Founder, investor, and industry analyst Jeremiah Owyang believes that the future envisioned by Bill Gates of a personal AI is rapidly approaching. This future will have far-reaching implications for SEO and e-commerce, requiring marketers and creators to shift their focus from optimizing traditional search engines to optimizing AI. Owyang argues that the traditional advertising model of driving traffic to websites will soon be obsolete, and marketers will need to adapt to capturing ad dollars within AI agents and foundational models. The emergence of sponsored sentences and ads next to generated content within AI platforms is just the beginning of this new marketing landscape.
According to Owyang, marketers and creators need to think beyond search engines and consider how to make themselves discoverable within the AI itself. As more and more consumers rely on AI tools like GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer) models to gather information, web crawling will become less efficient. Instead, marketers will need to ensure that their data is ingested by these AI models, just as they would optimize their content for SEO. Owyang suggests that chatbots and other AI agents should be trained on their data, similar to how search engines index and rank websites. By doing so, marketers increase their chances of being the first result when users search for relevant information within AI platforms.
Owyang emphasizes that AI is a new influencer in the marketing landscape, similar to journalists, analysts, and other traditional influencers. Marketers will need to cater to AI agents by feeding them information. This could potentially involve creating special APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) that can be adjusted by the foundational models, reducing the central importance of websites. Owyang even suggests that the most efficient way to influence an autonomous agent may be to build an autonomous agent itself. The endorsement of personal agents by Bill Gates and the significant investments made in companies like Inflection AI indicate the growing importance of AI in disrupting SEO and marketing.
While the vision of personal AI agents like Pi is still a distant reality, AI chatbots are already offering recommendations and interacting with users. Owyang argues that marketers, publishers, and creators who rely on SEO need to start catering to the preferences and requirements of AI agents through AI Engine Optimization. Unlike traditional SEO, AI Engine Optimization is not just about website optimization but also involves creating APIs that provide real-time information to foundational models. The standard API protocol for this purpose has yet to emerge fully, but it is crucial for marketers to adapt to this new paradigm.
Owyang asserts that corporate and government leaders are rapidly exploring the possibilities of building their own Large Language Models (LLMs) to interact with customers and their AI agents. Companies like Walmart, Macy’s, and even The New York Times could potentially have their own LLMs, marking a significant shift in the marketing landscape. Owyang emphasizes that the time to act is now, as marketers need to ready themselves to shape both human decision-making and AI behaviors. The future of marketing lies in understanding and leveraging the power of AI to reach and engage with consumers in ways never before imagined.
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