New research reveals why earned media, technical optimization, and content strategy must work together to help brands get discovered by AI.
For years, brands have invested heavily in search engine optimization (SEO) to improve their visibility on Google. The strategy was relatively straightforward: build a technically sound website, develop relevant content, earn backlinks, and compete for rankings.
But the rise of AI-powered search is fundamentally changing how customers discover, evaluate, and choose brands.
Today, consumers and business decision-makers are increasingly turning to platforms like ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, and Perplexity for answers and recommendations. Instead of browsing a list of websites, they are asking questions and receiving synthesized responses that draw information from multiple sources.
This shift raises an important question for marketers: What information is AI using to form its answers, and how can brands influence whether they appear?
A new October 2026 study from Generative Pulse and Muck Rack, titled What Is AI Reading?, offers some revealing answers.
Based on an analysis of more than 40 million AI responses, the research points to a significant development in digital marketing: improving visibility in AI-generated answers requires more than optimizing your website. It requires building authority and credibility across the broader digital ecosystem.
And that means SEO and public relations need to work together.
84% of AI Citations Come From Earned Media
Perhaps the most significant finding in the report is that approximately 84% of the sources cited by AI platforms come from earned media, while roughly 99% come from non-paid sources.
Before jumping to conclusions, it is important to understand how the study defines earned media. It includes traditional journalism, academic research, government and nonprofit websites, encyclopedic sources, social platforms, and third-party corporate content.
Traditional journalism alone accounts for approximately 22% of citations.
This distinction matters because the findings do not suggest that traditional PR placements generate 84% of AI citations. Instead, they demonstrate that AI platforms frequently turn to independent, third-party sources when constructing answers.
For brands, the implication is significant.
You can publish excellent content on your own website, optimize every page, and implement the latest technical SEO recommendations. But if your brand has little recognition or credibility beyond its own digital properties, you may be missing an important component of AI visibility.
When AI platforms research a company, product, or industry, they often encounter information published by organizations other than the brand itself.
This is where public relations becomes increasingly valuable.
Earned media coverage, expert interviews, independent research, and mentions in credible industry publications help establish a brand’s presence across the information sources AI systems may reference.
The goal is no longer just to make your website discoverable. It is to make your brand discoverable and credible wherever AI looks for information.
Your Website Still Matters. A Lot.
While earned media dominates the overall citation landscape, the research also reinforces the importance of brand-owned content.
The study found that product and service pages account for 58% of citations from owned media, followed by practical guides at 24%.
In other words, AI platforms still rely heavily on company websites when they need specific information about products, services, and solutions.
This creates an important distinction between the roles of SEO and PR.
Your website is where you establish what your company does, explain your products and services, demonstrate expertise, and provide detailed information about your solutions.
Third-party sources help establish credibility, validate claims, and provide independent perspectives.
For example, consider a medical technology company seeking to appear when someone asks ChatGPT about innovative rehabilitation devices.
The company’s website should clearly explain how its technology works, which patients may benefit, the clinical evidence supporting its products, and how its solution compares with alternatives.
At the same time, coverage in respected healthcare publications, independent clinical research, and interviews with medical experts can help establish broader credibility.
Neither approach replaces the other.
A technically optimized website without external validation may struggle to establish authority. Strong media coverage without clear, accessible website content may leave AI platforms with an incomplete understanding of the company’s offerings.
An effective Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) strategy needs both.
Different AI Platforms Trust Different Sources
Another important finding is that AI platforms do not all rely on the same information sources.
In the study’s September 2026 comparison, ChatGPT drew approximately 35% of its citations from government and nonprofit sources. Gemini relied more heavily on owned media, which accounted for approximately 34% of its citations. Claude showed a preference for third-party corporate content, while Perplexity cited traditional journalism more frequently than the other platforms.
The researchers also found that only 212 domains appeared across all four providers in their comparative analysis.
This demonstrates why optimizing for a single AI platform is not enough.
A brand that performs well in Gemini may have limited visibility in ChatGPT. A company frequently mentioned in Perplexity may be absent from Claude.
It also suggests that brands need a broader approach to content distribution and authority building.
National media coverage can be valuable, but so can industry publications, regional media, academic sources, professional associations, and well-structured content on a company’s own website.
The right mix will depend on the company’s industry, audience, and the questions potential customers are asking.
For marketers, this represents a shift from trying to rank for a collection of keywords to building a consistent brand presence across multiple sources of information.
The Questions Customers Ask Determine What AI Cites
One of the most actionable findings in the research is that AI platforms use different types of content depending on the question being asked.
When users ask how-to questions, practical guides account for 68% of citations.
When users ask for the best products or services, buyer’s guides and reviews account for 45%.
For industry trend questions, expert analysis leads with 41% of citations.
And for comparison questions, evergreen reference content accounts for 37%.
These findings have important implications for both content development and public relations.
A company looking to increase visibility for product comparisons should develop clear, accurate comparison pages and seek independent evaluations.
A business hoping to become a recognized industry authority should publish original research, contribute expert commentary, and pursue opportunities in relevant trade publications.
