From Google's Dominance to the AI Revolution
How the Next Generation of Search is Influencing the Future of Brands
10 percent of the world's population, around 800 million people worldwide, already use ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence from OpenAI. If you add the users of all other services like Google Gemini, Microsoft's Copilot, or Claude from Anthropic, about one billion people on our planet are already using Generative AI in their daily lives. Experts expect mass adoption of AI as early as mid-2026. That’s just under four years since the launch of ChatGPT — while Google’s search engine took nine years to reach a comparable level of widespread use.
"AI is a rupture for search. AI is not a feature, it's a future framework. Not just something to integrate, but something you build upon," said Volker Petzsch-Kunze, Director Strategy of Mediaplus Performance, in his masterclass on the future of search. The era of algorithm-driven search engines, dominated by Google for over two decades, is coming to an end. This is also because the way people search online is changing due to AI. Brands and companies must react to this if they want to remain visible in the future.
About three-quarters of all prompts on ChatGPT are conversations between users and the AI in which they ask for new things — requests that traditional search engines have so far been unable to answer. For instance, instructing the AI to create new photos and videos or to summarize texts and data into brief analyses. Anyone who believes that the rise of AI will soon replace traditionell search is mistaken. This is because artificial intelligence still hallucinates and sometimes delivers incorrect results and information. That is why 95 percent of people who consult ChatGPT continue to use traditional search to validate the AI-generated answers. As a consequence, the number of classic search queries on Google and Bing increased by 20 percent in 2023 and 2024 alone - despite the existence of AI.
Another important aspect: Multimodal search is increasing significantly. People can now interact with AI via voice or images (Voice and Visual Search). One in five ChatGPT users already uses their voice to communicate with the Large Language Model (LLM), and this trend is rising. Google is also seeing a similar development: Around 1 billion search queries are made via audio every month.
Why is voice so successful? It is a more convenient mode for users. Questions are asked more precisely, with more context; they do not have to be typed, and as a result, the answers arrive faster.
Google's visual search, Google Lens, also grew by 65 percent year-on-year for 2024/25 – to currently about 20 billion search queries per month. One in four of these queries has a commercial background.
What does this development mean for brands and marketers? Do they have the right content in the right formats to be found and analyzed by the machines? And what does this mean for paid search?
"We will have fewer ad slots in AI answers," predicts Stephan Kopp, Managing Director of Mediaplus Performance. "It is expected that this will increase the cost per click and noticeably raise the pressure for brands to be visible."
Pure keyword targeting in its current form will be replaced, with the long tail and contextual search gaining in value. As a consequence, Kopp says, advertising budgets will also have to be reallocated and replanned. Stephan Kopp added: "There will be new advertising formats in AI, native placements that are more deeply embedded in the context. The advertising information will have to be designed differently because users expect it to have more of a conversational character and to be even more precisely tailored to their questions or needs." In the future, the AI will decide if and which brands are part of the conversation.
Kopp continued: "People don't ask the AI to get informed. They ask them to get help. Also, with decisions. That's why we must rethink the buying process. The traditional search works according to the motto: Search, Click, Browse, Act. With GPTs, this is shortened to three steps: Ask, Get, Act." According to Kopp, this consequently leads to fewer clicks, but in return, AI-supported search delivers higher-quality traffic. Kopp: "We are entering an era of super-clicks. Clicks that have a significantly higher conversion rate than in classic search."
For brands and companies that want to prepare for AI search, the experts at Mediaplus Performance recommend the following steps, among others:
- Monitor the AI traffic to your shops and websites and mentions in AI answers.
- Readjust your content strategy and production. The number of 'how-to' and 'why-to' queries will increase.
- Pursing a 'search everywhere' strategy that also caters to multimodal searches.
- And in conclusion: Don't panic. Find the right balance between the channels that have worked well so far and the new opportunities.
Because the next stage of search holds another challenge: so-called agentic browsing. Then, the former search engines evolve into assistants that can take on a wide variety of tasks: For example, carrying out a price comparison for a product and identifying the cheapest source. Or arranging a test drive for a new car and coordinating the appointment that suits the dealer with one's own calendar. Always linked to personal data or digital identity that one makes available to the AI. Directly purchasing products or services is also already possible via ChatGPT.
In agentic mode (the next stage after the traditional search and the GPT query), the user journey is shortened to just two steps: Prompt and Act. "Agentic browsing is the first stage of marketing to agents. The next step will be, among other things, creating content specifically for AI agents," said Volker Petzsch-Kunze. His forecast: "The open agentic Web will reward brands that connect visibility, personalization and measurement into a single strategy. There is no reason to panic. Search engine optimization and marketing are by no means dead. However, brands should get to know the opportunities and peculiarities of AI-powered search early on to be prepared for the future of search."
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