You need to master ChatGPT and AI-driven SEO

Everyone’s debating whether AI is going to kill SEO, but I’ve been quietly figuring out how to dominate ChatGPT search results for the highest-value keywords.

And guess what? The data doesn’t lie.

After testing with 50+ brands, we’ve found that 71% of ChatGPT results now come from Google, not Bing.

We're no longer in the age of “search engine optimization.” The new era is “search everywhere optimization.” 

People aren’t just Googling anymore—they’re asking ChatGPT, scrolling Reddit, searching Amazon, discovering stuff on Pinterest, and watching YouTube. The brands that are winning today are the ones adapting.

If you're not paying attention to this shift, you're already falling behind.

Here’s what the data tells us about the future of AI-driven search:

• 95% of ChatGPT citations come from content that’s less than 10 months old.

• Pages with visible "last updated" timestamps get 1.8x more citations.

• 86.5% of top-ranking pages have AI-generated content.

• AI overviews are capturing 37-50% of Google’s clicks.

That’s right—AI is already taking a significant share of Google’s traffic. If your content isn’t fresh and updated, you’re missing out. Content with clear “last updated” timestamps is getting more citations, meaning you're leaving a lot of opportunities on the table if you’re not doing this.

The winning strategy:

1. Keep your content fresh: Make sure it’s updated regularly. The timestamp matters.

2. Optimize for AI citations: Structure your content with clear H1 tags to make it easy for AI to pull.

3. Blend human insight with AI: Don’t just rely on AI. Mix in your human expertise for that unique angle.

4. Track performance across platforms: It’s not just Google anymore. Track your results across platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini.

Marketers can’t attract qualified traffic without the right help. Here are the tools and platforms that I’m using to rank in AI search:

• Ahrefs has a brand radar tool that shows how you’re ranking on LLMs.

• Hook Ahrefs up to Cursor to find trends in your niche before your competitors act on them.

• Clickflow is an AI writer created by my team of marketers and SEO experts. Just enter your business details and the type of content you want to create. We’re currently offering 25,000 words for free—no, that wasn’t a typo.

• Viewstats crawls YouTube and finds outlier content that’s successful on other channels.

• Claude Code connects everything, so you move a lot faster.

The real opportunity isn’t in fighting AI—it’s in recognizing that search behavior has shifted completely, and most businesses are still stuck optimizing for 2019.

The brands that win in 2025 will be the ones that master search everywhere.

Are you going to adapt fast enough to capture all the traffic? It’s time to start optimizing for where the world is going, not where it’s been.

To mastering the future of search,

Eric

1 - We’re hiring AI-forward performance ad creative strategists, AI-forward SEOs and paid media people, AI short form creators, AI automation interns, and more.. If you’re interested, apply at our Careers page.
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