Search as a Channel

MarketerFirst LLC
  • 0.0 (0)
  • MARKETING

Explores how discoverability powers modern marketing from SEO and paid media to social discovery and product growth.

  1. 1D AGO

    Portability Is the Metric Search Leaders Need Now

    Most teams measure AI visibility as one blended score. New data across 3.7 million citations from ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews shows why that's a problem: only 2.37% of cited URLs appeared across all three engines, while more than 91% showed up in just one. In this episode, we unpack why presence is no longer enough and why portability, the ability of your content to travel across AI retrieval systems, is the metric search leaders should actually care about. We cover why guides and tutorials outperform homepages in cross-engine citations, why grounding answers is a different job than ranking pages, and a three-layer measurement model covering presence, portability, and concentration that you can bring into your next leadership meeting. If your AI visibility looks healthy but rests on one engine's habits, you may be renting visibility rather than building it.

    21 min

  2. MAY 7

    When AI Can't Tell You Apart from Your Competitors

    Your brand might be ranking just fine and still vanishing from the AI answers that drive pipeline. We unpack cluster collision, the moment LLMs decide your messaging sounds too much like your competitors and summarize you all away. If you lead an agency or own a growth strategy, this one reframes how you think about visibility. Inside the episode: Why pattern matching in SEO now works against you in AI search The data on source rotation, citation, and why being cited isn't being recommended How to spot where your messaging is interchangeable with competitors What it takes to build a narrative AI systems retrieve, repeat, and recommend Why your real competition is the cluster of brands an LLM can collapse you into The question to bring to your next leadership meeting: is your content making your brand more visible, or more interchangeable?

    20 min

  3. APR 22

    Search Volume Is Dying

    Between 65% and 85% of what buyers now ask AI has no matching keyword in traditional databases. If your strategy still starts with keyword reports, you are using a shrinking map to describe a growing territory, and that is a dangerous place to be in a board meeting. In this episode, we break down why search volume is becoming a lagging indicator, how to spot the demand your tools cannot see, and what the smartest CMOs and agency owners are doing instead, from mining sales call language to tracking AI citations and the "ghost citation" problem. If your traffic is flat but your pipeline questions are getting sharper, this is the conversation that explains why, and what to do next.

    21 min

  4. APR 9

    The Agentic Web Is Coming for Your Marketing Stack

    If your brand is ready for AI answers but not AI actions, you're already behind. Most marketing leaders are still thinking about AI as a smarter search engine. But the real shift is bigger: AI isn't just answering questions anymore. It's learning to take action on behalf of customers. Booking, buying, comparing, recommending. And the brands that win won't be the ones with the most content. They'll be the ones AI can actually do business with. In this episode, we break down what the "agentic web" means for agency owners, CMOs, and marketing leaders, no engineering degree required. We cover why being findable by AI is no longer enough, what it takes to become actionable inside AI-driven customer journeys, and the practical steps your team should take in the next 90 days. If AI agents became a real acquisition channel tomorrow, would your business be ready? That's the conversation we're having.

    25 min

  5. APR 4

    Google Agent Is Here

    What happens when search stops sending visitors and starts completing tasks instead? Google just introduced Google Agent, a new user agent built for AI systems that can browse, interpret, and act on the web on behalf of real users. This isn't another algorithm update. It's a structural shift from search-as-discovery to search-as-execution. In this episode, we unpack what Google Agent means for agencies, brand leaders, and anyone building a digital presence. We explore why automated traffic is now growing 8x faster than human traffic, how Shopify is already wiring millions of merchants into AI-powered commerce channels, and why your website's next most important visitor may not be human at all. If your strategy still revolves around rankings and clicks, this is your wake-up call. The brands that win from here will be the ones machines can trust enough to act on.

    22 min

  6. MAR 23

    Server Logs Are the New Search Data

    Your analytics aren't showing you what AI is actually doing on your site, and that blind spot has real business consequences. This episode breaks down the growing gap between AI crawler ingestion and actual citation or retrieval, why server-side log analysis is now an executive-level concern, and what agencies need to start measuring before clients start asking. If GPTBot is hitting your clients' sites thousands of times a day but driving zero attributable traffic, what are you actually giving away and what are you getting back? A reframe of how search visibility works in an AI-mediated world.

    24 min

  7. MAR 16

    The Ask Maps Era Is Here

    Google Maps just got a conversational AI layer and it changes the game for local search. This episode breaks down Ask Maps, Google's new Gemini-powered discovery feature, and what it means for agencies still running the old local SEO playbook. You'll walk away with a clear framework for auditing your clients' local presence for AI recommendation readiness, rethinking how reviews and business profiles function in a dialogue-driven world, and reframing reporting when fewer discovery journeys produce a click. If you manage local for clients, this one is worth your full attention.

    18 min

  8. MAR 9

    TikTok Is the New Search Engine

    Your SEO strategy has a blind spot, and it's costing you consideration share before Google ever enters the picture. TikTok has quietly become one of the most powerful discovery layers in digital marketing and most brands are still treating it like a social channel. In this episode, we break down why that's a strategic mistake with real go-to-market consequences. We cover: Why nearly half of US consumers are using TikTok to research purchases, find local businesses, and learn how to do things and what that means for your funnelHow TikTok search actually works (hint: it's not keyword matching it's relevance modeling)The three high-intent search clusters where brands are winning right now: local/experiential, product research, and how-toWhy your organic metrics are probably lying to you and how TikTok is making paid look more essential than it really isWhat "TikTok SEO" actually means in practice, beyond the buzzwordWhether you're a CMO trying to explain discovery gaps to a board, or an agency owner figuring out where the next service wedge comes from, this episode gives you the strategic frame to act on — not just observe. The era of search as a single-channel traffic play is over. The question is whether you're measuring where customers actually form preferences now, or just what happens after the click.

    20 min
See All (16)

About

Explores how discoverability powers modern marketing from SEO and paid media to social discovery and product growth.

Information

  • Creator
    MarketerFirst LLC
  • Years Active
    2K
  • Episodes
    16
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © 2026 Search as a Channel
  • Show Website
    Search as a Channel