Why this matters

More people ask AI tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google’s AI Overviews for recommendations before they open a search engine at all. When someone asks for a good option in your category, the AI answers from what it has already picked up: outside coverage, reviews, and content that plainly answers real questions. If none of that exists for your brand, the AI has nothing to recommend, so it recommends someone else.

This is sometimes called GEO, short for generative engine optimization. It runs alongside regular SEO but rewards different things: being mentioned by others, answering real buyer questions directly, and showing up in comparisons, more than keywords and backlinks alone.