🔎 AIO vs. SEO: How to Rank Everywhere (with

Is SEO dead? Not even close—but it’s no longer the only game in town. In this episode of Kids, Chaos, and Killer Campaigns, we break down the rise of AIO (AI Optimization) and what it means for marketers who want to be found everywhere—from Google to ChatGPT.

In this episode, you'll learn:

• What AIO actually is (no, it’s not just AI-generated content)
• How to format answer-first content that gets cited by AI tools
• Key differences between SEO and AIO ranking signals
• Real-world examples of blending SEO strategy with AI-readiness
• A simple weekly challenge to make your existing content go further

Whether you're in demand gen, content, or strategy—and juggling snack requests between Zoom calls—this episode will help you future-proof your content strategy with smart, scalable tactics.

🎧 Subscribe, share, and join the movement of marketers writing for humans and algorithms—without losing their voice (or their sanity).

Transcript

Eden Reid (00:11)
Welcome back to Kids, Chaos, and Killer Campaigns, your go-to podcast for making sense of marketing when you've got a kid on your hip and KPIs on your mind. Today, we're talking about something that's everywhere right now, AIO versus SEO.

Because while SEO has been the content queen for years, AI optimization, AKA AIO, is quietly rewriting the rulebook. And let's be honest, half of us are Googling, what is AIO, while pretending we totally have a strategy for it. So if you're a marketer trying to rank, resonate, and not sound like a robot, while also answering your kid's 14th snack request of the hour, this episode is for you.

Let's dig in.

Let's start with addressing what even is AIO and why you should care.

AI optimization is about creating content with AI as your collaborator and making that content perform well for both humans and search engines. Unlike traditional SEO, which focuses on keywords, backlinks, and meta descriptions, AIO is about speed, structure, and smarts.

So really, here's the TLDR. SEO is about optimizing your content for search engines like Google, using things like those keywords, those backlinks, and structured data to show up in those top organic spots. AIO is about optimizing your content for AI search assistance, like ChatGPT, Bing Copilot, or Google SGE. So that when someone asks the question, like, how do I achieve CMMC compliance?

Your content is what AI is summarizing and citing. And here's where it gets interesting. 45 to 55 % of users who search with an AI engine still copy and paste that AI generated response into Google to dig deeper. While, 12 to 18 % of users click directly on a citation from that AI panel. So what does that mean for you?

well, your content needs to rank in both traditional Google results and AI generated summaries and results because users aren't just sticking to one path.

So let's break down the key ranking signals for both SEO and AIO. For AI Search, focus on answer first content. Think 40 to 60 word summaries, FAQs, how-to schemas, topic clusters and internal linking, content focused on things like templates, toolkits, checklists, and original data.

and explicit source attribution so AI picks up and cites you. You want to brand all that content so AI is branding you in their results. For SEO, really for Google, you still need long form depth and user optimization, strong domain authority and backlinks, technical health on your website. Think of Core Web Vitals, site load, page speed, all of those things,

and optimized metadata and page hierarchy.

So in other words, SEO gets you found and uses those traditional key ranking signals. And AIO gets you featured using answer first content.

Here's your sweet spot. Use those AIO ranking factors to build outlines, to help generate intros, to rework drafts, to optimize content you already have, and layer in your SEO tactics, your keywords, your internal links, headings, et cetera. And then finish all your content with a human touch. Your voice, your brand, your audience insights, that's your magic.

So, example, let's say I need a blog about cybersecurity targeting IT directors. When I think of AIO, I think of making sure I include FAQs or that how-to model. And then to make sure I also rank in SEO, I'm going to add those relative stats and those top ranking keywords. And then...

When I finish writing that blog, I make sure to include our unique perspective. Maybe that's a real world analogy, or a client quote, a testimonial, or a case study, or even just a hook that really speaks to the reader's pain point. And boom, you have something that's rankable in both SEO and AIO and relatable. It's still human.

So what does this mean for you and me? Whether you're an SEO, content, demand gen, or strategy, this shift to AIO ranking impacts all of us.

So here's a seven word mantra to share with your team. Answer fast, get sighted, rank everywhere, repeat.

Because it's not just about writing great content anymore. It's about positioning that content.

So let's recap. AIO helps people get answers faster. It's looking for answer first content because people are talking to AI more like it's a person than searching based on keywords. SEO still matters, but it's not the only game in town anymore. So don't forget about your keywords, but expand on what you're doing with your content to help your ranking. And remember,

Blending human creativity with the AI efficiency is how you win in today's search world

AIO is not replacing SEO. It's just expanding what visibility looks like. Content needs to be answered first. Make sure it's AI friendly and deeply human. But again, don't forget those keywords

today's content must be answer first, AI friendly and deeply human. Stats don't lie. 45 to 55 % of AI search users still Google it after and 12 to 18 % click the citations AI provides. Strong content gets reused, repurposed and ranked in both places.

So, your challenge for this week. Take one of your highest performing blog posts or guides and run it through the AIO lens. Can it pull out a 40-word summary? Is the content formatted like a checklist or an FAQ? And does it clearly answer a specific question? If not, this is your sign to make that AIO ready.

Optimize.

If today's episode helped you demystify AI optimization just a little bit, send it to your SEO buddy or your content partner because the only thing more powerful than ranking in Google is showing up in AI before your competitors do. Thank you so much for checking out this podcast. I'd love to hear the topics you want to hear discussed. So please drop them in the comments or shoot me a line on LinkedIn.

I encourage you to subscribe to the podcast, leave it a review, or share it with a marketer who you think would benefit from learning a little more about AI. I'd love to connect on LinkedIn to stay in touch through the journey. My LinkedIn will be dropped in the show notes so that you can click there and shoot over that connect request. Next week, we're going to be talking about content repurposing in a time crunch, turning one piece of content into 10. In the meantime, enjoy the kids.

Enjoy the chaos and I'm wishing you all killer campaign.