Increasing Brand Visibility in the Age of AI: 6 Steps You Can Take Now

AI-driven summaries and the surge of zero-click results are reshaping how brand discovery happens in search.

According to SparkToro, fewer than 35% of Google searches now result in a click to a website. In other words, sticking to old-school SEO alone means missing a huge share of potential traffic.

So what can marketers do instead? The key is to increase brand visibility through diversified, earned-first strategies — ones that make your brand discoverable across LLMs and in the places where audiences are actually consuming content.

But First: Brand Visibility vs. Brand Awareness

Even though often used interchangeably, brand visibility and brand awareness are distinct. Visibility is about where and how often your brand appears, while awareness is about recognition and recall among your target audience.

You need visibility to build awareness, but you also need the right context, frequency, and distribution for that visibility to result in brand lift. In an AI-dominated content environment, visibility must be intentional and widespread to break through algorithmic filters.

Here are six ways you can start building that visibility now.

1. Build Visibility with Content

Content is foundational for building visibility. If you're not creating valuable assets that people want to discover, it'll be much more difficult to achieve the brand exposure you're looking for

How It Works

Start by creating content that solves problems your audience faces, regardless of the search volume. Get ideas by performing topic research, talking to your sales and customer service teams, and interviewing new clients/customers about how they came to their buying decision.

Develop a distribution strategy for that piece of content. Ask yourself: How will people find this?

Consider a multi-channel approach:

• Share the content via your company’s email newsletter and employee advocacy tools.
• Repurpose it into bite-sized formats for social media, like LinkedIn carousels or Twitter threads.
• Pitch the content to industry blogs, podcasts, or guest post opportunities.
• Run a small paid campaign targeting your ideal audience with the content as the centerpiece.

By mixing earned, owned, and paid channels, you can give high-performing content multiple chances to be discovered and shared. 

Example: Vince Nero from BuzzStream uses his LinkedIn to promote the reports and content he and his team put together. This helps spread the word that the content exists and get more clicks to view it in full.

Fast Visibility Tip: Republish your highest-performing blog post through a content syndication platform or on an active employee’s social media profile.

2. Collaborate Through Co-Branded Partnerships

Strategic partnerships bring brand visibility through association and shared reach. When you're able to tap into someone else's audience, you're expanding your visibility quickly and effectively.

How It Works

Identify a non-competitive brand that has a similar mission and audience overlap. Align on a shared theme or message that resonates with both your audiences.

Develop a shared content asset, such as a report, webinar, or video series, that showcases both brands’ expertise.

Jointly promote the asset through PR, newsletters, and social media. This lets both brands benefit from each other’s distribution power.

Use UTM parameters and media monitoring tools to track co-branded campaign results across channels.

Example: On Instagram, Passion Planner posted about a giveaway they were running in partnership with three other brands that all have audiences with interest in mental health.

Fast Visibility Tip: Pitch one of your brand's subject matter experts to speak on a podcast in your industry.

3. Use Content Syndication to Get Discovered Where People Are Reading

Effective content syndication is about consistent exposure across high-authority outlets your audience trusts.

How It Works

Create data-rich or expert-driven content that journalists want to cite or republish. Surveys, reports, rankings, and newsworthy trends often work well here. You need to create something that's worth citing with clean, modern visuals like graphs and charts that illustrate the data. It should also include a write-up that contextualizes the information and explains the methodology used.

Once the content is created, it’s time to pitch it to writers/editors or distribute it through a syndication partner. For example, Stacker is an earned distribution platform that amplifies visibility by placing your content in multiple publications in as short as a few days’ time.

For help on how to pitch your content well, check out Cision's Complete PR Pitching Guide.

Example: Beyond Finance created a report about holiday money stress that was picked up by various news affiliates with high domain authorities, like the example shown below.

Fast Visibility Tip: Create a local or industry-specific data report and distribute it through earned media channels.

4. Leverage Influencers Strategically

Influencers remain trusted sources for recommendations, but ROI depends on authenticity and alignment, not just reach.

