We have a 21st-century gold rush on our hands.

Folks are rushing to the digital wild west, scavenging for streamlined workflows and broadened capabilities. Only to realize the lawless lands of AI are not as fruitful as they were once led to believe.

This is especially true for content creation.

We can push content out more quickly than ever, but is that what brands need? 

There is a way to use this tool to its advantage. (Note the use of the word “tool.”) Content creation is the backbone of your business, telling consumers what you’re about and how you’re the best solution for them. It should not be more droning, unsupervised AI-created content that adds to the hum drum of other AI-created work.

This article will help you distinguish the good from the meh ideas when it comes to AI’s usage in content creation. We’ll do this in two ways:

1. Discuss the three considerations that should be weighed before AI is used: outside circumstances, resources, and the creativity/efficiency dynamic.
2. Then, we’ll learn to distinguish the metaphorical pyrite (fool’s gold) from the gold nuggets surrounding content creation processes in the AI age.

1. How Should I Use AI for this Piece of Content?

Don’t head into this journey with a suitcase and a dream. This is what you should consider before traveling into that wild, wild west of AI content creation. You need to organize how you’re getting there and what you’ll need.

Outside Circumstances

We all remember Coca-Cola’s fingernail-less Santa and Xbox’s eyebrow-raising winter wonderland. Think back to the last time you saw one too many em dashes in a valueless LinkedIn post (no slander to em dashes — as you can tell I love them too). We know audiences cast a critical eye on obviously AI-generated content, so we have to be very careful with its use. 

Then, when you add in Google cracking down on spammy AI articles and security-sensitive industries like health, finance, and legal, AI use in content is even more risky.

Controls need to be in place to review anything AI touches. An extra Google search should confirm sources. Keen eyes should review imagery/video and written work. Think like the legal department in your reviews; pick apart every detail and try to refresh the perspectives.

TL;DR: Keen eyes win the prize when it comes to using AI for content creation!

Resources

Ah, this is a mighty proponent of using AI. Smaller teams can produce more with less.

Yet, even though we can create more, it doesn’t mean we necessarily should. So ask this question in the brainstorming process: Will the ideas you’re sharing be valuable to your customer/client?

Quality over quantity wins with content. Every. Time. 

One gleaming piece of content gold is better than smaller nuggets of pyrite any day. Make a well-written piece of content go further by repurposing it. Adapt it to different channels through carousels, short-form videos. Keep it fun and interactive. 

HubSpot does an awesome job of this. One report will be released. It’s posted on social media in a unique way. An influencer or two collabs on it. Email supports it when it just comes out and reminds you in a few months when it’s relevant again. (See the AI plug-in piece collab with Modern Mille.)

TL;DR: Even though you can create more content with AI, prioritize high-quality, well-written, repurposeable pieces.

Creativity/Efficiency Dynamic

The great debate: AI ruins creativity vs. AI enhances creativity through efficiency.

I sit on the borderline of these beliefs. Sometimes, if you choose efficiency in the brainstorming/creation process, you sacrifice creativity. You lose whatever words or graphics you could have come up with if you hadn’t chosen to use AI.

But, if you prompt with detailed, well-thought-out prompts, you might be able to enhance what you can brainstorm and expand your perspective for a more bird’s eye view.

While creativity is not exactly a give and take, it does pose many what-if situations. The real question is how will AI enhance your output. Not great at putting words together, but you have great ideas? AI streamlines your thoughts. Good at getting words or images on the screen, but could use a detailed review? AI’s got your back.

TL;DR: (Carefully) experiment with how AI can fill in your knowledge/skill gaps while enabling your talents. Use it to help you think more creatively, not think for you.

