Author: Christopher Burdick
AI-driven search is changing the game, and technical SEO has to evolve with it.
Search engines like Google and Bing aren’t just matching keywords anymore. They’re using machine learning, natural language processing, and generative AI to understand content, figure out intent, and serve up direct answers. Your site might show up in an AI Overview or chatbot result without the user even clicking through.
That makes things more complex, but it also opens the door to more visibility if your technical SEO is built for it.
Here’s what to look out for:
1. Structured Data is Non-Negotiable
- Schema markup: This is still the most powerful way to help machines understand your site. Use it wherever it makes sense – products, articles, FAQs, breadcrumbs, how-tos, and more.
- Keep it accurate: Even if Google isn’t showing rich results, structured data still helps AI models pick up and use your content.
- Validate it: Tools like Google’s Rich Results Test or Schema.org‘s validator help you catch issues before they matter.
2. Crawlability and Site Clarity Still Matter
- Indexing directives: Use meta robots tags and canonical tags carefully to guide search engines. Make sure important content isn’t accidentally excluded.
- Clean, semantic HTML: The easier it is for bots to parse your site, the better. Avoid bloated, JavaScript-heavy pages where possible.
- Clear internal links: Help AI connect the dots between related pages. Topical clusters and smart internal linking go a long way.
- Sitemaps and robots.txt: Keep sitemaps updated and accurate. Use robots.txt wisely so you’re not blocking valuable content.
- llms.txt: It’s not widely supported yet, but it’s a signal to AI tools about how they should treat your content. Think of it as hybrid robots.txt/sitemap but for language models.
3. Performance and Accessibility
- Mobile-first and fast: Users won’t wait, and neither will AI. Performance still counts.
- Server-side rendering (SSR): If your site relies heavily on JavaScript, make sure you’re using SSR or hydration-friendly frameworks so that crawlers and LLMs can access your content properly.
4. Not Technical, But Still Important
- Write like a human: Natural, conversational writing, and clear, easy-to-follow content are more digestible for people and machines alike.
- Answer-first formatting: Use bullet points, tables, and short paragraphs. These formats make it easier for AI to pull the right info.
- FAQs and How-To content: Even if it doesn’t earn rich results, this format helps AI understand your content structure and more likely to cite you in its results.
5. Monitor How AI Sees You
- Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools: These are still your go-to tools for indexing and crawl insights.
- Track AI placements: Start noting when and where your content shows up in AI summaries, Bing Chat, and beyond.
- Experiment early: Tools like llms.txt and .md summaries aren’t industry standards yet, but getting ahead now could give you a serious advantage later.
Search is evolving fast. If your technical SEO is stuck in the past, you’re going to get left behind.
What changes are you making to your SEO strategy for AI-driven search?
