are actually purchasing. Some in-store, some directly on the website.
In B2B, we’re seeing mainly direct on the website. It’s a huge conversion channel. It doesn’t even show up in the data because people do research on platforms before they even click or go to your website.
Write Like You’re Answering a Question:
Here’s how to make that happen. Number one, write like you’re answering a question. For example, the question could be, “What are the best SEO tools for beginners?” The answer could be Uberys, Ahrefs, SEM Rush, and Google Search Console. They’re easy to use and scale as you grow. That format makes it effortless for AI to lift your content.
Structure for Scanners (Skimmable Content):
Two, structure for scanners. Use short paragraphs, bullet points, and subheadings. If a human can skim it, AI can summarize it. We’re seeing that AI platforms love content that’s well-structured more than anything else.
Target People Also Ask (PAA) and Comparisons:
Target people also ask. Those questions often feed AI summaries. Each one is a chance to earn a citation. And when you get cited, you’re not just getting traffic, you’re getting high-intent users who convert. Now, if you want to get included in Google’s AR view specifically, they’re citing facts and comparisons. More than anything else, from what we’re seeing, that’s where to focus your attention if you really want to get included.
Strategy 4: Feed the Machines (Structured Data and AI-Friendly Content):
Getting AI to quote you is only half the battle, though. If your content isn’t easy for AI to read and understand in the first place, it’ll skip you no matter how good you are at answering questions. Strategy four is about that. Structured data and AI-friendly content. Here’s something most marketers don’t clearly understand. A doesn’t automatically pick the best content. It skims just like humans do. If a reader clicks away from your page, AI will skip it too and cite someone else instead.
Imagine walking into a massive library. Most of the books are just random piles of pages. No titles, no chapters, no structure. But that one book that stands out has a clear table of contents, clean headings, and quick summaries. You need one answer fast. Which book would you pick? AI works the same exact way. It skims and sites content that’s organized and easy to parse. If your content isn’t structured, AI treats it like low-quality noise and moves on to the next site.
AI Prioritizes Structure and Formatting:
Now, here’s the difference between traditional SEO and what I call GEO, or AEO, or even AI SEO, whatever you want to call it. With traditional SEO, things like thoroughness are super important, as well as quality. But with AI and LLMs like TAG GBT, they really care about structure and formatting. If you don’t get those right, you’re not going to do as well.
Traditional SEO cares about links. GEO cares about citations. If you’re not getting those citations, you’re not going to do as well. This is why blogging is so important. When AI understands your content better, humans do, too. That’s a win you’ll see in both rankings and conversions.
With AI, they also look at things like sentiment. Traditional SEO does not look at sentiment as much. Are people saying things positively about you or negatively?
Use Schema Markup (FAQ, HowTo, Review):
So, here’s how to fix this. One, use schema markup. Add FAQ, how-to, and review schema so AI instantly knows what your content represents. A schema is like a nutrition label for your content. It helps machines read, digest, and recommend your material confidently.
Add Multiple Formats (Videos, Visuals, Charts):
Two, add multiple formats. Include videos, visuals, and charts. AI prefers multimodal data. It signals depth and clarity. And here’s something interesting. When we looked at what AI platforms actually cite, they love blogs. But blogs with images, videos, and data visualizations get cited way more often.
Make Your Data Explicit (Lists, Stats, Tables):
Three, make your data explicit. Use number lists, stats, and tables. Don’t hide value in long paragraphs. When you cite facts and stats, and unique research, data platforms eat that stuff up. That’s what they’re pulling from more than anything else. But none of this matters if you’re still treating SEO as a one-time thing.
Strategy 5: Rethink Your SEO Workflow for Generative Search:
Back in the day, stuffing content with keywords and updating it once a year was enough to keep ranking. Today, that’s not even close to doing well. If you’re not training AI to think like you, it’s quoting your competitors instead. Think about teaching a parrot to speak. If you repeat clear phrases consistently, the parrot mimics you perfectly. But if you mumble, switch topics randomly, or talk once in a while, the parrot learns from the TV instead. AI is the parrot, and right now it’s listening to everyone. The question is, whose voice will it repeat?