2. Is This Content Idea Worth Pursuing or Just Fool’s Gold?

This brings us back to our gold rush metaphor of AI content creation. Which ideas are lurking around like pyrite, making you think they’re hunks of gold? Here are my top metaphorical pyrites of content marketing with AI:

• Making streamlined creation and promotion the #1 priority: Going overboard on streamlining often stands in the way of real goals (lead generation, audience building, etc.). Orbit media reported that, in this AI-integrated age, content marketers are pulling back on previous high-performing strategies like guest blogging, influencer collaboration, and publishing original research. Creating something genuinely valuable for your audience should be the top goal, then work on streamlining it.
• Neglecting proper research to save time: AI is an amazing timesaver when it comes to research, but remember to put the guardrails in place to check our convincing but often misinformed robot research pal. SEO keyword and AI prompt research is also a great way to delineate the good ideas from the bad, but be sure to prioritize feedback from the sales and business development team first… they know what customers are actually saying, feeling, doing.
• Guessing what will work and never checking: AI (when not prompted correctly) can give you the same, worn-out ideas it gives everyone else using those prompts, resulting in a lack of differentiation and visibility. Be as detailed as possible in your prompt about the audience, the context, the channels, your brand, and any thought leadership perspectives you own when prompting. THEN, monitor your performance via analytics dashboards for traditional channels. For AI platform monitoring, you can create your own tool to do this work (if you’re fancy like that) or there are some tools that can do it for you. (I’ve heard good things about Profound.) 
• Having AI just write some social posts for your content: AI can be super helpful in repurposing content beyond just social media posts. Prompt AI to search your website for internal linking opportunities. Let it pick out chunks to repurpose for each platform and in what manner (carousels, short videos, webinars, and more). Get creative with it!

Going For AI-Assisted Content Gold
AI is becoming a habit and the norm. The content marketers that win know not to use it as a crutch for creative thinking and doing, but as an assistant to enhance the creative and promotional processes. 

We have the opportunity to expand beyond our talents to create value for our audiences…. We just have to be smart about it.

Happy creating!

Also published on NatalieLorenzo.com.

FAQs.

The acronym always had traction in the digital marketing world. Now in the age of AI, FAQs are all the rage, especially when used to gain visibility on AI platforms.

FAQs on a service page. FAQs on their own page. A burger with a side of FAQs…

Okay, maybe I’m joking, but the point I’m buzzing around is: there is more to creating an effective FAQ than you might think. Because when approached the wrong way, website FAQs can become an eyebrow-crunching, cringe fest.

Having played in the realm of FAQs for a while, our team pulled together our best advice for creating optimized FAQs: what to do and what to avoid with a 39 ½-foot pole.

What FAQs Should Not Be

As you may have guessed, an FAQ (whether a standalone page or just a section) is not meant to be brag time and can impede on customer experience if not executed just right. An FAQ should not be…

• Where you put all critical product/service information. People shouldn’t have to dig to find out crucial information — it should be prominently displayed.
• A catch-all for information you don’t know where to put. FAQs should follow a theme overall. If the information is important for people to know, find the best way to lay that out in your website content and navigation.
• A garbled regurgitation of sales pitches in question form. These FAQs should be questions the consumers are actually asking. (Think back to the intro.)
• A duplication of existing content. You want people to go to your beautifully designed website content first. Duplicating the content takes away that user experience if people stumble on your FAQ first.
• A total replacement for customer service. Sure, it can be helpful to troubleshoot, but please have a place where customers can connect with you.

What FAQs Should Be

Now that we’ve passed the no-no’s, your FAQs should:

• Be scannable. No one wants to read a jumbled answer.
• Have the answer front-loaded at the beginning. If there is more detail, add it at the end. This makes it easier for the reader and bots to pick up the gist for results and citations.
• Use questions your leads and customers actually ask. You can generate ideas from your sales team (top strategy), prompt AI for popular questions, use 3rd-party tools, and more to research relevant FAQs.
• Have a topic theme relevant to the page they’re on. If you make a generic FAQ page, your audience can get bored or frustrated searching for their answer.
• Be a part of an overall, curated content strategy. An FAQ page can serve as a great format thought-leadership content. Choose a topic and answer questions your audience is asking. This ideally should be a high-value blog post for your ideal audience. I.e., “Common Dog Training FAQs, Answered by Dog Trainers” (Again, see our post on FAQ question research!)
• Integrate topic-relevant keywords and phrases into your copy. You can use Google Keyword Planner to scout out popular terms to see how people talk about their problems and your brand’s solutions.
• Use industry-standard terminology while explaining terms/concepts that may be new to the audience.
• Be able to be found in your website’s search bar. If it’s a popular question, people may search for it directly, especially in the age of AI chatbots.
• Break up text with bullet points when applicable. Make your data chunk-able, just like an AI chatbot does.
• Link to other internal resources. Might as well boost your internal linking SEO while you’re at it!
• Mention your brand name when relevant in question answers, but don’t overly stuff it for the sake of including it. Mentioning your brand name helps bots establish the connection between the knowledge information and your brand but using it too much will only turn off the reader.

