{"id":78806,"date":"2026-04-10T12:37:01","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T12:37:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/?p=78806"},"modified":"2026-04-10T12:37:02","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T12:37:02","slug":"seo-to-grow-alongside-ai-search-marketing-leaders-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dralysstore.com\/blog\/seo-to-grow-alongside-ai-search-marketing-leaders-say\/","title":{"rendered":"SEO to Grow Alongside AI Search, Marketing Leaders Say"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Marketing leaders expect SEO and AI search to grow side by side, at least in the short term, according to new research from mobile analytics and marketing tech firm Branch<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Branch\u2019s AI Search and Discovery Enterprise Benchmark Report, based on a survey of 300 enterprise, marketing, growth, and digital leaders across six industries, concluded that leaders don\u2019t expect AI search to replace SEO, and that both channels will continue to grow.<\/p>\n

The leaders project that the percentage of website traffic from traditional SEO will grow from 45% to 53% in 2026 \u2014 an eight-percentage-point increase, the 20-page report noted. At the same time, they expect the percentage of website traffic from AI search to grow even faster, jumping from 35% to 50%.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis shift is dramatic,\u201d the researchers wrote. \u201cOnly 26% received over half their traffic from AI search in 2025, but by the end of 2026, 49% expect to hit that threshold. That\u2019s nearly doubling in one year.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, they added: \u201cThese projections assume AI search will drive traffic the same way traditional search does, which is unlikely.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAs AI platforms deliver more complete answers directly in their interfaces, the relationship between discovery and website visits is changing,\u201d they continued. \u201cLeaders are managing both channels now, not choosing between them \u2014 and that means tracking more touchpoints, mapping more complex customer journeys, and solving attribution challenges that didn\u2019t exist a year ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

SEO Evolves Into GEO<\/h3>\n

\u201cAI search won\u2019t replace SEO, but it will absolutely demote old-school SEO from king to one part of a bigger system,\u201d maintained Mark N. Vena, president and principal analyst at SmartTech Research<\/a>, a technology advisory firm in Las Vegas.<\/p>\n

\u201cSEO still powers discoverability at the index and content layer, but AI optimization now sits on top of it, translating brand authority, structured content, and relevance into model-readable signals and synthesized answers,\u201d he told the E-Commerce Times.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven Branch\u2019s own framing is not \u2018SEO is dead,\u2019 but that marketers are moving from SEO to [AI Overview], which is a meaningful expansion rather than a clean replacement,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

AI search won\u2019t kill SEO, but it will evolve it into GEO \u2014 Generative Engine Optimization \u2014 predicted Rob Enderle, president and principal analyst of the Enderle Group<\/a>, an advisory services firm in Bend, Ore.<\/p>\n

\u201cTraditional SEO focused on site structure and keywords to rank in a list,\u201d he told the E-Commerce Times. \u201cGEO focuses on brand authority, sentiment, and \u2018citability.\u2019 The goal is no longer just to be \u2018found,\u2019 but to be the definitive source that the AI chooses to include in its synthesized response.\u201d<\/p>\n

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AI won\u2019t replace SEO so much as absorb and transform it, contended Molly McKinley, founder of Redtail Creative<\/a>, a marketing and strategic communications consultancy in Raleigh, N.C.<\/p>\n

\u201cTraditional SEO optimized for algorithms that ranked pages,\u201d she told the E-Commerce Times. \u201cGEO optimizes for algorithms that synthesize answers. The underlying logic is similar, such as being the most credible and well-structured source on a topic, but the signals that establish credibility have shifted.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThird-party validation and earned media matter more now than they did in a pure keyword world,\u201d she said. \u201cThe brands that understand this earliest will have a real head start, but the ones chasing shortcuts will find themselves invisible in ways that are much harder to diagnose than a dropped ranking.\u201d<\/p>\n

Complementary Technologies<\/h3>\n

SEO and GEO aren\u2019t nearly as far apart as the hype would have us believe, argued Peter Sloterdyk, chief marketing officer for Gist<\/a>, of Pasadena, Calif., a brand visibility platform for AI ecosystems.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey complement each other, and both are still wildly necessary,\u201d he told the E-Commerce Times. \u201cWhile conversational AI engagements will most certainly become the default for consumers in the not-too-distant future, I don\u2019t yet see a world where the SEO best practices we\u2019ve embraced over the last two decades disappear. Content is once again ruling our sphere, as it influences both SEO and GEO performance.\u201d<\/p>\n

