5 AI Search Trends for 2026 | Louise Linehan (Ahrefs)

<p>Searches for &quot;AI search&quot; are already running at nearly two-fifths the volume of &quot;SEO&quot; itself, and the industry is scrambling to keep up. </p><p><br></p><p>Tim Soulo sits down with Ahrefs content marketer <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/louise-linehan/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferer">Louise Linehan</a>, who mined LinkedIn and Reddit discussion, and validated it against 18 months of Keywords Explorer data to surface the five AI search trends marketers are actually talking about:</p><p>- the race to prove AI&#39;s ROI</p><p>- optimizing for readers that are bots</p><p>- zero-click survival strategies</p><p>- the never-ending GEO-versus-SEO debate</p><p>- programmatic SEO&#39;s risky resurgence</p><p><br></p><p>When the clicks are vanishing and the industry can&#39;t agree on what replaces them, what&#39;s still worth optimizing for?</p><p><br></p><p>---</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Timestamps</strong></p><p><strong>(00:00)</strong> Intro</p><p><strong>(01:00)</strong> The Method</p><p><strong>(05:56)</strong> Trend 1: Proving the ROI of AI (and the New Reporting Wave)</p><p><strong>(17:00)</strong> Trend 2: Agent Optimization: llms.txt, Markdown, Accessibility Trees</p><p><strong>(23:30)</strong> Trend 3: Zero-Click Search and the Crocodile Mouth</p><p><strong>(30:52)</strong> Trend 4: GEO vs SEO</p><p><strong>(36:00)</strong> Trend 5: The Programmatic SEO Resurgence</p><p><strong>(39:15)</strong> Rapid-Fire Predictions: Watermarks, Agentic Commerce, Negative GEO</p><p><br></p><p>---</p><p><br></p><p><strong>Where to find Louise:</strong></p><p>Louise Linehan: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/louise-linehan/" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://www.linkedin.com/in/louise-linehan/</a></p><p><br></p><p><strong>Where to find Tim:</strong></p><p>LinkedIn: <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/timsoulo/" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://www.linkedin.com/in/timsoulo/</a></p><p>X: <a href="https://x.com/timsoulo" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">@timsoulo</a></p><p>Website: <a href="https://www.timsoulo.com/" target="_blank" rel="ugc noopener noreferrer">https://www.timsoulo.com/</a></p>