1. Citations ≠ backlinks
This trips up EVERYONE.
With backlinks, you care about anchor text, DA, what page gets linked. A high-DA site can talk trash about you but as long as they link to your website, that link still helps your Google rankings.
With AI citations, the actual CONTENT matters. LLMs read and understand the page. They care if it says "your pricing starts at X" or "you're best for companies like Y."
The information itself is what matters, not just the link.
2. Tech SEO doesn't help with LLMs; there isn't a version of tech SEO for LLMs either.
All those SEOs who love technical optimization? Sorry.
Don't waste time on LLM.txt or other technical "solutions" - I have data proving they don't work.
Just make sure your site isn't JavaScript-based. That's it.
3) Content strategy is dependent on new metrics.
In traditional SEO, you use search volume and Keyword difficulty to select keywords.
For AI optimization, we identify searches where LLMs use vague sources to generate their answers.
This means you have a chance to replace existing citations with better content from your site.
So, "citation vagueness" is the new keyword difficulty.
4. Web presence > website
SEOs are used to optimise pages for keywords. In SEO, you only think of other place you're mentioned when you're thinking of backlinks.
AI search doesn't have this website, off-website divide. It thinks of your entire web presence at once - not just your website.
If ChatGPT believes a competitor's support is better than yours, you can:
- Create a dedicated support page
- Add sections on your existing pages talking about your support
- Run PR campaigns talking about your support
- Tweak your review collection process to make your customers highlight your support
Sure, your website is still the center, but it's just one piece of your web presence.
What I'm sharing feels unnatural to some SEOs, and others get excited by how obvious but new this is.
Either way, it's not easy to self realise this. There is a lot to unlearn.
The only reason I was able to figure this out, is because the SEO team at Spear Growth has 4 years of experience working across B2B SaaS clients for SEO, but we also have access to Chosenly.com data across all our Chosenly clients.
This is a rare scenario and we're definitely extremely lucky to be in it.
Most SEOs aren't this lucky. i.e. most companies don't have the talent needed to execute on this.
That's why even with the DIY plans of Chosenly.com, we always give dedicated consulting support. Implementing without that is extremely hard.
Send this to an SEO person who's been trying to crack AI search optimisation.
– Ishaan "Making AISO less confusing" Shakunt
Ask: We crossed 20k in rev, which is great for a month but we need to get to 100k in 2 months now. Know anyone who may be interested in checking out Chosenly?
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