Hi my friend!
As a senior content writer, one of the questions I get asked all the time is:
How should we actually optimize content for AI search?
And this week, I got to answer that question in a guide I wrote for Searchable 🤩
I’m genuinely happy I got to be the one writing it!
But before we get into the real deal, let me show you a little behind-the-scenes look at me writing this email for you:
I really think this is the perfect space for writing. It always boosts my creativity and productivity!
Now, back to AEO!
There’s a lot of AI search advice being repeated as a fact right now. But some of it has little to no evidence behind it. Google’s guide even points to specific popular advice and says they aren’t needed for its generative search features 🤯
That means you could spend time implementing something without knowing whether it actually improves your AI visibility.
So, I got to dig into the research, separate what we know from what we’re still guessing, and turn it all into practical recommendations you can trace back to research or official guidance.
The article isn’t live yet, but because you’re part of my little backstage community, you get the TL;DR before everyone else 👀
So here we go with key takeaways:
Answer your prospects’ questions clearly, support your claims with evidence, use credible authors, and make sure crawlers can access the page.
Put direct answers first in every section, then add more details, evidence, examples, and caveats. Each answer should make sense on its own, so AI engines can retrieve it for a relevant question.
Give AI engines something worth citing, like original data, firsthand insights, specific examples, or named primary sources. This gives AI engines something new instead of what’s already written everywhere.
None of this is radically different from strong SEO content.
When I write, I imagine exactly who the reader is, why they searched for that query, and what question they’re really trying to answer. Then I try to give them everything they need without making them look elsewhere.
Both traditional and AI search engines want to surface useful, trustworthy, original content. If you start with what the reader needs, you’ve already covered much of the AEO work.
But please don’t blindly follow every new tactic. Google says it ignores llms.txt files and doesn’t require artificial chunking or special AI writing styles for its generative features.
You also need to measure AI visibility separately from traditional SEO. Rankings and traffic still matter, but you should also track where your pages are cited or mentioned across different AI engines.
I’ll share the full guide with you when it goes live!
And while we’re backstage, let me tell you that today, I’m working on my first-ever UGC video collaboration with a marketing AI tool. I’ll be filming it over the weekend.
I’m excited, but I’m a bit anxious too.
My perfectionist side wants to get every detail right, and ideally finish the whole thing in one go.
But I know how that usually ends for me. I think about every part at once, feel overwhelmed, and freeze until the deadline gets uncomfortably close.
So, this time, I’ve split the project across several days.
Today, I chose the angle and wrote the first version of the video concept and script. Tomorrow, I’ll film myself talking, record some B-roll on Sunday, and edit on Monday.
I might move a few things as I go, but giving each stage its own day has already given me so much peace of mind.
And now that I’ve written the plan here, you’ll keep me accountable for actually following it 😄
Wish me luck! I’ll let you know whether the plan worked next week.
See you next Friday,
Kate 🌟
