The rumors about the inevitable end of the "traditional" search engines like Google at the hands of AI Search are highly exaggerated. According to latest data by SEMrush, based on the last 12 months, people interact with search engines 34 TIMES more often than with AI search.

So there is no dilemma at all: since traditional search engines still rule, hoteliers should not be embracing AIO (Artificial Intelligence Optimization) at the expense of SEO, but investing diligently in both.

There is an additional wrinkle to the story: the data for traditional search engines does not include the queries on Google, Bing, etc. that were answered by AI, which blurs the boundaries between traditional search and AI.

For example, Google uses its Gemini AI to provide answers in its Answer Box in the search results. Today, nearly 60% of Google searches end up as zero-click queries i.e. people find enough information in the Gemini AI-powered Answer Box and do not need to click on any of the organic or sponsored links.

SEO

Continue with your SEO practices (On-page SEO, Inbound linking, Technical SEO) but also adopt AIO practices.

AIO

Each AI platform has and will have its own indexing rules. The main emerging factor is that your property website will no longer be "the ultimate bearer of truth" about your hotel. SEO company VertoDigital"s data shows that only 25% of AI answers are pulled from website content, in this case the hotel website content.

The AI Search bots will seek other sources of information about your hotel and the hotels in your area in general. One of these sources is citations about the hotel in social media, online publications, YouTube, travel-related sites and blogs, customer reviews, etc. Another - from destination and travel guides, OTAs, etc. In the not so distant future, one such source will come from a handshake between the property"s own AI Agent with travelers" Personal AI Agents.

In other words: the main difference between SEO and AIO is that your website is no longer the primary source of influence about your property. AIO is about earning recognition, not ranking like the traditional SEO. Invest in content marketing with the goal to be cited in ALL places of relevance.

How do you achieve that? By investing in content marketing with the goal of earning citations in places of relevance.

Some of the obvious recommendations are:

  • Since people interact with the AI platforms in the form of questions and prompts, all property content pieces, including the website content, have to be written and structured in a manner to provide value and pass a real-life test: "Would a potential guest find a satisfactory answer from this content?"
  • Invest in content marketing to "earn recognition" via citations about your property, services and amenities on relevant other websites, blogs, etc.
  • Avoid flowery, fluffy content and long-winded paragraphs.
  • Introduce short intros, page summaries and short "snackable" paragraphs on all of your content website pages and content pieces.
  • Use extractable formatting: H1s, H2 headers in the form of questions ("Why our guests are raving about our spa?"), bullet points, lists of services, amenities, top reasons to visit, experience, etc.
  • Introduce FAQs ( Frequently Asked Questions) in every section of the website (Accommodations, Dining, Meetings, Spa, etc. ) - the AI bots love scraping these!
  • On the website, link internally paragraphs and pages with similar and relevant topic.
  • Ask your webmaster to insert llms.txt in the code of appropriate pages of the website, allows the LLM bots to access and interpret structured content from the website: business hours, calendar of events, room policies, etc.

The moral of the story is that hoteliers should not abandon their traditional search marketing initiatives. Ex. Search marketing on Google and all of its formats: Google Ads (GA), Google Hotel Ads (GHA), organic listings (SEO) consistently generates in the form of direct bookings and referrals over 50% of hotel website bookings.

At the same time, hoteliers should not ignore the rising AI Search. The most immediate priority is to optimize the property website for AIO (Artificial Intelligence Optimization), the AI version of SEO and invest in content marketing to "earn recognition" of your property.