What does AI-powered search mean for demand generation?

With Google announcing AI availability to all of its users and the answers to our questions being served without digging into multiple links, it begs a question as to who is actually reading our content.  

I find myself googling a question, finding an AI-generated answer at the top of the search page, and hardly ever scrolling down to see supporting links where the answer came from. Often, I compare the answer to my question on ChatGPT and move on to another task.

As a human being, I love the speed, the ease and the simplicity of getting information. As a marketer, I am feeling unsettled by lack of visibility of the sources of content when using Google or ChatGPT in the AI-powered era of search. In fact, many websites’ traffic is bound to fall drastically in the next few years as more and more tech buyers will rely on AI to find answers to their questions. 

It begs a question how we should adjust demand creation and demand capture given that most readers don’t look at specific links when doing their research. The latest thinking includes:

• Focusing on your ICP’s use cases to the degree that AI is forced to capture and quote your content.

• Diversifying from written text into other mediums, especially video and podcast to capture the eyeballs and the ears of the target audience.

• Creating an exceptionally easy way to understand what you sell on your website and making it easy to capture the demand of your target audience.

• Engaging your ICP in other places besides search, e.g. social media communities, industry associations, and user forums.

It’s clear that building authority on the web is more important than ever for demand generation success.

What is your thinking for adapting and thriving in the AI-powered search era?

#demandgeneration #demandcapture #AIpoweredsearch