How to Get Found in AI Search

When thinking about search optimization, most small businesses still chase Google rankings alone. But AI tools are rewriting the SEO playbook for brands. Have you caught up?

Couples are beginning to skip search results entirely and head straight to AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, and Claude when planning their wedding. If your content isn’t optimized for AI search, you risk becoming invisible where the decisions are actually taking place.

That’s where AEO—Answer Engine Optimization—comes in. 

While traditional SEO helps you show up in a long list of links, AEO positions you to provide the direct answer to a searcher’s question. 

Both strategies are essential for wedding industry businesses who want more visibility, so I’ll show you exactly what that looks like and how to integrate AI optimization into your content workflow.

SEO vs. AEO: What’s the Difference?

So what exactly is AEO, and how is it different from traditional SEO? 

Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) is the practice of structuring content so AI engines like ChatGPT can easily find, understand, and cite it when generating responses. While SEO aims for rankings on search engine results pages, AEO is all about showing up as a trusted answer when a searcher asks a direct question.

This isn’t just about keywords—it’s about building authority and trust in ways that AI models recognize. 

Something that might surprise you is that SEO and AEO actually have a lot of overlap. Both kinds of optimization have the same goal—to get you found when people are searching the web. Factors like structured content, relevance to search intent, and being cited by others boosts your authority in both worlds. 

But AEO has a more direct goal: to answer the direct question posed by the user. 

With AI-driven search reshaping searcher behavior, wedding service providers need to adapt quickly. Fortunately, there are three steps you can take today to start optimizing your content for AI search tools.

3 Easy Steps to Optimize Your Content for ChatGPT

Step 1: Keep SEO Foundations Strong

SEO lays the groundwork for trust and credibility, ensuring your site gets noticed by both Google and AI engines. (Want an expert in both SEO and the wedding industry to overhaul your site’s SEO? Let’s chat!)

That means that traditional SEO factors are also important for AEO:

• Incorporating strategic search keywords naturally into your content
• Technical factors like site speed and mobile optimization
• Backlinks and authority building

Think of SEO as the foundation layer that AEO builds upon. Start with solid SEO, and you’re already on the fast track to getting found in AI search.

Step 2: Format Content for AEO and AI Search

ChatGPT and AI search tools are looking for easy-to-understand answers it can pull when a searcher asks a question. You want to provide that answer in the clearest possible format for them to scrape, so keep your structure as simple and direct as possible.

Here are a few formatting tweaks you can make to your web content to start optimizing for AEO:

• Format your section headers (H2’s) as questions followed by direct, simple answers 
• Use scannable paragraph formatting like bulleted lists, numbered “step-by-step” instructions, and FAQ’s
• Add structured data like schema markup in the backend of your site to help AI understand your content accurately

Step 3: Publish Authoritative Thought Leadership

AI tools don’t just favor optimized content—they favor content they trust. The more often your brand is mentioned externally, the better your odds are of being cited in AI chat responses. 

These are ways to increase your website’s authority rankings to encourage AI citations:

• Publish CEO insights, original research, and niche perspectives that no one else can write but you
• Provide hot-takes, actionable tips, and visually rich content that others want to link to and share
• Include high-authority citations (with links) to other sources within your own content to show that you’re building your expertise on reputable information 

AI engines like ChatGPT want to know that you’re the go-to expert in your field before citing your as the answer to someone’s question. Build that authority by making sure you share unique perspectives backed by trusted facts (blogging is the perfect way to do this!). 

Practical AEO Tips for Wedding Vendors

As a wedding industry business owner, you’ve probably been focusing on ranking in Google search results using SEO. But if you’re wondering how your brand can appear in the AI overview section or within ChatGPT answers, you’re not alone.

Once you start formatting content as questions and answers, adding strategic list formatting, and publishing niche thought leadership, you’ll see your presence in AI searches grow. 

Easy Ways to Show Up in AI Searches Faster:

• Submit your sitemap to Bing Webmaster Tools (this can dramatically boost visibility in ChatGPT, which uses Bing to browse, index, and scrape for answers)
• Add FAQ or Q&A sections to high-traffic pages and blog posts for AI-friendly formatting
• Publish proprietary data like case studies or survey findings that AI can’t source anywhere else
• Focus on backlinks by contributing guest posts or interviews for more citations and visibility

Ready to Be Found by Both Google and AI?

You need a digital marketing strategy built for search results and AI answers. I’d love to help you by optimizing your main website pages, writing SEO-driven blog posts, and driving traffic to your content on Pinterest. Get in touch to start the conversation today!