The Future of Search (SEO), Why Brands Must Become Entities, Not Just Websites

In my 20 years leading marketing teams, I have seen a lot of “tectonic shifts.” I survived the transition from print to digital, the social media explosion, and the rise of the inbound movement. But what we are witnessing right now, in late 2025, isn’t just a shift. It’s a total decoupling of the discovery and validation phases of the B2B buyer journey.

If you’ve been looking at your traffic dashboards lately and feeling a sense of dread, you aren’t alone. Here is what is actually happening on the ground, and why the “old way” of SEO is officially dead.

We are moving into a world where AI has quietly become the first place people go when they want to understand something, while Google remains the place they go when they want to be sure.

This shift is especially painful for B2B. So much of B2B discovery begins with informational curiosity: how things work, what tools exist, which vendors are worth short-listing. For years, that curiosity translated into clicks.

The “Catastrophic” Traffic Drop

For years, the B2B playbook was simple: win the “What is…” and “How to…” keywords. We poured millions into Top-of-Funnel (ToFu) content because we knew that being the first to educate a prospect meant we’d be the first they’d call. In 2025, that bridge has been burnt.

The impact on B2B is significantly more severe than in B2C because our buyers are inherently research-heavy.

Today, 60% of Google searches end without a single click to a website, a number that climbs to a staggering 77% on mobile.

When Google’s AI Overviews (AIO) answer a “Top tools for…” or “How to integrate…” query directly on the SERP, the click-through rate to our sites doesn’t just dip; it collapses by nearly 47%.

The reality is that 80% of tech buyers now use AI tools like ChatGPT or Perplexity for their initial discovery phase. They are getting their “shortlist” from a chatbot, not a search result. AI hasn’t replaced Google. It has simply stepped in front of it.

The Safe Zone: Why Google Search Still Matters

But the interesting part is that this disruption is not uniform. There are areas where traffic is holding steady, even improving. Despite the carnage in ToFu traffic, there is a “Safe Zone” where Google remains the undisputed king. As a VP, this is where I’m reallocating my budget.

• Brand-Specific Searches: Our data shows that while blog traffic is down, homepage traffic for established B2B brands is up by 15%. This is the “Second Search” phenomenon. Buyers meet you in ChatGPT, but they “marry” you on Google. They see your name in an AI list, then Google your brand specifically to find the official site.
• Transactional Intent: When a buyer is ready to pull the trigger—searching for “pricing,” “demo,” or “security certifications”—they don’t want an AI summary. They want the source. AI is a poor bridge to a transaction; Google is still the best highway.
• High-Complexity Research: For deep, technical integration problems where a “hallucination” could cost a million dollars, buyers still flee AI’s vagueness for the “expert” sources they find through deep Google searches.

So yes, discovery is drifting toward AI, but validation, reassurance, and transactions still live in the familiar place.

The “Great Decoupling”: Discovery vs. Validation
Meeting on AI, Marrying on Google

What’s emerging is a new kind of search behaviour,  a two-step dance. People ask AI to reduce the universe, to give a shortlist, to remove the noise. Then they ask Google to confirm whether those answers can be trusted. Discovery and validation have decoupled. You meet the brand in one environment, but you make your judgement in another. For marketers, this means that ranking is no longer the only prize. Being named is.

We are living through a phenomenon I call “The Great Decoupling.” The buyer’s journey has split into two distinct ecosystems.

Discovery has moved to AI. Roughly 34% of B2B qualified leads now originate from AI platforms. It is the second-largest driver of leads behind LinkedIn. This is where the “Initial Traction” happens. The AI acts as the world’s most efficient filter, synthesis, and matchmaker.

Validation remains on Google. A buyer might “meet” you in a chat window, but they won’t sign a $100k contract until they’ve validated you. They return to Google to find your case studies, your LinkedIn presence, and your peer reviews on G2 or Reddit.

This is where your original intuition becomes powerful: if AI is now curating, then brands need to exist in the places AI learns from. Not just on their own blogs, but across the broader web,  review platforms, analyst sites, partner content, community conversations, podcasts, LinkedIn posts, structured documentation.

Large language models do not “rank pages” the way Google does. They absorb patterns, entities, and repeated associations. If the internet repeatedly describes you in a consistent way, across credible surfaces, the model begins to understand who you are, what category you belong to, and in which situations you deserve to be suggested. We are no longer simply optimising websites; we are training systems to recognise us.