Where to Put an FAQ

To answer the question of where to put your FAQ, you must think of how many questions you have and the theme of the questions.

Lower Section of a Page

Use case: You feature all your relevant, purchase-driving information at the top of your page in an easy-to-read, well- written way. BUT you would like to feature 3-5 super-relevant, commonly asked questions to help enhance the understanding of your offerings.

FAQ Section Top Tips:

• If you only have 2 questions, you may not need this section at all. The answers can be creatively answered in the page’s content.
• These sections can benefit from accordion-/toggle-style design, so it doesn’t muddy the page with too much text.
• Make sure the questions are completely relevant to the theme of the page.
• Don’t duplicate content already featured on that page. If it is important information, it should be featured prominently.

A Standalone SAIO-Optimized Page

Use Cases: Think of this in 2 ways: 1. You’ve got a list of questions where you can really emphasize your thought leadership on a specific topic or 2.You have a longer list of vetted popular product/service questions that follow a specific theme.

FAQ Page Top Tips:

• Clearly stick to your topic, so you can optimize that page’s tags and titles for SEO/SAIO.
• Organize your questions in a natural progression. If the questions follow an order, keep them organized in that way. If your questions can be separated into sub-headers, do that!
• Code the questions as headlines (H2s/H3s). If you just have questions, make the questions H2s. If you group the questions under sub-headers, the sub-headers will be H2s and the questions will be H3s.

Bonus: In a Video With a Transcript

Use Case: If you make a video answering the questions, that’s great. Be sure to include a transcript on the video platform (i.e., YouTube) and on the featured webpage.

Video FAQ Top Tips:

• The transcript can be designed as a toggle/accordion for design/space preservation on the webpage.
• Mark the questions as timestamps/chapters in YouTube, so search engines and AI bots can pull up specific sections easily.
• The video itself should be engaging and informative. Users should see a benefit in watching the video.

The Wrap-Up on FAQs

When executed well, FAQs can be helpful for reader understanding and gaining relevant search visibility. These tips and tricks should help keep you on the right track!

The search community generates a lot of news and information often sourced from – well – within the search community.

That’s not a complaint per se because information sharing is a good thing. But it’s also nice to occasionally find data from independent sources and real users who don’t have an axe to grind or an app to sell.

Such is the case with YouGov’s recently released 2026 U.S. Web Search and AI Report and that’s why we are sharing it with you.

Report Background

YouGov’s report is based on responses to questions it asked its research panel of over 34 million registered members from 55+ markets worldwide. The report is primarily focused on the US search and AI market though there are some comparisons between the US and the rest of the world.

DBE team members reviewed the report and found some interesting data points we felt were worth sharing with our own insights on the implications for SEO and SAIO.

Search Behavior Highlights

86% of US online searchers looked for information or answers on a search engine in the last 30 days. Only 25% reported using an AI assistant/chatbot. Also, search engines were the default starting point for all the tested tasks. E.g., for “asking a specific question,” 69% of respondents said they started on a search engine and only 25% said they started with AI.

• DBE insight: The only caveat we have is the Google platform is now very much both a traditional search engine and an AI assistant at the same time – and we still don’t have any way to parse the usage and click performance of either. Nonetheless, this does offer further proof that SEO is not dead and remains a vital part of brand visibility.

58% of AI searchers are using AI more than a year ago, and 35% expect to use AI assistants even more in the next year. Among those who have not used AI in the past, 72% don’t expect to start.

• DBE insight: The growth in future AI usage is coming from those already comfortable with AI. These AI users will also likely be perfecting their prompts to search for the best answer to their question. As AI users become more adept at prompting AI, marketers must become more adept at creating SAIO content designed to become part of “the” answer to those more sophisticated prompts.

22% of AI users “most often” click on links as a next step. 16% compare sources with other AI apps; 8% conduct further searches on other topics; and only 17% stop searching.

