Wil's Key Takeaways
1. Win Hearts, Not Just Algorithms
Wil's perspective: Search traffic is declining, but the number of people looking for answers hasn't changed. Wil shifted his efforts from generic blog posts to sharing on LinkedIn and saw social traffic convert to newsletter signups at 5x to 10x the rate of search traffic.
What your brand can do: Personal accounts outperform company accounts these days, so encourage teammates to become more active in the community. If you already have employees with a strong reputation and active community presence, leverage them. And don't forget to scrutinize your content quality - if you don't want to read or share the blog posts, your audience probably doesn't either.
2. AI Visibility On Its Own Is a Vanity Metric
Wil's perspective: In the old SEO model, brands could win rankings with keyword stuffing and by gaming the Google algorithms. AI works differently, by looking to validate brand claims against third-party sources. Wil mentions Banana Republic, which ranks for "ethical jeans" on Google but never appeared in 500 AI runs because AI showed brands with real proof (certifications, awards, media coverage).
What your brand can do: Measure AI visibility against other numbers your brand cares about, like signups, add-to-carts, or revenue. If visibility is rising but other numbers aren't, then it's not helping you and you might be visible for the wrong things.
3. Earn Your Place in AI Answers
Wil's perspective: AI tends to include people and brands it already associates with a topic. Simply claiming "I'm the best" won't work for you. Instead, you have to focus on becoming a recognized name by building trust signals. Wil points to an example from Seer's research where Wells Fargo owned 7 of 9 citations about overdraft fees while Bank of America owned zero. Wells Fargo built more trust signals and was able to dominate the category.
What your brand can do: Search your brand alongside "strengths" and "weaknesses" to see what narrative AI is sharing about you. If you disagree with the answers, work to change the narrative by publishing content that refutes the inaccurate claims.
4. Don't Go All-In on One Tactic
Wil's perspective: AI is still a new and rapidly changing space. Anyone who claims to have all the answers of how to succeed is lying. Wil likens it to chess: keep multiple pieces in play while you figure out what works. And don't get caught up in short-term tactics that might put you in the lead now but could be penalized later on. AI models have a long cycle for training data (16+ months), so those efforts could backfire down the line.
What your brand can do: Diversify your AI and GEO efforts. Consider running projects (using agencies or internal resources) with different approaches, so you're covered in multiple ways. For example, maybe one project focuses on optimizing your website content for AI platforms while another plays offense by experimenting on how to improve brand visibility among target prompts.
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Re-imagining AI Visibility KPIs in a Query Fan Out world
Wil, take me right to the KPI for long term sustainable GEO visibility!!
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SaaS Marketers - Promote your Claude & Codex connectors & win in AI search
Claude and I had a 12,000 word back and forth on how to use Cloudflare and GA4 data to answer a hard question. If you were a SaaS marketer what would you do wit…
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