A company targeting practical questions should create detailed educational content that directly addresses customer needs.
Rather than simply producing more content, brands should organize their efforts around the questions people are asking AI.
That requires understanding customer intent, identifying gaps in existing AI answers, and developing content and earned media strategies designed to address those gaps.
This is where integrating SEO, AEO, content strategy, and PR becomes particularly powerful.
PR Is Becoming an Important Part of AI Search Strategy
Historically, SEO and PR have often operated as separate marketing disciplines.
SEO teams focused on search rankings, website content, and technical performance. PR teams concentrated on media relationships, storytelling, thought leadership, and reputation.
The growth of AI-powered discovery is bringing those disciplines closer together.
Consider another finding from the Generative Pulse and Muck Rack research: Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity frequently cite smaller publications than ChatGPT.
In fact, Claude showed a particular preference for smaller trade and regional publications.
This is an important opportunity for companies that may not have the resources or national recognition to secure coverage in major media outlets.
A respected industry publication with a specialized audience may provide meaningful value in AI-generated answers, even if its overall readership is relatively small.
For PR professionals, this reinforces the value of targeted media relations, specialized industry expertise, and thoughtful storytelling.
For SEO and AEO professionals, it creates another opportunity to understand which external sources influence AI answers and coordinate efforts to build visibility within them.
The result is a more integrated strategy that connects technical optimization with reputation and authority building.
Technical AEO Provides the Foundation
Although earned media is critically important, the report should not be interpreted as suggesting that technical optimization is becoming less relevant.
Quite the opposite.
Making content accessible, understandable, and useful to search engines and AI-powered discovery systems remains a foundational requirement.
Technical AEO work includes improving site architecture, resolving crawling and indexing issues, implementing appropriate structured data, strengthening internal linking, and developing content that clearly answers important audience questions.
It also involves ensuring that product information, company details, expertise, and supporting evidence are presented consistently across a website.
The research underscores why this work matters.
Different AI providers have different technical approaches to retrieving and citing information. The report found that crawler access was particularly important for Claude and Gemini, although the relationship between crawler permissions and citations varied across providers.
A company may have outstanding content and strong media coverage, but technical barriers can still make some of that information difficult for AI platforms to discover.
Technical AEO helps establish the foundation. Public relations helps expand the brand’s credibility and visibility beyond its own website.
Together, they create a more comprehensive strategy for AI discovery.
Measuring AI Visibility Requires a Different Approach
Traditional SEO measurement has centered on keyword rankings, organic traffic, impressions, and conversions.
Those metrics remain valuable, but they do not fully capture how brands appear in AI-generated answers.
One of the most interesting findings in the report is that AI responses can vary considerably even when the same question is asked twice.
The researchers found that cited-domain overlap between two runs of the same prompt was 41% for ChatGPT, 45% for Gemini, 56% for Claude, and 94% for Perplexity.
That means a brand appearing in one AI response and disappearing in the next does not necessarily indicate a meaningful change in performance.
Effective AI visibility measurement requires a more systematic approach.
Brands should monitor a consistent set of relevant questions across multiple AI platforms, repeat those tests over time, and analyze trends rather than individual responses.
They should also distinguish between whether a brand is mentioned in an AI answer, whether its website is cited as a source, and whether the platform recommends its products or services.
These are different outcomes, and each provides a different perspective on how AI understands and presents a brand.
Measuring these signals alongside traditional SEO performance and PR results can give marketers a more complete picture of digital visibility.
The Future of AI Visibility Is Integrated
The Generative Pulse and Muck Rack report reinforces something we believe strongly at Zozimus: the future of search and brand discovery cannot be addressed through a single marketing discipline.
Brands need a coordinated strategy that connects technical expertise, high-quality content, media relations, and ongoing measurement.
At Zozimus, our combination of SEO, AEO/GEO, public relations, content strategy, and analytics positions us to help companies address this challenge from multiple directions.
Our technical search teams work to make websites accessible, understandable, and optimized for the questions customers are asking. Our PR team helps build credibility through earned media coverage, industry thought leadership, and third-party validation.
Just as importantly, our analytics capabilities help us understand how a brand is represented across AI platforms, identify opportunities, and measure progress over time.
This integrated approach allows us to move beyond simply asking whether a brand ranks on Google.
We can examine whether AI platforms recognize the brand, understand its expertise, reference credible information about it, and include it when customers are evaluating potential solutions.
As AI becomes a more influential part of the customer journey, these questions will become increasingly important for marketing leaders.
The companies that succeed will not necessarily be those producing the most content or securing the greatest number of media mentions.
They will be the ones building a clear, consistent, and credible presence across the sources that AI systems rely on.
In the age of AI-powered discovery, SEO helps AI find and understand your brand. PR helps establish why your brand deserves credibility. Together, they create a stronger foundation for visibility.
If your company is looking to improve how it appears in ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Perplexity, and other AI-powered discovery platforms, Zozimus can help develop an integrated strategy that brings technical AEO and public relations together.