• DBE insight: AI search is not a zero-click abyss but rather part of a longer journey of discovery. This finding is similar to what Marc Engelsman reported when looking at zero-click data for Google searches. A core goal of SEO and SAIO strategy is to develop consistent visibility throughout the search journey.

16% of AI searchers said “clear links to sources” would most increase trust in an AI answer. 15% said they trust AI more when “the answer comes from an official source” and 14% said “seeing multiple sources side-by-side” would increase their trust of AI answers.

• DBE insight: The report doesn’t define what is an official source, but as Billy Joel sings it, an official source may one with “A matter of trust”. And in both the traditional SEO and SAIO search realms, the Trustworthiness in Google’s E-E-A-T guidelines is earned with relevant, helpful content that leverages Experience, Expertise, and Authoritativeness.

Want to see the full report? If this data piqued your interest and you want to read more, you can download the YouGov report here.

Recently I have been trying to open some people’s one-track-mindsets regarding zero-click searches.

You may have heard some of our industry’s Chicken Littles proclaiming how the traditional search sky is falling because a recent study showed 68% of clicks now end with zero clicks on traditional Google organic search results.

But, as with the proverbial Chicken Little, it’s best not to leap to conclusions based on one experience. Consider these two additional data points from other studies produced by the same group behind the above referenced study:

• An obviously pre-AI 2020 study mentioned in the same story above showed – wait for it – 65% of Googles searches ending without a click. So a 3% increase in zero-click searches = the search sky is falling.

• Additionally, a 2024 study said the zero-click data included 21% of searchers who actually conducted refinement/follow up searches. So a third of the zero-clicks were actually led to a two-step search?

All I’m saying is maybe we shouldn’t be counting zero-click searches until they’ve fully hatched. (Couldn’t resist mixing chicken metaphors.)

P.S. If you’re a Dave Matthews Band fan, you probably know their song “Two Step.” The lyrics came into my head as I wrote the headline and I realized that one minor adjustment would make it relevant for AI search:

“Say, my [AI], I came to you with best intention
You laid down to give to me just what I’m seeking
Say [AI], you drive me to distraction”

The big question on SEO-ers and SAIO-ers minds: What does Google’s search bar expansion and AI-first announcement mean for organic search traffic?

Short answer: it’s too soon to tell, especially given Google also announced a May 2026 core update of its search algorithms last week, too.

But we have some considerations to share and impact premonitions:

Consideration 1: A recent analysis of user behavior when presented with an AI Overview included on the Search Engine Result Page (SERP) found increases in time users spent on the SERP and increased scrolling activity as they reviewed the range of information being presented. The implication is many users needed the time to review all the results on the SERP to confirm the AI Overview and/or decide which result they want to click for more information.

Consideration 2: A McKinsey survey of US consumers showed “research and understand general topics” as the top use of AI by task. “Discover and/or decide on brands, products, or services” was the third-highest use of AI. (We added the italics on “decide” to reinforce the consideration aspect.)

Premonitions: Based on Google search and analytics data we were analyzing before the AI-first announcement, we foresee:

• Impressions in Google Search Results will continue to increase but click-through-rates (CTR) will drop — so Organic Search Traffic volume will be lower than previous averages.

• However, the value of the Organic Search clicks you get (whether from AI Overviews or other traditional Google organic results) will increase as the user has considered your content to be more relevant to their needs. This will result in higher conversion rates and reduce the impact of fewer visits.

Stay tuned for more updates as we develop a clearer picture of the SEO/SAIO search road ahead.

You walk into a crowded room — a soiree of sorts. Around you, the crowd breaks into whispers. It’s people you know and people you’ve yet to meet. You may think they’re talking about your sick get-up or new haircut. Or are they actually talking about somebody else?

The thing is you can never be truly sure what’s being said in those whispers.

Today’s content marketers are faced with this dilemma as they try to align content with the whispered prompts being asked of AI search bots.

We know Search AI Optimization (also called SAIO, GEO, AIO, AEO, etc.) FAQs, whitepapers, and other answer-rich content can help gain visibility in AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity.

As search behemoths roll out AI-integrated features like Google’s new search bar, people are asking their full questions directly into AI chatbots as well as traditional search engines.

