AI search is shifting traffic from volume to value

AI is changing how audiences find and engage with brands. Clicks may be fewer, but they are arriving later in the funnel, better qualified and far more likely to convert. For marketers, that shift is a challenge and a rare opportunity.

“We hear both the threat and the opportunity from CMOs every day,” said Guy Yalif, chief evangelist for visual web design and CMS platform Webflow. “Traffic used to be what SEO was all about, but now elements are remixing and reformulating the words you spent so much time creating. That changes not just how people find you, but how your brand narrative gets shaped.”

Large language models (LLMs) are already reshaping site traffic. Yalif said they are now the second-largest source of bot traffic on Webflow, behind only search engines. While Google has downplayed the trend, Webflow data shows “gentle traffic declines.” Semrush goes further, predicting that AI-driven search will overtake traditional search within three years.

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The real story is not just where traffic comes from, but what gets rewarded. The new algorithmic imperative — what Yalif calls “E-A-T++” — favors firsthand expertise, original perspectives and authentic experiences. That helps explain why Reddit, with its unfiltered conversations, has become the third most cited domain on Google after Wikipedia and Amazon. However, marketers should tread carefully on the site.

The Reddit danger zone

Chris Penn, chief data scientist and co-founder of TrustInsight, puts it bluntly: “Reddit can be an exceptionally unforgiving place, especially if you are a marketer and your intent is obvious. Reddit tends to heavily punish commercial intent, which is one of the reasons why AI uses it as a source so often. Redditors generally try—correctly—to chase us marketers away because our intent is to take value, not give it.” 

For brands, that underscores the challenge: audiences are shifting to channels that demand unfiltered authenticity, where business-as-usual SEO tactics no longer work.

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While overall volumes are flattening, traffic arriving via AI search is proving far more valuable. Yalif noted that the average Google query is four words long, while the average LLM prompt is now 23 words and rising. That depth signals stronger context and clearer buying intent. The conversational nature of AI means users self-educate and pre-qualify before they ever land on a website. In B2B, the shift is even more apparent, with the vast majority of buyers now using genAI to filter vendors, gather information and shape their decision process.

The payoff is dramatic. Ahrefs reports that AI search visitors convert at twenty-three times the rate of traditional organic traffic. In the past 30 days, less than 1% of Ahrefs’ visitors generated more than 12% of signups. Semrush finds that these visitors are more than four times more valuable, viewing 50% more pages on average. At Webflow, 8% of signups already come from AI search, consistently outperforming every other channel. This is no longer a volume game—it is a value game.

Relevance is king

For B2B buyers in particular, relevance matters more than reach. Yalif cautions against “spray and pray” tactics, arguing that experiences need to be more tailored, especially on owned media like websites.

For Yalif, the job of marketing hasn’t changed — build brands, deliver value, drive revenue. What’s changed is the toolkit. AI should sharpen, not replace, a marketer’s work: refining brand voice, pressure-testing ideas and speeding up execution without outsourcing the thinking. But it comes with risks. Hallucinations, “yes-man” answers and accuracy gaps make guardrails essential. The most innovative teams are already hardening prompts to keep AI honest.

“One of the challenges is that we marketers often all sound alike,” said Yalif. “We’re all the best, the most, the fastest, the leader, but the value of an original point of view and a unique data, unique lens is as high as it’s ever been. And brand matters more today than it did a year ago because that is a big part of standing out and differentiating in the new world of search.”

However, it’s essential to note that, despite all the talk of change, the core job of marketing remains unchanged. It’s still about building brands and driving revenue by being valuable to prospects. 

Nearly identical twins

“These are new capabilities to go achieve those jobs,” said Yalif. “GEO is not some completely radical departure from SEO. They’re not identical, but they are quite close.”

The temptation to flood the web with AI-generated content is real — but misguided. Today, just 9% of Google-indexed content is fully AI-generated. The rest is human or human-assisted, because originality, perspective and editorial oversight remain critical. The marketers who win will be those who combine AI’s scale with human judgment to create content that machines can parse and humans actually want to read.

The mandate for marketers is simple: treat AI as an amplifier, not a replacement. The winners will not be the brands that churn out the most content, but those that create the most meaningful content in an AI-shaped marketplace.