My name is Josh Blyskal.
I’m an AI Search Strategist at Profound.
Profound empowers brands with the data and insights to understand, take action on, and tangible improve their visibility in AI Search.
We actually analyzed AI search results. over 41,000,000
Across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity, and Microsoft Copilot
We tested queries with both commercial & informational intents in mind
These findings will change the way you think about search
400% increase in market share
2.15% decrease in market share – first time in a decade Over the last 6 months,
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/chatgpts-search-market-share-jumped-185233745.html https://www.reuters.com/technology/artificial-intelligence/openais-weekly-active-users-surpass-400-million-2025-02-20/
AI owns the relationship
Al now acts as both connector and arbitrator, owning the direct relationship with users
Past Paradigm Current Reality
ChatGPT’s browsing uses
Bing to do the heavy lifting
hot yoga studios with coupons brighton uk URL 1:
Perplexity is semantic and vector based
Perplexity
hot yoga in brighton
yoga classes in brighton
yoga studio brighton
hot yoga in brighton ✓
What is the best SUV for a family of 4 living in Woodstock, NY?
AI Search literally can’t be the
same as traditional search
Choosing the right SUV for your family of four in Woodstock, NY, involves considering factors such as space, safety, fuel efficiency, and performance, especially given the region's seasonal weather conditions. Here are some top-rated SUVs that cater well to family needs:
Kia Telluride
The 2025 Kia Telluride offers a spacious interior with three rows of seating, accommodating up to eight passengers. It's praised for its upscale design, comprehensive safety features, and a comfortable ride. The Telluride's robust build and available all-wheel drive make it suitable for Woodstock's varying Ask ChatGPT
Experiment:
Across 650 informational and commercial prompts, we asked ChatGPT and Google the same questions.
The best running shoe for marath
What % of ChatGPT results overlap with the Google SERP?
Analyzed commercial and informational queries across
SERP analyses of 650 individual ChatGPT executions
ChatGPT results overlap 12% with the Google SERP
ChatGPT loves Wikipedia
Perplexity is UGC-focused
Google AIO is domain agnostic
Copilot gravitates towards Forbes–massively
What drives citations?
Experiment:
Across
5 key industries and 50,000+ prompts, we measured how SEO signals correlate with AI citations
Traffic ≠ AI Citations
95% of AI citation behaviour cannot be explained by traffic r2 = 0.05
Low traffic High citation
Zero traffic 900+ citations
High traffic Low citation
Backlinks ≠ AI Citations
97.2% of AI citations cannot be explained by backlinks.
Sites with fewer backlinks often receive significantly more AI citations.
r2 = 0.038
Typical SEO strategies don’t apply
But make no mistake, AI Search is controllable
Technical optimization is key, but it looks a little different
User
Answer
Citation
ChatGPT Crawler
ChatGPT Index
Bing Index
Can you just optimize for Bing?
ChatGPT results only overlap 26% with Bing
Analyzed commercial and informational queries across 100 SERP analyses of 650 individual ChatGPT executions
9:41 9:41
AI crawlers don’t interact with Javascript
llms.txt is your new best friend
Semantic URL slugs win
Answer Engines go to the open internet and want to find the content that they are most confident will solve the specific query.
When ChatGPT compares URLs, it selects the one it’s most confident contains the answer.
goodonyou.eco/most-ethical-and-sustainable-clothing-brands-from-uk/ ecothes.com/blog/sustainable-brands-uk earthday.org/toolkit-how-to-shop-for-your-clothes/
goodonyou.eco/a8d7f-ethical-92j3k-brands-uk/
ecothes.com/blog/72hf3-sus-bra-uk
earthday.org/kit-92hd2-shop-clo-3jf8/
content="The best business credit cards include Ink
Business Unlimited, Venture X Business and U.S. Bank
Business Triple Cash Rewards, among other options.
AI Search is lazy
Reasoning
best men's running shoe?
Answer Engines have a recency bias
Answer Engines pick-up and cite content on the scale of days
Social media and UGC work situationally
I think these cloud GPU providers are probably the best bets for your startup:
RunPod.io - Affordable scalable and flexible GPU cloud with serverless dedicated and community-run instances for Al/ML
Paperspace - User-friendly platform good for development and research
CoreWeave - High-performance cloud GPUs with enterprise-grade reliability
Vast Al - ecentralized GPU marketplace for deep learning and HPC
FluidStack - Low-cost cloud GPUs leveraging underutilized hardware optimized for training and compute-heavy tasks
What does all of this mean for you?
AI search predictions
AI search is going to even more diverge
Brand visibility
Percentage of AI answers about Accounting Software that mention FreshBooks
Track your AI Visibility
Profound enables companies to analyze and improve how they appear in AI Answers. We do this by running millions of searches on platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews to build a picture of how AI responds to questions about brands, products, and industries.
Understand Conversations and Models
Find which models surface your brand and understand how many people are
for any topic in AI.
As a former SEO, we’re the black sheep of marketing.
AI search is about to become the sexiest area of digital marketing, everyone in this room has a prime opportunity.