Here are some considerations for gaining insight into the right questions to guide your answer-driven content:

• What questions are people asking?
• Which questions are worth answering through content?
• How should you answer these questions?

What Questions Are People Asking?

Sales & Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) Knowledge

These are — hands down — the best knowledge mines, as they are directly interacting with customers. Most of us are aware of marketing/sales silos — content marketers can break through this divide by getting experts’ inputs early in the content planning process. If your sales/SME professionals are strapped for time, consult their notes, AI notetakers, and/or meeting recordings to unearth the most asked questions about features, offerings, processes, and more.

AI Platform Prompting

This seems simple and it could be, but AI tools still need to be prompted correctly. Be specific about your audience and the buying stage they’re in throughout the prompt because questions from the general public may be vastly different than the audience you’re targeting. Here’s an example prompt:

I am making [an FAQ/whitepaper/video script/other content] on [topic] for [specific target audience] as [your brand or non-branded industry]. Please provide a list of questions people ask about [topic] to AI platforms. They should appeal to people in [specific stages of sales/buying process]. [Include any extra clarification relevant to your needs like technical you want the questions to be.]

Now, put this prompt in multiple chatbots (at least 3). Compare the responses. You may notice very similar questions worded differently. Take this all as directional data. Note which ones are very applicable to what you know about your brand and how many times a core question is reiterated across AI responses.

Third-Party Tool Research

There’s a plethora of AI research tools out there that can help generate questions, including Moz, Answer the Public, and SEM Rush. Normally, we’ll start out with Google Keyword Planner to inform the keywords we use for this third-party tool research. Then, our team uses Answer the Public to generate long-tail keyword and question variations.

Also take this as directional data, especially if the tool offers a competitive research component. Every response is different in the AI — no general rankings to which to adhere — so if your brand is not mentioned in a sample response your tool pulls up, it doesn’t mean it is never cited. Always take variability between responses into account.

Review Websites

This is a reminder that you can use reviews from Amazon, Reddit, Google, etc. to see the questions people are asking about your brand’s offerings. Be sure to remember that most reviews are polarized one way or another. But, if a bunch of people have the same comment or question, this is a great place to gain insight.

Competitor Websites

Your competitors are doing something right in order to be your competitor. There are two ways to find how their content supports your shared audience:

1. Search through their content to see what questions they’re answering and topics they’re covering.
2. Go to AI platforms and search engines and prompt/search the topics/questions on which you compete for brand visibility. Are you competitors showing up with you/instead of you?

In both cases, you don’t ever want to copy (or reword) competitor content. (Ew, that’s not cute.) But you can put your own spin on the topic with your brand’s unique differentiators and experience. The reason (and we’ll talk about this more later) people click onto your website from AI citations and search engine results is because they in some way trust you — your experience, expertise, authority — as a source.

You may also notice topic gaps from your competitors and dive right in there with your own content to gain early visibility/authority for it.

Customer Interviews

If your company already does interviews, these can most certainly be repurposed in content. Here you can utilize a lot of the advice from previous sections: uncover their common discussions and questions on the process, product/service, etc. that could use clarification on your website.

Which Questions Are Worth Answering Through Content?

Let’s start by blowing up the bubble of positivity: answering questions on your site can get you cited in AI chatbot citations.

Now, let’s pop it: Unfortunately, there are more things that need to be considered before spending time and resources answering every viable question.

Namely, the big one is if the question can be easily answered in an AI summary in a sentence or two. If yes, the question could be answered as a part of a larger piece but not the sole focus. Examples: What is a pool vacuum? Is composting good for the environment? There’s already a plethora of content around these topics. The way to get clicks is by activating the unique brand spin, which brings us to E-E-A-T….

E-E-A-T stands for Experience – Expertise – Authority – Trustworthiness, and that is what your content should flaunt. Google recently released guidance on AI optimization and AI Search linking enhancements. Both pieces emphasize making relevant, helpful, E-E-A-T-based content. Why, you ask? Let’s discuss!

AI & Experience/Expertise: While AI has the expertise to easily answer questions like “What are good humidifiers for large rooms?” It has never actually experienced owning a humidifier to offer solid, all-encompassing advice. AI is just summarizing.