And no: this doesn’t mean spamming more content.
It means creating clear, consistent, recognisable identity across surfaces AI respects.

From SEO to GEO: The New Playbook

AI rewards coherence, not volume. To win in this environment, we have to stop doing SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and start doing GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) and AEO (Answer Engine Optimization). It’s no longer about “getting the click”; it’s about “becoming the source.”  Here is how I am steering my team to win the “Share of Model”:

1. Optimize for “Extractability”

AI engines don’t “read” stories; they “extract” entities. To be the tool that the AI recommends, your data must be “clean.”

• Use Structured Tables: Don’t just list features in a paragraph. Put them in a side-by-side comparison table. AI loves structured data it can easily pull into its own responses.
• Direct Answer Formatting: Start your high-value technical articles with a “TL;DR” or a direct answer. If you hide the lead, the AI will ignore you.
• Schema Markup: Use technical tags (FAQ and Product Schema) to tell the bots exactly what each part of your page represents.

2. Own the “Surround Sound”

AI models validate their recommendations by looking for a consensus across the web. If you only exist on your own blog, you don’t exist to the AI. You need to be mentioned where the AI “listens”: on Reddit, in trade publications, and through third-party analyst reports.

3. Depth Beats Breadth

The era of the “Generalist Blog” is over. We are now focusing on Topical Authority. I’d rather own one specific, deeply technical narrative (e.g., “AI-driven fraud detection for fintech”) than 50 generic articles on “What is AI.” AI “digests” depth; it “regurgitates” breadth.

The Real Shift, From “Getting Clicks” to Becoming the Source

Becoming an Entity,  Not Just a Website

In the AI era, a brand isn’t judged only by what’s on its website. It’s judged by the pattern it creates across the entire internet. Search engines and AI systems no longer ask, “What does this page say?”

They ask, “Who is this company, what do others say about it, and where does it consistently show up?” When your message appears in reviews, analyst notes, community threads, partner announcements, podcasts, LinkedIn conversations, and your own content,  in a way that all tells the same story, the system begins to treat you as credible.

You stop being a URL and start becoming an entity.

When that coherence is missing, you fade. Not because your product isn’t good, but because neither AI nor buyers know how to categorize you. Vague positioning, one-off blog posts, and disconnected messaging confuse the ecosystem. AI doesn’t reward noise,  it rewards clarity that keeps repeating across trusted places.

Think of a well-positioned SaaS brand. On their website, the headline is simple and specific: “The fastest way for finance teams to close their books.” On G2, customers describe them using the same language. On LinkedIn, their founders talk about “faster financial close cycles.” In an analyst report, they’re mentioned as a “close automation platform.” A podcast host introduces them the same way. Everywhere you encounter them, the idea is identical  and because of that, AI confidently recognizes them whenever someone asks, “What tools help speed up financial close?”

That’s what becoming an entity means. It’s not shouting louder, it’s shaping a story so consistent that people, search engines, and AI all arrive at the same conclusion about who you are and when you matter.

What This Means for B2B Marketers

We are moving from a world of Search Volume to a world of Share of Model.
Earlier your job was easy, now it is tough.  

The real shift happening right now is that marketing is no longer about simply getting clicks it’s about becoming the source that AI and humans both trust.

In the old world, the sequence was straightforward: write content, rank on Google, drive traffic, and then nurture leads. In the new world, discovery increasingly happens inside AI tools, validation still happens on Google and review platforms, and the final decision comes down to credibility.

Generative search collapses the messy middle and forces brands to earn trust much earlier. That requires deeper topical authority instead of thin content, clearer positioning instead of vague “we do everything” messaging, stronger reputations built through real reviews and communities, and broader distribution across third-party platforms rather than relying on a single website.

In simple terms, we are moving from keyword marketing to entity marketing from trying to game algorithms to teaching systems, very clearly, who we are and when we deserve to be recommended.

One uncomfortable truth: AI does not read the way people do.
It extracts. So the same article can either be invisible to AI or become a default source, depending on how it is structured.

We don’t need more content; we need higher-authority content in more places. You want to be the brand that the AI cannot ignore because everyone else is already talking about you. The matchmaker has made the introduction, now it’s our job to make sure the marriage happens on our site.

When content is thoughtful, structured, and referenced elsewhere, AI starts pulling it. And once AI pulls you into the conversation, you don’t just win clicks.

You win status.

Read more on AI SEO here: https://sociallistener.in/how-to-build-an-ai-search-seo-strategy-for-a-b2b-brand/