As ChatGPT, Gemini and AI-powered search tools influence how people discover companies, businesses are wondering: how can we rank higher in AI-generated answers?
In her latest op-ed for Forbes Business Council, Valentina Drofa, Founder and CEO of Drofa Comms, argues that the question asked is a wrong one.
AI cannot create a company’s reputation from scratch. It can only work with the public presence that already exists.
Why AI Search Visibility Is More Than SEO
For years, companies have invested in websites, SEO, social media and other tools designed to make them easier to find online. AI is now alongside them as another important gateway to information.
Still, Valentina argues that AI visibility should not simply be treated as the next generation of SEO.
Large language models gather information from multiple sources, including company websites, media coverage, interviews, partnerships, reviews and executive profiles. They then use this information to form an answer about a business.
That means technical optimisation and discoverable content matter. But they are only one layer.
The foundation remains the credibility a company has built publicly over time.
How Companies Can Improve Their AI Search Visibility
According to Valentina, businesses looking at their AI visibility should consider several things:
- Build a consistent public presence rather than relying on a single campaign or a few optimised pages;
- Pay attention to source quality, as credible media coverage and independent recognition can carry more weight than purely promotional content;
- Keep information fresh, because AI systems may favour more recent sources when forming answers;
- Treat technical optimisation as an additional layer, instead of a substitute for reputation built over time;
- Check AI-generated answers manually, since models can miss context, repeat outdated information or produce incorrect claims.
This is also why trying to optimise exclusively for algorithms can only go so far. A company cannot simply invent the reputation it wants AI to describe.
The stronger approach is to make sure that when an AI system looks for information about the business, there is enough credible, consistent and up-to-date material for it to work with.
Read Valentina Drofa’s full Forbes Business Council op-ed, “AI Can’t Create Your Reputation — It Can Only Reflect It,” to get her complete take on AI visibility, SEO and public credibility.