AI & Authority: Yes, AI does have authority, but only as much as its sources do. Your brand is endowed with its own authority by the content and products/services it puts out. You are the only one with your unique authority in what you do. Own it.

AI & Trust: Well, this one is tricky but gives brands the leg up. We trust AI to answer easy questions with nothing crucial riding on their responses. You may ask: “Who starred in this movie?” But you might not check beyond it to find out it was, in fact, not that actor. Having said this, you want to choose questions that people will want reassurance on, for example: “What’s the benefit of choosing this computer security platform over this one?” Questions like these are a bit further down the funnel where people are more primed for conversion.

So, the question for pondering is: how can you weave in your own brand experience, expertise, authority and trust to make people want to click through?

How Should You Answer These Questions?

Answers can not only be laid out in a FAQ format, but in a multitude of creative ways like videos (make sure to include a transcript), whitepapers, social posts, articles, etc.

What matters is that people get their answer in a clear way from a source they trust. After you’ve done your research, you’ll likely have a few topics you can use to expand your experience, expertise, authority, and trust through your website’s content. That will help drive AI visibility to your site!

Happy optimizing!

It appears Google is trying to drink its own E-E-A-T Kool-Aid with respect to the 5 AI search linking enhancements being rolled into AI Overviews and AI Mode:

1. “Explore new angles.” Here Google is anticipating potential fan-out queries and is prompting you to dive deeper into your prompt topic with links to articles, analyses, and other related content. It’s definitely an attempt to improve the user Experience.
2. “Easily access your news subscriptions.” This feature will highlight links from your news subscriptions in AI Mode and AI Overviews. It clearly amplifies the Trust factor (provided you trust the sources you subscribe to). One question is if it also might skew the AI algorithm to narrow the breadth of content presented, aka “preaching to the converted or choir”?
3. “Get advice from people who have been there.” AI responses will now include links that “provide a preview of perspectives from public online discussions, social media, and other firsthand sources.” Human Experience, check. Expertise, Authority, and Trust, TBD based on the quality of links and content being presented.
4. “See links right where you need them.” More links will be embedded directly within AI responses right next to the relevant text. This could be a plus for user Experience, but the rest of the E-A-T depends on how relevant the content presented really is.
5. “Get more context on linked websites.” Another attempt to provide elements of Expertise, Authority and Trust to preview and prompt a link click…

…Hmm, wait a minute as a cynical idea coalesces…

Is Google really adding these enhancements to help the user with a better AI response? Or is it just trying to bolster the reportedly very low Click-Through-Rates on AI Overviews and AI Mode citation links? Let’s go with both things so Google can have its cake (link clinks) and E-E-A-T it, too.

It’s hard to believe it’s only been 3 years since DBE was one of the first agencies to recognize the marketing opportunities inherent in Search AI Optimization (SAIO) and publish a framework for brands to leverage them.

There have been many changes since then in the form of new AI search engines, new AI search capabilities, new AI search tools, and (of course) new AI search acronyms (AIO, AEO, GEO).

What hasn’t changed, and what is now generally accepted within the search industry, are the 4 core strategic elements we introduced as a formula to gain AI search visibility and citations: Technical, On-Website Content, Off-Website Content, and Analytics.

And, while the strategic core remains, the tactics used to deliver AI success across these 4 pillars have evolved. So here is DBE’s 2026 Framework for AI Brand Visibility and Citations:

Recently, I’ve been questioning the role and capabilities of AI in various marketing- and content-related situations. So, I asked Perplexity those questions and am sharing the answers:

AI & Departmental Silo Mentality

In a post about the still ongoing issue of “silo mentality” betwixt and between company departments including sales, marketing, finance, etc., the question was “Will  AI technology help hasten organizational strategic alignment or create new kinds of tactical silos?” Here are highlights of Perplexity’s answer:

• “AI can do both—and which dominates depends almost entirely on how it’s introduced and governed.”

• “Evidence across research and practice converges on a conditional answer: AI accelerates whatever alignment (or misalignment) you already have.”

• Perplexity then noted one of the key determinants of AI success in terms of helping breakdown silos is a strategy-before-AI approach: “Strategy → AI, not AI → strategy”.
  