Channing Ferrer, chief revenue officer and Americas CEO of Brevo<\/a>, a global customer-engagement and marketing-automation platform, agreed that AI won\u2019t replace search, but added it will absolutely change what effective SEO looks like.<\/p>\n

\u201cTraditional SEO is still foundational because AI systems are often drawing from the same underlying web content ecosystem that search engines index,\u201d he told the E-Commerce Times. \u201cBut AI discovery introduces a new layer marketers now have to think about, whether their content is crawlable, rankable, understandable, attributable, and useful inside AI-generated answers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Much of AI search optimization is simply good SEO, asserted Ryan W. Bailes of Bailes Zindler<\/a>, in Tyler, Texas, a digital agency that builds websites, SEO programs, and paid media campaigns for businesses.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is still vital to maintain your website\u2019s crawlability, indexation, content quality, authority, internal linking, and technical health,\u201d he told the E-Commerce Times.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow, it is also vital to ensure machines can easily read your content by including schema, Open Graph, content structure, consistent messaging, product feeds, and any other relevant information you can provide,\u201d he said. \u201cBrands succeeding in AI search are not abandoning SEO. They are adapting to the new AI reality.\u201d<\/p>\n

New Search Paradigm<\/h3>\n

The Branch report explained that traditional search has been the foundation of digital acquisition for more than 25 years. Organic search traffic, search engine optimization best practices, and Google\u2019s dominance have shaped how businesses think about discovery, visibility, and customer acquisition.<\/p>\n

But AI search and large language model experiences are creating a new discovery paradigm, it continued. ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google\u2019s AI Overviews, and other AI platforms are changing how people find information and how brands get discovered.<\/p>\n

For the first time in decades, the rules of search are changing, it added.<\/p>\n

\u201cMarketers are always looking for the next concept, the next mechanism for finding clients,\u201d said Adam Landis, head of strategic growth at Branch.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd for good reason,\u201d he continued. \u201cIt\u2019s existential for a brand to maximize ROI and reach with clients. To miss a paradigm shift could leave the brand behind and threaten its very existence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor marketers to demonstrate \u2014 and vote with their wallets \u2014 that AI is growing in importance means marketers need to pay attention to these shifts,\u201d he added. \u201cIf they don\u2019t, they could find themselves irretrievably behind.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\"Lead<\/a> <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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\u201cThe new paradigm is forcing brands to rethink how they show up online,\u201d observed Anne DeSpain, founder of DeSpain Consulting<\/a>, an AI operations and workflow automation consultancy in Park City, Utah.<\/p>\n

\u201cSEO became a very strong skill set and somewhat formulaic, to the point where it was getting easy to game the system,\u201d she told the E-Commerce Times. \u201cThe shift is requiring brands to be more authentic about storytelling, because LLMs reward authoritative, well-structured content over keyword-stuffed pages.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIf your brand doesn\u2019t have a clear, credible story backed by real substance, you\u2019re not getting surfaced,\u201d she said. \u201cAI platforms are also more selective, so the stakes are higher now. In traditional search, you might rank on page two. In AI search, you\u2019re either there in the output, or you\u2019re not.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAs an industry trend, AI search will indeed change SEO as we know it, but that should not scare consumers or businesses,\u201d added Eli Clemens, a policy analyst at the Information Technology & Innovation Foundation<\/a>, a research and public policy organization in Washington, D.C.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday, if you want to read an online recipe, you sometimes have to scroll through large amounts of HTML content to get to the recipe itself,\u201d he told the E-Commerce Times. \u201cSome consumers like the extra content and some do not, but the main reason why online recipes are designed that way is SEO-driven incentives.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAI-driven discovery can synthesize all of the extra content or get just the basic recipe to the consumer, whichever one the consumer wants,\u201d he said. \u201cFrom a consumer perspective, that is better technology. For businesses that rely on search for marketing, there is uncertainty and the need to adapt, but also a clear opportunity to build new strategies around model optimization, both for being cited by models and for being incorporated into models\u2019 inference process.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

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Published by Dralys Blog \u2013 Stories | Insights | Innovation<\/strong><\/p>\n

Discover more on DralysStore.com<\/a><\/p>\n

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