Buyers used to search Google and click through a list of links. Now a growing number of them just ask ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Gemini directly: "who makes this kind of product, and who sells it in my region." The AI picks one answer and hands it over. That means a website now has two different readers, Google and the AI chat tools, and they don't read the same way.
What Google Wants
Google's own guidance is direct: its AI features (AI Overviews, AI Mode) run on the same ranking system as regular search. No special files needed. No special markup. Google says plainly that llms.txt files, which many sites now add specifically for AI, are ignored by Google entirely. Google also warns against writing a separate version of content just for AI, or chopping it into unnatural fragments. The advice is the same advice good SEO has always given: clear, original, well-sourced content written for people.
What the Other AI Tools Want
ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Copilot are different. They don't use Google's system, and they do reward specific things:
