AI Search For SaaS: 3 Steps For Reaching High Intent Buyers

In this video, I'm going to show you exactly, step-by-step, how to rank your SaaS in AI tools like ChatGPT and Gemini. In fact, these are the same strategies that I use to get my SaaS startup to show up for literally thousands of prompts, including the exact prompts that potential buyers use to make a decision. Showing up in AI search has been huge for our brand. That's because, according to a recent survey of a thousand B2B SaaS buyers, half of them now start with AI tools instead of Google. And 87% said that AI tools have changed how they choose which software vendor to go with. So, if you're not showing up in AI tools, chances are your target customer is going to go with a competitor. With that, let's get right into the steps.

Starting with step number one, optimize your SaaS site for AI search. Before you worry about mentions, reviews, or external factors, it's important to first focus on your actual website. That's because it's the only source that LLMs use that you fully control. After all, AI systems use your site as a reference. And even when they pull information from elsewhere, they still cross-check it with what they find on your website. Here's an example of ChatGPT using our own site as a reference in an AI answer. If your site is unclear, incomplete, or inconsistent, the model is going to use third-party sources to fill in those gaps. And that's how errors, mistakes, and negative sentiment creep into AI answers about your brand. So, this step is about making it easy for LLMs to learn and train on your own website. This is something we take very seriously at Exploding Topics. We check Google Search Console and SEMrush's site audit tool weekly to make sure there aren't any technical issues holding us back. We also have dedicated product pages that outline what we do and who we're ideal for. That way, AI tools have a dedicated source of truth, our website, to understand what our brand is all about. Here's how to do the same thing for your SaaS website. First, you

want to chunk your pages so key info is easy for them to pull out. This is all about breaking your content into discrete sections that are easy to work with. If you think about it, most people don't read pages straight through from start to finish. They jump to the section that they care about. Search engines and AI tools basically do the same thing. So, instead of writing one long page, think in terms of chunks. Each chunk should cover one clear idea. For example, take this page at Exploding Topics. See how this page has dedicated sections for each strategy? That's how you want to structure your pages, not as just a giant long-form page with no sections. Here's a good test that I use with our writing team to make sure that we're chunking our content enough. If someone pulled out one section from a page and read it on its own, would it still make sense? If the answer is yes, you've probably chunked your content pretty well. For example, you could take strategy number seven from this page, and it could work without needing the rest of the page at all. The next thing you want to do to optimize your website for AI tools is to

publish boring but useful pages. This is where I see a lot of SaaS sites slip up. LLMs need complete, accurate information if they're going to use that information as part of an AI answer, which means you don't want your site full of hyped-up marketing copy like, "We're redefining the CRM category. " Basically, just be explicit about what your product does, without a lot of hype or vague promises. For example, at Exploding Topics, we have several dedicated pages outlining who our product is for — and what we do. We even have a few pages dedicated to our product's key features. And if you don't have this kind of information clear on your site, LLMs will use other sources to fill in the gaps, including Reddit speculation, outdated reviews, and guesses based on what your competitors do. And that stuff is not usually very flattering for your brand. But when you have content on your site that describes exactly what your brand does and who it's for, you're likely to get in front of people searching for your category in AI search. And now it's time for your

second step, show up in key sources that AI models train on. Once your site is cleaned up, the next thing I do is make sure that your SaaS site appears in the places that LLMs train on the most. AI obviously doesn't just look at what you say about your software. It cross-checks against review sites, documentation, community discussions, and comparisons. And if these sources all don't line up and say the same thing, AI models are going to be reluctant to include that info in an answer. So, what you want to do first is search for your brand the same way a customer would. For example, in my case, I would Google things like Exploding Topics reviews, Exploding Topics pricing, and Exploding Topics alternatives. This will bring up the types of pages that AI models love to train on when it comes to SaaS brands. Then I would check these specific places where, again, LLMs like to train when it comes to SaaS brands. Now, as I go through these pages, I'm not really looking for praise or criticism. I'm just making sure that I have a consistent presence on these platforms. What I'm really looking for is just to make sure that when someone describes Exploding Topics, they're describing it about the same way. And I also want to make sure that the information is generally complete, accurate, and consistent. So, when you go through this exercise, just make sure that your profile is complete, the categories make sense for what you do, the feature list reflects your current product, and most importantly, that your plans and pricing info is up-to-date and accurate. And in SaaS, these mismatches are dangerous because they can make it harder for LLMs to understand what you do and who you're ideal for. For example, when I recently did this little test, I was pleasantly surprised to see that most mentions of Exploding Topics were pretty consistent. They all said some version of, "They help people find trends before they go mainstream. " Now, fortunately, our use case is pretty straightforward, which probably helped. Next, I'd go and fix the places that need fixing. Specifically, you want to check those big third-party sites that talk about your brand like Crunchbase, G2, and Product Hunt. Now, obviously, you can't rewrite the internet, but you can rewrite the places that you control. In practice, this usually means updating review profiles with accurate feature lists, correcting category placements that are wrong, tightening up these best for descriptions, and responding to reviews where expectations are clearly off-base for what you actually do. That way, you eliminate those big contradictions that make LLMs reluctant to mention your brand. And now it's time for step number

three, which is to create your own comparison and alternative pages. A lot of people don't realize that AI tools will sometimes cite your own website as a reference. Now, obviously, getting mentions on third-party sites is huge when it comes to ranking in AI tools. But I've also found that detailed comparison and alternative pages help us show up for more AI answers. In fact, here's an example of our own site being used as a reference in AI answers, along with us getting recommended. It's pretty cool. So, I'd start by identifying which competitors people bring up on sales calls and on review sites. Then I'd create pages like your product versus a competitor, alternatives to your product, and best tools for a specific use case. The key here is to be honest, objective, and thorough. If your product is stronger for startups and kind of weak for enterprise, feel free to say that. If a competitor has a really helpful feature that you don't, just be honest about it. This makes your content credible for AI systems to train on. For example, here's a list on our site of the best PR tools on the market. We do have quite a few marketing and PR agencies that use our product to find trending topics, but we're not 100% designed for this target group like other tools are, which is why, as you can see here, we put ourselves number six on the list. Now, even that is probably a little bit generous, but it definitely wouldn't make sense to place us number one on the list, so we don't. We also try to be super thorough on these pages. For example, here's an alternative page on our site for one of the other trend platforms out there. As you can see, we don't just cover what makes us better or different at a surface level. We do a deep dive where we cover features, pricing, and a detailed comparison table, which, by the way, LLMs love. If you take a step back, a lot of this stuff is just smart marketing. Make sure your site is clear. Make sure other sites aren't describing you in conflicting ways. Show up in places where people compare software, and publish honest comparison pages that help people make a decision. You usually

don't need to reinvent your entire marketing or SEO strategy for AI. You just need to focus a little bit more on the details that matter for AI systems. With that, I'll see you in the next video.