I did AI-SEO for ChatGPT and Google AI

I spent the last six months trying to figure out how to get websites featured in Google's AI overviews, chat GPT, and every other AI's search results. And I'm afraid to say, I f***ing cracked it. One client's AI traffic shot up over 2,000% and they now appear in over 90 AI overviews compared to zero before. In this video, I'm going to show you how to identify all the AI opportunities in your niche, how to optimize your site to show up in them, and how to track your AI traffic so you're drowning in dopamine every time you open analytics. My name is Matt Diggity. I'm the director of The Search Initiative, a world-renowned SEO agency managing some of the biggest brands on the internet. And today I'm going to show you how we're now doing SEO in the age of AI. Let me first give you a quick background on what this client was dealing with. Imagine you run a website for a quality brand. You're like the BMW of your industry, but you don't show up in any AI search results. Not Google, not chat GPT, nothing. Meanwhile, your competitors with 1997 whatever mobile websites are teabagging you and dominating all these AI searches. Our customer was frustrated. It would be like your grandma knowing how to out-SEO you. With all due respect for grandma, we couldn't let that happen. Now, before I get started, quick heads up. My agency, The Search Initiative, is now taking on a handful of new clients. If you want results like this, we're offering $1,000 off month one in exchange for a testimonial down the road. Just head on over to thesearchinitiative.com, put your deets into the form, and we'll hit you up. All right, let's get cooking. So why would you want to optimize your website for AI anyways? Because not too long ago, when fine-cultured people would search for something like premium Japanese whiskeys, they'd get served a set of websites from Google. And if you were the number one mofos like uesuki.com here, then you were like, But now the search result looks like this, where AI overviews are summarizing the answer. There's links over on the right, but no link to our tomodachi. That means friend in Japanese, Uesuki. AI SEO is not only about getting your brand featured in the link section of the AI overviews. You also want to show up in chat GPT. Uesuki is number one on freaking Google for its coveted keyword, but not even listed here for online whiskey retailers in chat GPT. So how do you get into the AI answers? Think of it like this. If the AI uses you to come up with its answer, then it's likely to link to you. So the name of the game is to do all the things that make the AI want to use your content. But where do we begin? First, you need to figure out all the AI opportunities in your niche, so you can target them and optimize for them. Ahrefs recently launched a new tool called Brand Radar. It lets you find out what AI is saying about your brand. Enter your brand name, product or service, and hit enter. I like to add my brand plus some competitors to see how I'm doing against them and what AI answers I need to steal. Once you hit explore, you can see the number of mentions of your brand versus your competition. Scrolling down further, here's where you'll find which AI keywords mention you or your competitors. If you want to see which keywords your competitors have and you don't, then set up a filter like you see here and then voila, here we go. Now for the meat and potatoes. For the last six months, I've tested countless AI SEO theories. Here are the 12 most impactful tactics that you can use to make sure your website is featured in AI. Let's start with how to relearn your content strategy. The first tactic is to make sure your content is direct and concise and not fart around the answer with fluff. Here's the AI overview for do heat pumps work in water? The top Google results are actually from the sites Heatable and The Guardian, but they're not mentioned in the AI overview. In the Heatable article, yes, it's very cute that they use language like when the earth goes cold, we're likely to start seeing pigs fly. But AI don't play that game. Instead, let's look at Ira's article who actually did get the AI overview link. Language like works exactly the same way in winter is more confident and direct and immediately answers a question. Next, be conversational in the tone of your content. AI-powered search isn't based on keywords like the old days of Google. It relies on how people actually speak. If you search for a keyword like 15-minute home workout, surprise, no AI overview. But if you search what's a quick 15-minute workout I can do at home without equipment, sure enough, AI overview. So to get picked up for these AI queries, you need to write conversationally and not robotically. Next, headings, you know, H1s, H2s, and so forth, play a ridiculously important role in how AI systems understand your content. Here's how to think about them. H1, use a single H1 for the main title of your page. H2, use H2 tags for major sections or questions. H3, use H3s for sub points or nested ideas within an H2 section. For example, here's a heading structure for an article on cloud hosting. MailChimp has an article about when to post on Instagram with a designated H2 for posting on Sundays. Sure enough, it was picked up in the AI overview for should I post on Instagram on Sundays. After that, and this one is super easy, add a TLDR summary at the beginning of your article. Providing a brief TLDR, too long, didn't read, helps readers and AI quickly grasp the key points on your page. Alternatively, you can include a key takeaway section, which AI also really likes to cite. Now, before I go on, here's one thing that you really need to know. All the AI bots need to trust you, your brand, your company, your reputation, if they're going to cite you. So let's get into some AI SEO tactics around brand and reputation. Start to regularly check AI platforms for what it knows and thinks about your brand. Some prompts you can use are, what can you tell me about my brand? And what does my brand do? Here's an example of what would come up in ChadGBT. If you see anything that's wrong or inaccurate here, you need to take action in this next step. Take control of your brand narrative. LLMs learn about your business and its reputation from the following places. Google Business Profile, Yelp, LinkedIn, Trustpilot, and so forth. Make sure you've claimed these listings and their information matches your website's About and FAQ pages. And the reviews. Bro, do everything you can to maintain a high star rating. The number of reviews and average rating has a stupid amount of control over your AI SEO rankings. And don't just collect reviews on these profiles. Highlight them visibly on your website. Next is an industry secret that every OG SEO knows. If you want to improve your website's trust and reputation in Google's eyes, get high quality links from relative domains. The oldest story in SEO. Backlinks from reputable sites act as trust signals for both users and AI systems. Now, this isn't a paid promo. In fact, they don't know I'm dropping this at all. But these days, I've been getting high authority links from simplymedia.digital. The quality for price is just way too good. Now that you've convinced Google to trust your brand, we still need to make sure that they trust your content. The stuff you write. If you think about how AI systems work, they dump out a bunch of information and they cite the content they use so you can trust it. You need to do the same thing. Use credible sources and provide links to them. You also want to publish expert-driven content. Use quotes from experts to salt bae a dusting of trust to your content. And include author bios with credentials on each of your articles. Speaking of credentials, if your business has any industry certifications or awards, list them on your site. If you're a Michelin star restaurant, you'd have to be smoking crack not to display it. Next, it's not just enough to say that you're an expert, you have to actually show it. Do that with case studies, real-world examples, client success stories, and original research. This not only adds credibility, but signals to AI systems and Google that your content demonstrates first-hand experience and proven results. That's exactly the kind of content that AI-driven systems are designed to highlight. Now, for the most important step of all, I'll quote the business legend Peter Drucker, if you can't measure it, you can't improve it. You must track your AI traffic in Google Analytics 4. Navigate to Reports, Acquisition, Traffic Acquisition. This is where you'll find your general traffic stats. Then click Add Comparison at the top. Add a filter for only referral traffic. Then under Dimension, search for Session Source slash Medium. Yes, I know Analytics has the user experience of a medieval torture chamber, but we're almost done. Under Match Type, select Matches Regex, and then paste this big-ass regular expression, which is also in the description. With any luck, you'll have some AI traffic. You can see what platforms it came from, and what pages on your site it's going to. So, what was the result of all this effort? 2,300% increase in AI referral traffic. The client site is appearing for 90 keywords and AI overviews compared to zero before the campaign. And yes, their typical Google SEO traffic took off too. If you'd like us to take a look at your SEO, head on over to thesearchinitiative.com and use the form at the bottom to reach out. That's it. We'd be happy to take a look at your site and let you know what we can do for you. $1,000 off your first month until the end of the month.