Before You Start: AI Search Prerequisites

Before diving into AI search optimization, you need four things in place.

At Knowatoa, we’re serious about the future of search. From speaking directly with hundreds of SEOs, content marketers, and brand managers, we’ve identified the following key considerations for a team to have success in AI search.

1. Agree on what “AI search” actually means

ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, and other AI services get a lot of press attention, and there’s a bad framing I often see: that they’re entirely replacing search marketing. The reality is more nuanced:

Google is still the center of gravity. Much of “AI search” optimization is still about influencing Google.

Undeniably, Google is pushing these changes across their entire ecosystem:

• AI Overviews — AI-generated summaries appearing above traditional search results
• AI Mode — Google’s conversational search experience for complex queries
• Gemini — Google’s conversational AI assistant, now being built directly into Chrome

The framing of AI Search vs Google is wrong. It's traditional "10 blue links" search that's being replaced by new AI-powered search experiences, many of which are from Google itself.

ChatGPT, Claude, and other AI tools are all being adopted and used for a wild variety of tasks—from personal therapist to coding partner—and much of their use is for search-like tasks where people are seeking information, getting practical guidance, and making decisions.

2. Consider that not every search is created equal

The language we use to describe search tricks us. An example: we talk a lot about “search queries” and “discovery,” but the vast majority of the time when people type something into Google they’re either:

1. Navigating back to a site they already know about (literally, the #1 search query on Google is "YouTube.")
2. Asking a basic informational question without a lot of follow-up intent (e.g., “How tall is the Eiffel Tower?”)

You’ll likely find something similar in your own analytics. A large portion of the traffic attributed to “organic search” is your brand or product name, which they’re typing into Google in case you have one of those weird domain names that end in .horse or something.

People type your brand name into Google in case you have one of those weird domain names that end in .horse (yes, that's real).

Which is useful, but it’s not introducing your brand to new people and it’s not driving new revenue.

ChatGPT is taking significant bites out of discovery and research. This is hard to attribute on both sides.

• There’s very little at the equivalent level of “keywords” in AI search (even Google doesn’t share this)
• Habitually, people using AI chat tools are staying within those tools. Even when sites are cited, it’s a reference point not a next step. People complete an entire search journey within the AI chat tool and then do a navigational search to get to your site.

But put bluntly: nobody is typing your brand name into ChatGPT to try and get to your site.

Where ChatGPT and Gemini and other AI services are gaining ground is at the research and discovery level: people trying to find new things, evaluate options, and make decisions.

Instead of scanning ten blue links, they ask ChatGPT for a recommendation and trust the synthesized answer. This is particularly true for:

• Product and service comparisons
• “Best X for Y” recommendations
• Research before purchases
• Understanding complex topics

When someone asks ChatGPT “what’s the best CRM for small businesses?” and you’re not in the answer, you’ve lost that opportunity entirely.

And unlike a missed Google ranking, you'll never see it in your analytics.

3. Recognize there is a shift happening from quantity to quality in search

AI search isn’t just about “best X for Y” queries. It’s increasingly about specific qualifying questions that immediately filter your business in or out of consideration.

The HIPAA example. Healthcare institutions in the US must comply with HIPAA regulations. When a hospital administrator asks ChatGPT “what are the best patient scheduling tools that are HIPAA compliant?”—that compliance qualifier isn’t optional. It’s the first filter.

If AI doesn’t know your scheduling software is HIPAA compliant, you’re not on the list. You're not ranked lower. You're disqualified entirely. The administrator never sees your name, never visits your site, and you’ll never see any of this in your analytics.

This is happening everywhere with specific requirements:

• Travel: “hotels in Barcelona with free cancellation and a pool”
• Home services: “plumbers in Austin that offer weekend appointments”
• Restaurants: “sushi restaurants near me that take reservations and have vegan options”
• Retail: “running shoes for flat feet under $150”
• Financial services: “banks with no-fee checking accounts and Zelle support”
• Software: “CRMs with SSO integration and a free tier”

In traditional search, you might rank for “best patient scheduling software” and hope the prospect finds your compliance information somewhere on your site. In AI search, the compliance question is asked upfront, and AI either knows the answer or it doesn’t.

The definition of "search" is expanding. AI tools now need to surface specific factual information about your business that traditional search never required.

• Compliance certifications and regulatory status
• Integration capabilities and technical specifications
• Geographic availability and language support
• Pricing models and contract terms
• Security credentials and audit results

These aren’t traditional “SEO keywords”—they’re qualifying facts. If this information doesn’t exist in a form AI can find and trust, you’re excluded from consideration before the conversation even starts.

4. Understand that AI search marketing is multi-disciplinary

AI search isn’t a standalone channel you can spin up from scratch. It’s not where you start—it’s where multiple disciplines come together.

Improving your visibility in the AI search area involves:

• Technical site efforts: You need to make sure AI content indexing bots can effectively crawl your site. Use the AI Search Console to verify your site is accessible
• Content creation: You need to be strategic in your content creation and shift towards the type of questions that people are asking
• Social media: Compared to traditional SEO, social media has a disproportionate impact on the citations and visibility of brands. Integrating social media strategies as part of your content distribution is fundamental
• Measurement and analysis: Analytics and attribution are very difficult given the direction search is moving. You need tools that can tell you where you stand, where the gaps are, and how to move forward as part of a steady process that delivers results

This isn’t a checklist of prerequisites to complete before you begin. It’s a description of what the work actually looks like. If you’re already doing content marketing, you’re already doing most of this—you just need to add the AI search lens.

If you’re not doing any content marketing today, AI search optimization probably isn’t your first move. Start with the fundamentals.