The bold emphases are Perplexity’s, but they are noteworthy — especially the realization that AI is a tactical tool that builds off the strategic inputs (and biases) of the users.

AI & Brand Differentiation

The ongoing need for marketers to create differentiation and relevance for their brand raised this question: “How would you respond to this statement regarding the differentiation dilemma marketers face: ‘the biggest issue with AI-generated content isn’t accuracy. It’s sameness.’” The Perplexity reply included these nuggets:

• “I’d respond by partly agreeing—but reframing it for marketers: Samenness [Perplexity’s misspelling] is the strategic issue with AI content, but it’s not the only one—and it’s not really a technology problem so much as a marketing one.”

• “You’re right that the deeper problem with AI in marketing isn’t ‘will it hallucinate?’—we can largely manage that. The real threat is that if we use it lazily, it drags our brand voice toward the industry average and makes us invisible. Our job isn’t to stop using AI; it’s to make sure the models are trained, prompted, and edited around our distinctive POV, data, and voice so we scale originality—not sameness.”
  

Perplexity agrees that sameness is a strategic issue with AI content, but it is putting the onus on marketers to provide it with the right prompts and training to avoid it. It’s odd hearing the GIGO (“garbage in, garbage out”) defense from AI. Oh, and the statement that “we can largely manage that” (i.e., hallucination”) is coming after the “samenness” typo?

AI & Creating Duplicative Content

On a lighter note, our post about the “Infinite Monkey Theorem” being updated to the “Infinite AI Theorum” asked: “Can AI bots be prompted in a way that will lead to an exact replication of a play like Shakespeare’s Hamlet?” Perplexity’s answer included:

• “No, not in any legitimate or allowed way—and in practice, not reliably even if you tried to ‘force it.’” 

• “In theory, if someone trained or fine‑tuned a private model directly on Hamlet with no safety filters and then prompted it cleverly, they might get very close to or even exactly reproduce the play.”

• “That’s less ‘prompt magic’ and more ‘I trained a model with the goal of memorizing Hamlet and allowed it to regurgitate it,’ which is exactly the type of misuse current providers try to prevent.”

It is good to know there are some AI guardrails, and it appears Shakespeare’s works are safe from both monkeys and AI bots — at least for now.

Nat: When AI citations and clicks are coveted and search engine rankings are constantly fluctuating, what do you need to know to keep your site optimized? From new acronyms to helpful tools to AI opt-out options, Marc Engelsman, our VP of SEO and SAIO at DBE, shared some major tips on LinkedIn, and we’re here to dive deeper to help you stay up to date. Hi Marc!

Marc: Hi Nat, what questions do you have for me?

Building Online Brand Authority

Nat: There was a post you did comparing “building a brand” to Build-a-Bear. Your website is the skin of your bear. You can dress it up however you want, but you need the proper optimization or “stuffing” inside it. Can you explain the elements to which you are referring and how people can start optimizing for them?

Marc: First, let me be clear, when we talk about proper optimization stuffing, it’s very much not about keyword stuffing. It’s all about getting keyword alignment throughout your page from top down – the URL, the Page Title, the meta description, the H1 tag, the content, and the alt tags. If you get all these done “just right” (as Goldilocks would say), then you will have built a well-optimized bear of a website.

Benchmarking SEO Data

Nat: Speaking of bears, you talked about being smarter than the average bear (a Yogi Bear cartoon reference) through benchmarking your own SEO data instead of comparing solely to industry averages. When do you recommend benchmarking the data, and which metrics should you focus on?

Marc: First you need to do an audit of what metrics are already available. Are you currently using GA4 or some other platform that provides website traffic data by channel/source? Have you identified Key Events aligned with the customer journey through to acquisition? Do you have an average value for a new customer that can be used to determine Return-On-Ad-Spend (ROAS for Paid Search) or Return on Investment for other channels like SEO? Have you already been doing SEO or SAIO and, if so, can you share past keywords/ranking data? If you have all this, you already have a good benchmarked data set. If you don’t you need to quickly fill in the gaps so you have a basis for creating your new SEO/SAIO strategy and for benchmarking it.

