💥 AI Search Rewired the Internet (and PR Needs a New Playbook)
and polished content is on its way out
Hi, Team PR@ctical.
This week, the internet quietly changed hands.
Half of consumers now make buying decisions inside AI-powered search engines—not Google.
According to McKinsey’s latest report, New Front Door to the Internet: Winning in the Age of AI Search:
50% of consumers already use AI-powered search today.
$750 billion in U.S. revenue will flow through AI search by 2028.
20–50% of traditional search traffic is now at risk as decisions move upstream into AI results.
✨ SEO didn’t die. It just split in two.
The New Reality
🧠 AI Search Owns Influence.
🔎 Google Search Owns Intent.
That’s the bifurcation defining the next five years of communications.
Brands that only optimize for Google will disappear from the tools decision-makers actually use. The ones that structure content for LLM extraction—and design for retrievability—will own the narrative and answer space.
What’s New This Week 👇
4 things you should keep an eye on:
AI Visibility Becomes Measurable
Semrush launched its AI vs SEO Comparison Tool—the first unified view of AI and traditional visibility—and Wix rolled out AI Visibility Overview to track brand mentions in ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity.
Measurement is finally catching up to discovery.
Hot Take ➡ We’re past the “does AI search matter?” debate. This is the visibility singularity. If you’re not optimizing for AI discovery, you’re optimizing for obscurity.
💸 Agency Economics in Free Fall
WPP issued its second profit warning in three months, forecasting full-year revenue down 6%. Meanwhile, the $13.5 billion Omnicom–Interpublic merger will close by month’s end, creating the largest holding company on earth.
Hot Take:
➡ Holding companies are merging for survival, not strength.
➡ Creative work is being traded for operational scale.
The future of PR belongs to agencies that build visibility, software, and operational systems, not headcount.
💬 B2B Visibility Shifts to Reddit
G2’s integration with Reddit Pro now lets verified software brands auto-sync company data into 100 K+ Reddit communities. This is where your next buyer discovers you—via a verified thread, not your website.
Hot Take:
➡ The future of B2B PR is Community SEO.
➡ If you’re not visible on Reddit or in ChatGPT, you’re invisible where decisions start.
🎙 Creator Trends → Authenticity > Aesthetics
Polished brand content is out.
Behind-the-scenes commentary and AI-augmented audio are in—creators are using tools like ElevenLabs to translate, clone, and scale their own voices.
Hot Take:
➡ The next wave of influence isn’t viral. It’s verifiable.
Voice, tone, and provenance are the new trust metrics.
So What Should Comms Leaders Do Right Now?
✅ Run an AI Visibility Audit – model where you’re missing from AI answers.
✅ Map your Earned Media Citations in ChatGPT + Perplexity.
✅ Build a Provenance Layer into your publishing workflow (see C2PA Standard).
✅ Test GEO Tools like Semrush’s AI Visibility Report.
✅ Rewrite your content to be machine-readable and human-trusted.
The internet’s new hierarchy is a combination of "realness,” retrievability, reliability, and resonance.
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Stay sharp, stay visible,
Sarah
🪄 PR@ctical — Where sharp taste meets sharper tools.