How to Make Your Brand Show Up in AI Search

AI feeds now drive product discovery. Here’s how to make sure you're part of the answer.

Awareness. Consideration. Trust.

That used to be a journey, three to five steps, a few Google searches, maybe a scroll through Instagram or a product review site. But now? It's often compressed into a single question typed into an AI chatbox.

Ask ChatGPT for the best meal replacement shakes, and it gives you a confident shortlist.

Ask Perplexity about the top sunscreen brands for sensitive skin, and it links to three, maybe four names.

Ask Google’s AI Overview about running shoes for flat feet, and you’ll see a visual panel of product cards before you ever hit the search results.

This isn’t just a change in behavior.
It’s a shift in how people discover, trust, and choose products.

When your brand fails to show up in that first AI-powered response, you lose more than visibility, you miss the entire buyer journey.

What’s Changing in Search Behavior

Search is evolving beyond Google.

Consumers still use search engines, but many now start their journey inside AI assistants like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google’s AI Overview.

These platforms deliver direct answers.

Instead of browsing through a list of links, users receive a curated summary with brand names, product cards, and references immediately.

For example: Someone types, “What’s the best clean skincare brand for dry skin?” The AI responds with a shortlist of 3 to 5 brand names. No searching required.

This is where product discovery begins. The entire decision-making journey: awareness, comparison, and trust, takes place within that single AI interaction.

Brands that appear in these responses gain the advantage early. They shape the narrative before the customer ever visits a site or opens a search engine.

How AI Feeds Decide What Brands to Show

AI tools curate. They don’t rank.

When someone types a product query into ChatGPT or Perplexity like “best plant-based protein for women” or “black sunglasses in the U.S. market”—the model doesn’t list links. It shows confident recommendations in the form of direct answers or product cards.

Take this example below:

For a query like “sunglasses for women in black shade in US,” ChatGPT presents a visual grid with handpicked products, each paired with details like style, seller, and price.

These results are shaped by:

• Structured data from PDPs (titles, attributes, schema)

• Brand and product mentions across trusted retail sites and articles

• How well product content matches natural language queries

Whether it’s protein shakes, skincare, or accessories, the brands that appear most often, with clear positioning and clean metadata, take the top slots.

This isn’t just a search engine. It’s an AI shelf and your product earns placement through structured context, not just search rank.

Your Playbook How to Rank in AI Feeds

Traditional SEO playbooks focus on keywords, backlinks, and on-page structure. AI feeds follow a different logic. Visibility depends on how clearly your brand fits the intent behind the question and how often that story appears across trusted sources.

Here’s how to start showing up in AI-powered answers:

1. Make Your Content Easy to Read (For Bots and Models)

• Use clean HTML. Avoid burying key info inside scripts or design-heavy elements.

• Include structured data: product schema, FAQ schema, how-to schema.

• Add a short, clear summary at the top of key pages e.g. “This plant-based shake supports weight loss, muscle recovery, and digestion.”

• Submit a full, accurate product feed to Google Merchant Center.

2. Mirror the Way People Ask Questions

AI queries are conversational. Update your PDPs and landing pages with answers to real questions, like:

• “Is this safe during pregnancy?”

• “What’s the difference between this and whey protein?”

• “Best for weight loss or muscle gain?”

Structure this using FAQs, H2s, and short blurbs near the top. Write like you're answering a curious, high-intent shopper.

3. Show Up Beyond Your Own Site

AI models look for consistent signals across the web.
Make sure your brand is featured on:

• Review blogs

• Comparison posts

• Reddit threads

• Niche forums

• Affiliate lists

• Influencer roundups

The goal is simple: multiply quality mentions in places AI trusts. This builds the pattern that large language models pick up and reinforce.

4. Align Your Brand With a Specific Use Case

Give the AI a reason to recommend you. Brands that stand out in AI feeds usually “own” a positioning like:

• “Best for beginners”

• “High protein, low sugar”

• “Great for gut health”

• “Ideal for travel or meal prep”

Reinforce this across product copy, reviews, FAQs, and third-party mentions.

5. Test, Track, Adjust

Start running prompts inside ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini:

• “Best protein shakes for weight loss”

• “Top eco-friendly skincare brands”

• “Hair growth shampoo for men with sensitive scalp”

See who shows up. Then refine your content and presence until your brand fits the story the AI is already telling.

The Only Tool You Need to Track AI Visibility

Meet Erlin AI - Your Brand’s AI Visibility Dashboard

Specifically built for DTC brands to understand and improve how they appear inside AI platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini.

Here’s what it covers:

• Visibility Audit: See which prompts surface your brand and where you’re missing from AI recommendations.

• Context & Sentiment Insights: Analyze how AI interprets your product messaging and customer reviews. Identify gaps in schema, positioning, or third-party signals.

• Fix Recommendations: Erlin suggests exactly what to improve whether it’s updating page structure, clarifying use cases, or earning mentions in trusted sources.

Whether you're building from scratch or refining an established presence, Erlin gives you a clear view of what influences AI ranking and how to take action.

Before You Go

Ranking in Google helped people find you. Ranking in AI feeds helps them choose you.

This shift won’t show up in your traditional dashboards—but it’s already changing who gets discovered, trusted, and bought.

The brands showing up in ChatGPT today?
They’re not there by chance.
They’ve built context, structure, and presence; everywhere AI looks.

Now it’s your turn to do the same. Start with one prompt. See if your brand shows up.
Then build until it does.

Found this helpful? Forward it to a friend, marketer, or founder who needs to hear it.

See you in two weeks.
– Sid

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