AI Feature Opt-Out Debate

Nat: AI opt-out features are available to website publishers and users. Both have benefits and pitfalls, but if one does not subscribe to AI opt-in features, the connection between publisher and user may not be made. What considerations should publishers and users mull over when making the decision?

Marc: It’s pretty simple. If you are a publisher and you opt-out of having AI bots crawl your site due to copyright concerns, you sacrifice visibility and authority for your website. If you are a user who opts out of allowing AI bots to “personalize” results based on your previous history, you sacrifice getting better results to your queries. Even if only the publisher or only the user opts out, then both may suffer less-than-optimal AI visibility.

AI Optimization Acronyms

Nat: AIO, SAIO, GEO, AEO… Search AI Optimization has many names, but we’ve been pointing out in our newsletter, Perceptive Marketer, (subscribe below) that the tactics are mostly aligned between acronyms. When a company is hiring an agency with these service offerings, what questions should they be asking?

Marc: I’m going to give you three related questions for both the hiring company and the prospect agency.

• First question from the company: How do you approach optimizing for traditional search engines and for AI platforms?
• First question from the agency: Do you see SEO and the fill-in-the-blank-acronym you use for SAIO as an integrated strategy or do you want to optimize for each as a separate channel?
• Second question from the company: What makes your approach to SEO/SAIO different from what other agencies are doing?
• Second question from the agency: Has your organization done SEO and SAIO work before? If so or if not, what’s prompting you to talk with us now?
• Third question from the company: How do you price your services?
• Third question from the agency: Do you already have a budget for this work? If not, what is your process and timeline for getting budget approval?

Answers to these questions will help companies and agencies assess how best to move forward with each other.

New Google ROAS Tool

Nat: Google Ads rolled out a Return-On-Ad-Spend-based tool to let advertisers calculate conversion value for new customers. You mentioned a potential new setting that could be a helpful feature. Can you explain what it was and the meaning behind it?

Marc: LTV stands for Life-Time Value and I was suggesting that a conversion setting that includes LTV would provide an even better way to look at the payoff of a new customer acquisition. Granted, LTV is not always the easiest thing for companies to assess, but we always ask about it during our Discovery and Benchmarking phase of work; and will work with companies to come up with at least a conservative estimation for reporting purposes.

Organic SERP & AI Citation URL Overlap Rates

Nat: The SEO tool, Moz, compared the URLs that show for Google organic search (AKA SERPs), AI Overviews, and AI Mode. Research on 40,000 keyword searches/queries across these platforms shows AI Overviews citations have an 88% overlap with Top 10 SERPs. AI Mode citations only have a 12% overlap with Top 10 SERPs. Why is there such a disparity between AI Mode citations and the organic SERP URLs?

Marc: AI Mode isn’t just searching for the specified keyword query – it’s building off the keyword to conduct broader, more topical “fan-out queries” to formulate responses. So, it’s not apples to apples in terms of keyword comparisons… more like apples to MacIntosh apples and Granny apples and Gala apples, etc. or maybe even apples to pears.

Nat: With that in mind, what does that mean for optimizing your website? Should we be doing anything different for AI Mode optimization?

Marc: It appears we can teach the new AI Overviews dog with relatively old, but proven, SEO “tricks” like tags and content alignment around target keywords on individual pages. As for AI Mode, the question is how much effort should be made to gain more visibility in AI Mode (that has less user volume than the other two)? My thought, at least until we have more data that suggests otherwise, is don’t let the AI Mode long-tail wag your SEO/SAIO strategy dog.

The Future of SEO Strategy in 2026

Nat: Keep appraised of new musings from Marc through DBE’s LinkedIn and our Perceptive Marketer newsletter. Is there anything you want to leave us with, Marc?

Marc: Stay tuned as all things SEO and SAIO are moving faster and faster. Are there any tips you would give, Nat?

Nat: I would say to use AI as a member of your content creation team. It shouldn’t be a one-bot show. Yes, it can help in aspects of the process like brainstorming or outlining, but people yearn for authenticity, originality, and connection. So, keeping humans as an integral part of the content creation process (like editing and writing) is crucial for developing higher performing content. Just be sure you keep SEO and SAIO best practices in mind as you craft it! Happy optimizing!

Marc: Happy optimizing indeed!