By Tom Batting • July 20, 2025
B2B buyer behaviour is shifting fast - and it’s being led by generative AI.
From ChatGPT to Perplexity and Google AI Overviews, buyers are turning to AI tools to research, compare, and shortlist B2B software. This isn’t a future trend. It’s already happening.
For B2B SaaS brands, this means the traditional playbook of SEO and PPC is no longer enough. If you want to influence the journey, you need to show up inside the tools your buyers are using to guide their research or get help with making decisions.
That’s where Generative Engine Optimisation (GEO) comes in.
So, what should you actually expect to see in term of results if you invest in an AI search strategy? Let’s break it down.
1. Engage buyers earlier in the journey
Buyers aren’t starting with Google anymore. They’re starting with a prompt in an AI tool like ChatGPT.
Instead of searching “best procurement software,” they’re asking:
“What are the top-rated procurement software platforms for large manufacturing companies that integrate with Microsoft and are SOC 2 compliant?”
That’s a big shift. GEO helps you identify and show up in these prompts so you can engage buyers at the point of curiosity or before they even know they need a solution - and certainly before they even know your brand name.
2. Improve visibility inside AI agents
Most companies still obsess over keyword rankings. But as search shifts, what really matters now is whether you appear inside AI generated answers.
GEO is how you increase your brand’s probability of being:
- Cited in a ChatGPT answer
- Referenced in a Perplexity source list
- Included in a Google AI Overview
- Summarised by Claude or another LLM
The companies that are already visible didn’t get there by accident. There might be some overlap with the SEO work they have already been doing, or they might be working actively on AI search.
3. Understand why your competitors are showing up
Generative engine optimisation gives you clarity on why certain competitors keep appearing in AI tools - and how to reverse-engineer their visibility.
By analysing prompts, citations, and model behaviour, you can understand:
- What types of content are being cited
- Which third party sources are trusted (e.g. G2, Reddit, Gartner)
- How you stack up by persona and prompt cluster
With this intel, you can shape your own AI search and content strategy with confidence.
4. Increase pipeline velocity
AI enabled B2B buyers are moving faster because the information they need is readily available.
They’re using LLMs to:
- Explore solutions
- Generate vendor checklists
- Compare features side by side
- Draft RFPs
- Analyse customer reviews
- Create evaluation scorecards
By aligning your content to those interactions, you’re reducing friction and helping buyers move from research to action. This means fewer surprises in sales conversations and faster consensus across the buying group.
5. Reduce dependency on SEO and PPC
GEO doesn’t replace SEO or PPC - but it makes your growth more durable. In many cases we believe B2B buyers are using AI alongside Google searches. But we’re almost certain that AI assistants are playing some role at some point in the buying journey.
By building visibility inside the answers themselves, you:
- Future proof against declining click through rates
- Lower paid search costs by capturing interest earlier
- Stop chasing keyword rankings that no longer drive ROI
The Search Results Page is changing fast. AI Mode is on the way. It’s unclear how paid ads are going to play a role in the future of search or inside AI tools.
6. Shift from random acts of content to strategic orchestration
Most content strategies still look like scatterguns.
GEO forces discipline. It helps you:
- Map prompts by buyer persona and journey stage
- Create content with defined strategic roles
- Coordinate content production across marketing, sales and product
This is how you stop creating content for the sake of it, and start creating it in a way which aligns it with real buyer intent.
7. Improve alignment across your go-to-market teams
When you go deep into understanding what buyers might be asking AI tools at each buyer journey stage, you can:
- Help sales anticipate and respond to questions
- Inform product of common feature gaps or confusions
- Coordinate marketing messaging across channels
We see AI search supporting the length of the B2B buyer journey - it isn’t just a visibility play. It can be a glue between functions.
8. Deliver measurable insights to leadership
If you want executive buy in for GEO, it starts with data. If traffic from Google in decline and you don’t have a plan - now is the time.
We use tools like Peec AI to help companies:
- Track brand visibility in AI answers
- Benchmark inclusion against competitors
- Monitor prompt-level performance
- Prove influence across the funnel
But even just using Google Search Console might give you some early insights into shifting B2B search behaviour. Generative engine optimisation can give marketing teams the evidence they need to lead in the boardroom.
9. Build an AI-first marketing function
GEO is a forcing function for modernisation.
It pushes teams to:
- Rethink how they create and measure content
- Embrace AI-powered research, planning, and publishing
- Collaborate across silos using shared audience intelligence
The result? A future-fit marketing function that can keep pace with how buyers actually behave and is fully AI enabled.
Many SaaS brands are already seeing the “crocodile” in their Search Console – impressions going up, clicks going down.
That’s often the result of AI Overviews giving users the information they need without clicking through to a website.
A GEO strategy helps you respond, adapt, and regain influence. And while attribution is imperfect today, it’s getting clearer fast. Google, OpenAI, and others will continue improving visibility analytics.
But if you wait for perfect data, your competitors will have already taken the lead.
At FirstMotion, we help enterprise B2B SaaS companies build GEO strategies that:
- Increase AI search visibility
- Map prompts & content strategy to buyer stages
- Connect content to commercial outcomes
If you’re ready to get started, we’re ready to help.
Tom Batting is a Forbes 30 Under 30 entrepreneur and founder of FirstMotion. Having built and exited multiple ventures, he created FirstMotion to help established B2B software companies stay visible as AI reshapes how buyers search and decide. He writes about GEO, AI search strategy, and turning organic search into a pipeline engine for B2B SaaS brands.