August 14, 2025
5 min read
@CNET
AI Agents Now Account for a Third of Brand Search Traffic, Report Finds
AI agents are increasingly conducting brand searches at a scale equivalent to a third of traditional organic search traffic, according to a recent report by digital marketing company BrightEdge. BrightEdge defines an AI agent as any AI tool that performs tasks on a user's behalf. For example, when you ask ChatGPT to find the most cost-effective bikes for teenagers to ride on gravel, it uses its live web browsing feature to search across bicycle brands. Other popular AI search agents include Google's Gemini, Perplexity, Microsoft Copilot, and Claude. The report highlights that truly agentic AI goes beyond chatbots. For instance, the recently launched ChatGPT Agent can browse the internet in a virtual desktop environment, performing tasks such as booking flights or ordering food, not just research. Jim Yu, CEO of BrightEdge, explained, "First, we'll be delegating more decision-making and prioritization to large language models (LLMs) — similar to how Google became the main entry point to the web, but this time with multiple players like Google, ChatGPT, and potentially others. Second, we'll gain the ability to match and research products and services at a level of detail that simply wasn't practical before. The flip side is that what you see will depend on what the AI finds and prioritizes, which will have implications for transparency, diversity of results, and accuracy." As AI adoption grows, humans are offloading more informational synthesis to machines, making research faster and easier. This shift allows users to find products tailored to very specific requests without sifting through reviews and comments themselves.Optimizing for AI
Marketers and SEO experts are adapting to this new landscape by shifting focus from traditional Google Search optimization to AI optimization. Previously, a shoe brand would try to rank high for keywords like "shoes" or "sneakers" on Google. Now, brands must aim to get their products recommended by AI chatbots like ChatGPT. This requires a combination of traditional SEO techniques and generative engine optimization (GEO). Since AI tools seek to understand user intent deeply, brands need to optimize their online content to be easily interpreted by AI, which often considers complex variables and structured data. Yu cautions, "History shows that gaming the algorithm never leads to high-quality results. At some point, the company supplying the answers must step in to address it or risk losing users to better alternatives." AI chatbots are vulnerable to prompt injection — a malicious technique that tricks AI into altering its responses. While this is a risk, Yu believes AI companies will implement safety nets to mitigate such issues. "The difference is that AI systems have the potential to cross-check information and apply richer quality signals than traditional search," Yu said. "At the core, brands still need to focus on creating trustworthy, authoritative content and monitoring how they're represented in AI-driven answers." Disclosure: Ziff Davis, CNET's parent company, filed a lawsuit against OpenAI in April, alleging copyright infringement in training and operating its AI systems.Originally published at CNET on August 13, 2025.