Track AI Visibility (Citations) as the New KPI:
Here’s how to make sure it learns from you. Number one, add AI visibility metrics to your reports. Track how often your content is referenced or cited in AI summaries, not just where it ranks. This is the new KPI. Forget about just tracking rankings. Start tracking citations. And you can actually do this for free using Uber Suggest. Just go to ubercess.com and check out the AI visibility report. We started working with companies on GEO or AEO. And we started seeing their traffic grow within 12 months.
And more importantly, within that period, we saw AI platforms like ChatGPT drive roughly 5.8% of their total online sales. Now, these companies did have a leg up because they were doing SEO before, but it shows you can actually get a lot of revenue from these channels.
Test Your Summaries (Clarity Check):
Two, test your summaries. Paste your post into chat, geor perplexia, and ask to summarize this. If AI misses your key points or gets it wrong, rewrite for clarity. This is how you know if you’re actually AI-ready.
Build Recognizable Patterns (Train the AI Parrot):
Three, build recognizable patterns. Instead of vague brand slogans, develop unique phrasing, visuals, and frameworks AI can associate you with. This is how you train it to quote your brand. When we work with companies on this, we help them develop signature frameworks and terminology that AI starts recognizing and citing.
Bonus: Blog Consistently (AI Loves Blogs):
You want to blog consistently. I know everyone’s saying blogging is dead. People have been telling us for years that they’re not blogging as much because it doesn’t drive as much traffic as it used to. But if you don’t blog, you’re not going to get included in ChatGPT. When we look at what AI platforms cite the most, as I mentioned before, blogs dominate. AI loves blogs. And if you don’t believe me, just check out this chart. It breaks down what happens when companies stop blogging versus companies that are actually blogging. And it shows how their search traffic may have decreased from organic traditional search, but their AI traffic went up more, and their total sales went up more as well, which is the most important thing.
Revenue, revenue, revenue. It matters more than traffic. Perplexity also loves blogs, and getting cited in news or industry-specific sites helps with it as well. Google’s AI loves blog articles, mainstream news, product blogs, and even LinkedIn articles. All versions of blogging, right? This is a big chunk of the citation share. Blogging may not drive traffic as it used to, but it does drive revenue through these AI platforms, and search is moving in this direction, whether you like it or not.
Now, here’s the thing. Understanding AI visibility is just step one. And if you’re not doing it, you’re missing out on all this potential AI traffic. As I mentioned earlier, you can do a lot of this for free within Uber Suggest. But the real shift isn’t just happening on your website. It’s happening inside Google itself. The way traffic, leads, and sales flow online is about to change forever.
Conclusion:
AI search is rewriting the entire SEO landscape, and the sites that win will be the ones that stop chasing keywords and start training AI systems to cite, trust, and amplify their content. If you build depth, authority, structure, and consistent patterns that machines can understand, you will not just survive this shift, you’ll thrive in it because the future of search belongs to creators who treat AI as a new distribution channel, not a threat.
FAQs:
1. How is AI changing SEO right now?
AI answers most queries directly, reducing clicks and prioritizing sources it trusts.
2. Why is topical depth more important than keyword stuffing?
Because AI ranks pages that show real subject mastery instead of repeated phrases.
3. Why does author authority matter in AI SEO?
AI cites people it recognizes as credible, not random creators with no footprint.
4. How do you make content easier for AI to quote?
Use clear structure, short sections, lists, schema, and question-based formatting.
5. Why are AI citations a new SEO KPI?
Because citations drive conversions even when they do not drive much traffic.
6. Is blogging still worth it in the age of AI?
Yes, because AI platforms cite blogs more than almost any other content type.
