AI Search is any search experience where an AI assistant reads the web and writes a single synthesised answer rather than returning a list of links.
AI Search means a search experience mediated by an AI assistant, where the engine reads multiple sources and writes one synthesised answer instead of returning ten blue links. ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews and Perplexity are all forms of AI Search. It is the common-usage name for what specialists call generative engine optimisation, and it changes how a brand gets found.
For twenty years, search meant typing a query and choosing from a ranked list of links. AI Search breaks that pattern. The assistant reads the sources for the user, decides what is relevant, and writes a single answer in plain language. The user often never sees the underlying pages, and rarely clicks through to them.
This shift is already large. 37% of consumers now start their searches with AI rather than Google (Conductor, 2025), and 900 million people use ChatGPT every week (OpenAI, December 2025). Google AI Overviews now appear on the majority of searches, and 69% of Google searches end without a click (Similarweb, 2024). The answer has become the destination.
For a business, the consequence is direct. If the assistant does not mention you in its answer, you are invisible at the exact moment a buyer is deciding. Ranking on page one no longer guarantees you are seen, because there may be no page one to rank on. What matters now is whether the AI cites you and recommends you in the answer it writes.
K&C treats AI Search as the territory its whole practice maps. We measure how the assistants actually answer the questions your buyers ask, then we work to change those answers. The mechanism is captured in our AI Visibility Score, a single number from 0 to 100 built across a twelve-pillar framework and three dimensions: AI Visibility, Source Quality and Narrative Fit.
Because AI Search and generative engine optimisation describe the same thing in different words, our methodology applies equally whether a client calls it one or the other. We run real buyer questions through the engines, record where you are cited and where a competitor is named instead, and translate the gaps into a plan you can act on.
The first step is an Exec Brief, which is free and shows you exactly how AI Search treats your brand today. From there, the ongoing work is bespoke priced to the cadence you need. The aim is simple: to move you up the answer, not just up the rankings.
Because AI Search behaves differently from classic search, the levers differ too. It is less about chasing keywords and more about being the kind of clearly sourced, well-described entity an assistant trusts enough to quote. We focus the work there, on the sources and the narrative the engines actually read, so the answers your buyers see begin to name you. Be Known. Be Cited.
Book an AVS Exec Brief: a real, one-off measurement of how ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews and Perplexity talk about your business right now. Same methodology as the full AI Visibility Strategy, delivered manually, free of charge. Annual, Bi-Annual and Quarterly cadences are bespoke priced.
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