B2B SEO Strategy: How to Thrive in the Age of AI

As a B2B SEO agency founder, I’ve had clients come to me asking the same questions again and again:

“How will AI search affect traffic to our website?”

“Is creating content still important if people can find out the answer in AI chat?”

Your clients probably share similar concerns.

After all, AI is disrupting the search landscape like nothing we’ve ever seen before. Decision makers can now compare services, read product reviews, and even shortlist vendors without ever landing on a website.

For B2B companies that have long relied on organic traffic to fuel their pipeline, that’s a major blow.

But it’s also an opportunity to adapt your B2B SEO strategy while the new playbook is still being written.

Why B2B SEO Strategy Needs a New Playbook

Ranking on page one is no longer enough to gain search visibility.

AI Overviews are pushing down organic search results and answering the audience’s questions directly, reducing clicks by 34.5%.

position 1 ctr for ai overview keywords — Image source: Ahrefs[[Image]]

Some users even skip Google altogether. They ask ChatGPT or Perplexity directly for personalized product or service recommendations.

And this isn’t just media hype – it’s real data.

According to Forrester, 89% of B2B buyers are using generative AI to research information during their purchasing journey.

Sparktoro also confirmed that AI chatbot usage in the US has surged from 8% to 38% in just the last two and a half years.

If your agency isn't being mentioned or cited by those AI assistants, you’re effectively invisible to a growing portion of your target market.

The same goes for B2B clients that you’re serving.

That’s why B2B SEO needs a new playbook. One that’s designed not just to rank in traditional search results, but also to appear consistently in AI-generated answers.

The Core Pillars of B2B SEO Strategy in 2025

I’ve helped countless B2B companies not only survive, but thrive in the age of AI.

One of our clients, a recruitment agency, managed to get featured in AI Overviews for 17 keywords for a single blog article.

The result? Organic traffic went up by 131% in just 6 months.

This tell us one thing: AI can be your best referral source if you know how to approach it the right way.

So, what exactly did we do to optimize for answer engines and LLMs?

I still believe that good solid SEO is the foundation of good solid generative engine optimization (GEO).

If you create well-structured content that answers user intent, keep your website technically sound, and provide the best experience possible, then you’re probably going to do well in LLM search.

But there are definitely some nuances as well.

From my experience, here are the core pillars of modern B2B SEO strategy to win in AI search.

Pillar 1: Offsite SEO – Brand Authority

Perhaps the biggest difference between SEO and GEO is the weight placed on brand authority.

In traditional SEO, it’s true that bigger brands tend to perform better.

But lesser-known brands and small niche sites could still get to the top of Google by targeting low competition keywords and creating really good content.

In GEO, AI systems and large language models lean more heavily on brand authority. They favor websites that are consistently mentioned in industry conversations and cited by credible third-party sources.

A recent Ahrefs study found that branded web mentions are the number one factor that influences AI Overview visibility.

Image source: Ahrefs[[Image]]

Another study by Seer Interactive also confirmed that strong brand awareness could positively impact visibility on LLMs like ChatGPT.

If you want to increase your chances of being included in AI responses, start building a strong brand presence across the web through targeted digital PR campaigns.

Pillar 2: Onsite SEO – Topical Authority

When forming an answer for a certain prompt, AI systems go through a process called the “query fan-out” technique.

Instead of pulling a single result for the exact query, AI breaks it down into multiple related sub-questions. Basically, mimicking exactly how a real user would research the topic step by step.

This is why topic clusters are critical in B2B SEO today.

If your content ecosystem covers all the subtopics of a given theme and connects them through internal linking, you dramatically increase the chances that AI will cite your brand in its response.

But beyond AI visibility, building topical authority is also a powerful customer acquisition strategy.

As you know, B2B decision makers usually go through a long and complicated buying process, involving a lot of research on product comparisons and reviews.

With topic clusters, you can create different content types to address user needs and pain points at every stage of their buying journey.

Pillar 3: Technical SEO – Page Indexability

Even the best content won’t get surfaced by AI if it isn’t properly indexed. I've seen many B2B companies pour resources into creating great content, only to have it buried behind technical issues.

If you want your pages to be discovered by answer engines, then make sure your robots.txt and firewall rules are configured correctly to allow AI crawlers.

Step-by-Step Process to Boost Visibility in AI Search

We’ve talked about the core pillars that could shape your B2B SEO strategy in the age of AI.

Now let’s turn those principles into practical steps you can take to boost your visibility in AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, and beyond.

1. Understand the Prompts Your Audience is Typing

Optimizing for AI search starts with the same foundation as traditional SEO: knowing what your audience is searching for.

The difference is that people now use longer, more specific, and conversational language, not just keyword strings.

A search that once looked like “best CRM software” has evolved into queries such as “What’s the best CRM for a mid-sized B2B SaaS company that needs advanced reporting but has a limited budget?”

Here’s how to adapt your research:

Go beyond keywords: Look at how people phrase real questions in forums, community threads, and “People Also Ask” boxes.
Reverse-engineer query fan-out: Type a seed query into AI tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Gemini and see how the model expands it into related sub-questions. This shows you all the queries users might explore for a given topic and helps you design content clusters for that.

2. Create Topic Clusters

Once you know what your audience is asking, the next step is to create content that addresses every angle of those questions.

Instead of publishing isolated blog posts, organize your content into topic clusters:

A pillar page that provides a broad, comprehensive overview of the main topic (e.g., “Complete Guide to B2B CRM Software”).
Multiple supporting articles that dive deeper into related subtopics (e.g., “Best CRMs for SaaS Companies on a Budget” or “How to Evaluate CRM Reporting Features”).
Internal links that tie everything together to signal topical depth and authority.

