In the view of a Search consultant, the effort to be cited by ChatGPT and other LLMs is pulling marketers’ attention away from what gets results.
TL;DR: optimise for organic and AI search equally.
It feels that generative engine optimisation (GEO) is replacing SEO as the prominent brand visibility tool, and Search consultant Marie Haynes analysed 100 websites to put its engagement potential to the test.
From her results, AI tools generated only a small share of traffic compared with Google organic search, which accounts for the great majority of tracked conversions. It leads to the conclusion that it is best to optimise for user satisfaction across Google – including AI Overviews and AI Mode – and not only for AI visibility scores.
At the same time, an AI tool might mention your brand and still recommend a competitor in the same overview, not quite making a mention equate to an endorsement.
So, what does this mean for a fund marketer?
Institutional consultants and investors are increasingly using AI Search for early research, building out shortlists of managers in a niche strategy. But it is unlikely that they will plump for a fund based on short chatbot answers. Mandates are won through DDQs, meetings, platform listings, fund factsheets and proof of historical track records. All pull their weight toward making a conversion more likely.
AI tools may describe your fund incorrectly, without your sign-off. This in turn means that fund marketers should up their game in making every source material it can draw upon accurate and current, and correctly labelled to the right investor type.
That level of quality and consistency should please both AI models and LPs, and can be regularly tested in the following ways.
Measure enquiries before you re-budget
Check your analytics to see how many sessions and queries come from AI referred compared with Google, and invest accordingly.
Fix your ‘marketing fundamentals’
Paying attention to fund pages, team bios and strategy explainers makes them indexable and relatable to questions that allocators actually ask.
Audit AI assistants’ view of your fund
Checking every quarter how leading assistants describe your firm and flagship funds helps correct any inaccuracies that risk failing compliance.
Track your recommendations
Whenever testing prompts like “best European small-cap managers”, check if you are simply a listing rather than a recommendation (two very different things!).
Juggle gated and public content
While professional investor gating is a key requirement for some fund documentation, be aware to leave enough crawlable summary content for Google and AI tools to understand what you do.
Source
Marie Haynes, “GEO is a distraction” (via TLDR Marketing)
