How users search and their expectations have changed

Users today are no longer searching in the traditional manner. Meaning, typing in a few keywords, phrases, and maybe a location into Google and getting a list of blue links of businesses in the area. Users are searching for answers to a specific problem they are having or looking to get an answer to a specific question. Quite often that means zero click searches. Zero click searches are those where the answer is displayed in an AI overview and the user never clicks through to the website. It is estimated that 58-68% of searches today end up with the user getting the answer in the AI overview, without ever clicking through to the website. The reason for this, users are able to search directly for an answer to a specific question by typing complete questions. In a March 2026 article by Neil Patel, there was a 163% growth in question based searches (from 8% to 21%) between 2023-2026 . Much of which is conversational between the human and AI agent.

How users find a business has evolved. Research involves typically more than one platform, online reviews, and increased customer expectations. Where SEO was the user doing all the heavy lifting, AI now acts as your personal assistant doing the heavy lifting for you. So buyer behavior is changing along with the need for more efficiency. 

Users are also comparing businesses more prior to making decisions. This includes their reviews, their reputation is outside of their own website, and the company’s mission and values. 95% of consumers read online reviews before making a purchase decision. They expect that companies will respond to the reviews (89%), that they are not templated responses (50%), and that they are recent (73%). 

AI helps transform how decisions are made. Google and Bing as search engines are both utilizing AI. ChatGPT and Perplexity both search the web, which is a true business transformation. You need to be ready and adapt as AI becomes another crucial interface between the customer and your business.

Where Does AI Pull Its Data From?

AI pulls from a variety of sources. They must be credible and trustworthy. In addition to being consistent across the web. AI also prefers newer information that can be verified so it can feel confident displaying the most up to date and accurate results. As a result, building user confidence with the information that is provided. Visitors coming from generative AI results stay on sites about 8% longer, view 12% more pages, and are 23% less likely to bounce immediately. 

AI realizes that anyone can say anything they want about themselves on their own website. So it placed more emphasis on what others are saying about your business and your online reputation. This includes news articles, press releases, case studies, customer reviews, and third party sites such as Reddit and Quora. Structured data which is a little piece of code that goes onto your website, can help the AI agents better match the user query with the content on the page. In other words, helping the AI agents understand your business.

It’s More Than Just Rankings

When making a decision on whether to invest in SEO and AI, you need to ensure you have a partner that will focus less now on rankings, keywords and clicks, and more on building brand awareness and authority. In addition to creating content that is trustworthy and backed by research. Can you prove what you say? What are the benefits to what you do and how is it different from anyone else? What specific problem does it solve for the user and what is the result? This heads you on the right path to demonstrating expertise and an authority around a specific topic or industry. It’s not just about writing content and loading up on keywords and phrases anymore. It’s about the user experience and having content that is helpful for the user. 

What Should Business Leaders Prioritize?

Business leaders should prioritize becoming the company that the AI agents want to cite and mention in their results. Creating partnerships and becoming a leadership voice. This could include being a guest on podcasts, hosting live events, webinars, etc. Being that verified source of information on social media and the various 3rd party sites like Reddit and Quora. This includes responding to users’ questions in subreddits with verifiable industry expertise. Providing helpful and the latest information in blog posts and downloadables that users can obtain through your site. Think outside the Google box. Potential clients and discovering brands now more than ever through AI assistants, voice interfaces and answer engines. 56% have used AI specifically to discover unique brands they wouldn’t have found otherwise.

In conclusion, the company that wins will be the most trusted. And businesses that are consistent in publishing userful, helpful and expert fact based content will maintain a strong digital presence and visibility not only in the traditional SEO but in the AI mentions and citations as well. The organizations that invest today will be better positioned to earn that online visibility, credibility and customer trust. Rank where is search is headed, not where it has been.