In 2025, visibility isn’t just about Google. It’s about AI.

A customer asks ChatGPT, “Which companies lead [industry]?” Your name isn’t mentioned. Would you know?

Generative AI tools have fundamentally changed how customers discover and assess brands. Instead of scrolling through search results, they’re relying on single, AI-generated answers. Answers that may or may not include you.

For leadership teams, this shift raises critical questions:

• Are we even showing up in AI-driven answers?
• Are competitors capturing leads and mindshare that should be ours?
• Is traditional SEO still worth investing in, or is the future all about AI?

This article examines these questions and presents guidance for understanding and improving AI brand visibility.

Are We Being Seen?

The first (and most obvious) question many C-Suites are asking is whether their brand appears in AI-generated answers at all. While AI-driven platforms don’t offer the kind of keyword-ranking dashboards we’re used to in SEO, tracking is no longer a complete black box.

A growing wave of tools now scans ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews for brand mentions. Some companies are even building custom GPT workflows to evaluate how their narrative appears (or doesn’t) across common customer queries.

Manual testing still plays a role: asking AI tools questions that reflect real buying intent, such as “Who are the top providers in [industry]?” or “What is [brand] known for?”, can reveal both gaps and inaccuracies. Crucially, it’s important to pay attention to citations. If AI references outdated news articles or third-party blogs instead of your official content, that’s a sign of a deeper visibility issue.

Give it a try, ask your LLM of choice:

• “Who are the top providers in [industry]?”
• “What is [brand] known for?”

If your business isn’t featured prominently and accurately, you’ve identified an area for growth

Is AI Driving Leads and Sales for Others?

Here’s the uncomfortable reality: if your brand isn’t visible in AI answers, your competitors might be benefiting instead. For example, when a user asks, “What’s the best software for [problem]?”, AI tools may compile a shortlist that includes only your competitors, drawing from blogs, reviews, and discussion forums where they’re more prominently featured.

This isn’t just a brand perception issue—it’s a revenue issue. 

AI platforms are fast becoming gatekeepers for early research and decision-making. If competitors have a more substantial digital footprint across AI’s trusted sources, Wikipedia, forums, and authoritative reviews—they’re likely securing the attention (and trust) that once came through search engine rankings.

What to do:

Review whether competitors are investing in content strategies that AI surfaces and prioritizes—such as authoritative guides, Wikipedia pages, or well-structured FAQs..

Analyze the kinds of queries customers are making and whether AI tools recommend your competitors.

How Do We Improve AI Visibility?

Improving AI visibility is less about gaming an algorithm and more about ensuring your brand narrative is present, accurate, and authoritative across all platforms. Consider these strategic moves:

• Strengthen your digital footprint. Ensure that your brand information is consistent and up to date across key platforms AI trusts: Wikipedia, LinkedIn, industry review sites, and credible media outlets.
  
• Publish content that AI can easily interpret. Well-structured, fact-rich content that answers questions directly is more likely to surface in AI-generated responses. Think of it as creating “definitive answers” for your niche.
  
• Correct outdated narratives. If AI is pulling old data or incorrect claims, update those sources. This may involve refreshing press mentions, improving structured data on your website, or creating authoritative content to displace inaccuracies.
  

Be present where AI looks. AI tools draw heavily on community-driven sources such as Reddit, Quora, and niche forums. While these may seem secondary, they increasingly influence how AI platforms describe your brand.

Is SEO Still Worth It?

The rise of AI doesn’t mean SEO is dead; it means SEO is evolving. Traditional keyword ranking is less critical when AI-generated answers are what users see first. However, the content that fuels AI answers is still SEO-driven content.

Think of it this way: AI is only as good as the content it can find and trust. If your website and supporting content are not optimized, AI will default to citing competitors, outdated blogs, or third-party reviews.

Investing in authoritative, structured content now means you’re not just ranking for Google, you’re feeding the AI ecosystem with accurate, on-brand information.

What’s Next for AI Visibility?

Over the next 12–24 months, AI brand visibility is expected to shift from an experimental concern to a measurable metric. Early versions of AI monitoring dashboards are emerging, offering insight into how brands are represented across generative platforms.

Expect to see:

• AI content analytics tools are akin to early SEO software.
• Stronger partnerships between search engines and AI providers are changing how content is indexed and displayed.
• Enterprise-grade testing workflows, where brands regularly evaluate and optimize how they appear in AI-driven responses.

For C-Suites, the question is no longer whether this matters; it’s how early you want to take control of your AI narrative before your competitors define it for you.

Final Word for Business Leaders

AI brand visibility is an emerging but unavoidable challenge. Whether you’re tracking pipeline, managing brand reputation, or ensuring technical readiness, the question isn’t if AI-driven discovery will impact your business—it’s how soon and how deeply.

Start by asking:

• Are we visible?
• Are we being described accurately?
• Are competitors dominating the conversation?

Brands that start shaping their narrative now will have a decisive advantage in a future where AI, not traditional search, dominates how customers find and evaluate businesses.