How It Works

Find niche creators with high engagement and domain credibility, not just massive followings. Use tools like Upfluence or CreatorIQ to narrow down your options.

Co-create content that’s native to their platform and audience. This could mean a product demo, a collaborative blog post, or a co-hosted live stream. And don’t forget to negotiate the usage rights so you can reuse the influencer content on your owned channels or in ads.

Finally, use influencer mentions in PR outreach or paid campaigns to extend their reach and enhance third-party validation.

Example: B2B creator AJ Eckstein, in partnership with Notion, posted on LinkedIn to his creator-economy-focused audience about Notion’s offline mode and the Make With Notion event.

Fast Visibility Tip: Comment on your target influencer's posts with an engaging comment showing you understand their content or have been following along to start to warm the outreach before you ask to partner.

5. Win on Social with Platform-Native Content and Community Engagement

Social isn’t just about posting anymore—it’s about showing up in ways that feel natural to each platform and building two-way conversations with your audience. With organic reach shrinking, platform-native content and community engagement are the baseline requirements for visibility.

How It Works

Platform-native content means creating for each distinct platform to match people’s expectations and stand out among the competition. Each network rewards brands that lean into its strengths. Here are some examples:

• LinkedIn: Long-form posts, carousels that break down insights, and commentary on industry trends. Thought-leadership that sparks discussion performs best here.
• Instagram: Reels and Stories that are visually engaging and humanize the brand. Behind-the-scenes glimpses or user-generated content resonate well.
• Facebook: Group participation, live Q&As, and localized content that taps into specific communities and demographics still active on the platform.
• X (formerly Twitter): Short, timely commentary, threaded insights, and participation in trending conversations. Great for thought-leadership “in the moment.”
• TikTok: Authentic, personality-driven short-form videos with strong storytelling hooks. Educational “quick tips,” challenges, and trend-driven formats perform especially well.
• BlueSky: Community-driven, early-adopter conversations. Great for brands experimenting with voice and tone, and looking to connect with digital-native audiences.
• YouTube Shorts / Long-form: Deep dives or snackable insights depending on the format, both of which offer longevity and strong discoverability.

But you still can’t just post the “right” content and call it a day. Community engagement is equally as important, as algorithms increasingly reward conversation, not just publishing. That means:

• Replying quickly and thoughtfully to comments.
• Asking questions that invite dialogue.
• Participating in trending discussions beyond your own posts.
• Highlighting community voices by resharing user-generated content.

These actions signal to both people and algorithms that your brand is worth engaging with.

Example: CEO of Dropout Sam Reich doesn’t just promote his streaming network’s shows and call it a day — he uses self-deprecating humor and a more casual, approachable tone, which do well on a social platform like Bluesky.

Fast Visibility Tip: Turn your latest testimonial or case study into a visual post and tag the company featured in it.

6. Optimize for AI Visibility

LLMs and AI tools often reference structured, factual, high-authority content to generate their responses. You need to make sure your brand appears in those sources and that your content is built to be understood by machines.

How It Works

Ensure clean technical SEO: schema markup, fast load times, and proper metadata help AI and search engines parse your content.

Get cited in third-party, fact-based content like news articles, rankings, and data reports, as discussed in the content syndication section.

Publish expert commentary on sites that AI tools are likely to pull from, like industry publications and high-authority blogs. Resources like Qwoted, Featured, and SOS Media Queries can help you find opportunities.

Your website should clearly communicate your value proposition and differentiation, with strong supporting evidence. This includes elements like testimonials, case studies, and data points that prove your claims. Having a strong site increases the chance that LLMs will surface your brand, as they'll better understand your company's value.

Example: SoFi wrote a blog post about how couples manage their finances in the first year of marriage, which ended up earning links from local news outlets across several states and LLM responses like Chat GPT. 

Fast Visibility Tip: Add schema markup and update metadata on your top three blog posts.

Brand visibility is about getting your brand into the stories, platforms, and partnerships that people (and AI tools) are already engaging with. Prioritize earned visibility, create content that performs on multiple channels, and invest in strategic distribution — and your brand will stay visible, even as search loses effectiveness.