Why would an AI search provider have a long-term incentive to trust information that a brand deliberately keeps separate from its public-facing website?

This is a question I’ve been coming back to as more conversations about optimizing for AI search seem to involve creating content specifically for agents, rather than people.

The logic is understandable: AI systems need information, sometimes in formats or structures that aren’t particularly useful to a human visitor. If we can make that information easier for agents to consume, surely that’s a good thing?

Yes, but there is a significant difference between making information more accessible to AI and creating an alternative version of your website, or even your brand, that exists primarily to influence what AI systems say about you.

We’ve spent decades dealing with versions of this problem in SEO, and I’m not convinced we’re taking those lessons seriously enough.

How Can SEOs See This Coming?

Anyone who has worked in SEO for long enough will have seen…