A recent large-scale study by Victorious, published by Search Engine Journal, reveals a striking visibility gap within AI search engines. When you ask AI assistants like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini and Perplexity directly what a specific company or brand does, the system provides an accurate description in a staggering 96% of cases.
However, if a prospective customer asks a general advice or purchasing question (such as “what is the best software for X?”), 89% of those same brands fade into the background entirely. They are simply omitted from the generated responses. In short, AI models know your brand, but they rarely actively recommend it to potential buyers.
Why knowledge doesn’t automatically lead to recommendations
Many business owners and marketers assume that for Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO), it is enough for a Large Language Model (LLM) to know who you are. This research proves that passive brand awareness in the AI’s memory is only the beginning.
This is because AI systems use a completely different mechanism when compiling a list of solutions compared to when they are defining a company:
- Direct brand queries: The AI retrieves basic factual information from its training data or crawled brand pages.
- Advice and comparison queries: The AI looks for clear supporting evidence, contextual relevance, third-party reviews and specific use cases to rank the best options.
If your website or online presence only explains who you are, but fails to offer concrete answers to specific customer pain points and comparison queries, the model will recognise your brand but won’t select it in its response.
What does this mean for you?
To transform from ‘known by AI’ to ‘recommended by AI’, you need to align your GEO strategy with your target audience’s evaluation stage:
- Focus on comparison and advice queries: Create content that specifically answers concrete buyer questions, such as “how much does X cost”, “best options for Y” or “pros and cons of Z”.
- Strengthen your external evidence: AI models rely heavily on independent sources for recommendations. Ensure your brand is mentioned with clear use cases on external review platforms, comparison sites and industry media.
- Use clear answer structures: Place concise answers and summaries right at the top of your most important pages. This makes it easier for AI systems to extract and cite your information.
Source: Search Engine Journal
