The Big Lie of AI Visibility
I’ve been watching a debate that I find exhausting and, frankly, not very useful. On one side, SEO professionals insisting that AI visibility is basically the same as traditional SEO. On the other, AI natives proclaiming the death of SEO and celebrating product rankings in ChatGPT as if they were genuine gold medals. Both sides are selling an incomplete version of reality.
The uncomfortable truth is simple: yes, AI feeds on SEO. It’s obvious to anyone who has even a basic understanding of how LLMs work. AI rankings are fed by the same signals that have dominated search for decades.
Right now there’s a correlation between Google ranking and presence on AI platforms. But this may be transitory: AI needed some kind of signal and SEO was the best option.
The Problem Isn’t Where the Information Comes From
The real problem isn’t that AI rankings are based on SEO. The problem is that AI completely changes the dynamics of interaction with the internet. Where there used to be keyword-based result rankings, now there’s conversation.
People don’t want to see ten blue links and then research which one is best. They want someone—or something—to tell them directly what to buy, what to hire, what to do. AI chat isn’t perfect, but it’s much closer to satisfying that need than any search engine. Because it resembles the human interaction you’d have with a trusted expert.
SEO Professionals Who Are Celebrating Shouldn’t Be So Comfortable
There are those who argue: “AI uses our content, so we remain relevant.” Strategic mistake. Google itself is already making its intentions clear by activating an AI tab in the number one position of its tools. The default functionality remains classic search, but only for now.
Thinking this won’t change is like believing the Yellow Pages were going to survive the internet.
What’s happening is a control transition. Before, the user controlled the process: they searched, evaluated options, decided. Now AI mediates that decision. And when something stands between your content and the end user, you lose a lot of control.
What This Means for Your Business
If your visibility strategy depends exclusively on ranking on Google with traditional techniques, you’re building on sand. It’s not that SEO is dead—that’s a sensationalist headline—it’s that the rules of the game are changing.
You need presence where people are actually looking for answers now: Google’s AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, etc. You need your brand, your products, your services to be known by these systems.
And even more important: you need to build experiences that AI can’t “summarize.” Interactive tools, calculators, simulators, content that requires active user participation. Because that will continue to generate direct traffic when informational searches have completely migrated to conversations with AI.