3. Strengthen Your E-E-A-T signals

AI models and Google both favor content that demonstrates Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness (E-E-A-T).

Strengthening these signals helps establish your brand as a credible source that AI engines can safely recommend.

Here’s how:

Add first-hand insights: Share real case studies, lessons learned, or proprietary data that only you can provide.
Include expert quotes and commentary: Feature unique insights, tips, and quotes from leading experts in your field.
Reference trusted external sources: Back up your claims with links to trusted studies, journals, and recognized industry leaders.
Use strong author bios with credentials: Make it clear why readers (and AI engines) should trust your content.
Show social proof: Display client testimonials and reviews, as well as relevant awards and certifications across your site.

4. Build Your Brand’s Presence Across the Web

Apart from their training data, AI models also use grounding — retrieving information from live web sources to generate accurate, up-to-date answers.

But which sites do LLMs actually pull from? Here are the top sources based on multiple studies on AI search:

Wikipedia
Forums (like Reddit and Quora)
YouTube
Review and affiliate sites (like G2, Forbes, and Nerdwallet)
News publications
Social media platforms

The more frequently your brand appears in these platforms, the more likely LLMs are to recognize and recommend you.

Here’s how you can secure offsite brand mentions:

Write guest posts: Reach out to leading publications within your niche and offer to write guest posts in exchange for a backlink.
Contribute to journalist requests: Use tools like Help a B2B Writer and Qwoted to connect with journalists looking for credible expert commentary.
Appear in “best of” articles: Find out which “best of” roundups are frequently cited by LLMs, then ask them to include your brand.
Form affiliate partnerships: When you work with influencers, niche bloggers, and review sites, they’ll naturally mention your brand and link back to your site.
Join niche conversations: Participate in Reddit threads, Quora Q&As, or industry forums where your target audience is active. These platforms are frequently scraped into training data and shape how AI engines “learn” about you.
Stay active on social media: Share original insights, research, and commentary on LinkedIn and X to build authority. Consistent presence on social media helps signal relevance and credibility to both people and AI models.

Also, make sure to update your Wikipedia page (if you have one) to ensure accurate brand positioning.

5. Structure Your Content for AI Parsing

Well-structured content is easier for AI assistants to interpret, summarize, and reuse in their answers.

Here’s how to optimize your content structure:

Target natural language queries: LLMs thrive on conversational, question-style prompts. Optimize your headings around how people actually ask questions, such as “How do I…?” or “What is…?”
Use a clear hierarchy (H1–H3): Logical heading structures improve semantic SEO and help AI models understand relationships between topics.
Add structured data: Implement FAQ schema, How-To schema, and Q&A sections to increase your chances of being surfaced in AI-generated answers.
Use BLUF (Bottom Line Up Front): Start each section or paragraph with the key takeaway before diving into details. This makes it easier for readers to grasp your point quickly and helps AI models extract the most important information when generating summaries.
Write short, scannable sections: Break up your content with bullet points, numbered lists, and concise paragraphs. Not only does this improve readability for users, but it also helps AI summarize your content.

6. Refresh Your Content Regularly

LLMs like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Copilot prefer to cite fresher content compared to traditional search engines.

The average time since publication for AI citations is 2.9 years. For pages ranking in organic SERPs, the average age is 3.9 years, which is one full year older.

A Seer Interactive study further solidifies the notion that AI has a strong content recency bias. AI Overviews, ChatGPT, and Perplexity mostly cite content published within the last 2 years.

Outdated content not only reduces the likelihood of your content being cited by LLMs, but can also damage credibility with B2B buyers who rely on accurate, timely information.

Follow this content refresh checklist:

Update stats, examples, and screenshots: Swap out old data with the latest research and industry benchmarks.
Expand thin sections: Add depth with new FAQs, case studies, or expert commentary.
Re-optimize for new queries: Monitor how people’s questions evolve (especially with AI-driven search) and tweak headings and copy accordingly.
Check for broken links or outdated references: Replace them with more current, trusted sources.
Update the publish date when substantial changes are made: This signals freshness to both Google and AI engines.

Try StoryChief's free Content Audit. Discover gaps, enhance readability, and boost your SEO—all in just a few clicks. Start now and see measurable improvements in traffic, engagement, and conversion rates.

7. Make Sure Your Site is Crawlable by AI Bots

Just like Google’s crawlers, AI bots need permission and clean pathways to discover your content.

Here’s how to ensure your site is crawlable:

Check your robots.txt file: Don’t accidentally block AI bots (or Googlebot) from crawling valuable pages.
Avoid login walls and heavy scripts: Content hidden behind paywalls, forms, or JavaScript often won’t be parsed by AI systems.
Use clean, semantic HTML: Structured code makes it easier for crawlers (and LLMs) to interpret your content correctly.

Use StoryChief to Manage Your B2B SEO Strategy

In their recent studies, Ahrefs confirmed two interesting findings:

So, it’s safe to say that using AI tools doesn’t just help you scale content production, but it can actually improve your chances of being surfaced in AI-driven answers.

StoryChief’s Content Editor is the perfect tool for that.

You’ll get real-time SEO and GEO suggestions as you write, so your content isn’t just optimized for Google, but also structured in a way that AI models can easily parse and reference.

The tool also features a built-in AI assistant called William, ready to help you generate any type of content you need.

Wrapping Up

AI is changing search faster than any of us expected.

For B2B companies, this shift can feel like a threat—fewer clicks, less traffic, and a buyer journey that happens off your site.

But it also presents a huge opportunity for those who adapt quickly and move early.

By focusing on brand authority, topical expertise, and well-structured content, you can put yourself in the best position to be cited in AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, and beyond.

And with the right tools, like StoryChief, you can scale this work and strengthen your B2B SEO strategy without sacrificing quality.