In our latest webinar, Kevin Indig joined AirOps' Josh Spilker and Eoin Clancy to share research-backed strategies for maintaining rankings and earning AI citations, including a special AirOps workflow.

They explored the shifting dynamics of user behavior, revealed what actually drives AI citations, and demonstrated how leading teams build scalable systems for ongoing content success.

Top 5 Takeaways

1. Content Decay Makes Regular Refreshes Essential
   Pages naturally lose visibility and performance over time as information ages. Proactive refreshes have become non-negotiable for maintaining rankings, as both Google and AI systems prioritize fresh, accurate content over stale pages.
2. AI Overviews Change User Behavior and Reduce Clicks
   Google's AI Overviews significantly reduce organic click-through rates by answering queries directly. The shift is especially pronounced among younger users, who increasingly validate AI answers on platforms like Reddit and YouTube rather than traditional business websites.
3. Topical Authority Drives Both Search and LLM Visibility
   Being recognized as an expert in specific topics dramatically increases your chances of being cited in both search results and AI-generated answers. Brands with comprehensive, well-referenced content across related subtopics consistently outperform one-off content efforts.
4. Freshness and Structure Are Key to AI Citations
   Kevin's research revealed that regular updates, clear content structure, and proper schema markup are the strongest drivers of AI citations—outweighing traditional SEO metrics like backlink profiles or keyword density.
5. Automated Workflows Scale Content Refresh and Authority Audits
   Leading teams are building systems, not just creating content. By implementing automated dashboards and workflows, they efficiently monitor content performance, identify refresh opportunities, and close topical gaps at scale.

Best Practices and Key Learnings

This webinar highlighted actionable strategies for adapting to the new realities of search and AI Overviews. Below, we break down the most important insights and frameworks shared by Kevin Indig and the AirOps team.

Make Content Refresh a Core SEO and AEO Strategy

Content refresh isn't just a periodic maintenance task—it's a foundational strategy for maintaining visibility in both traditional search and AI-powered platforms. Regular updates signal relevance to search engines and provide fresh information for LLMs to cite.

• Content refresh remains a top tactic for combating content decay and staying competitive in both search engines and AI Overviews.
• Both blogs and landing pages benefit from regular updates, and AI can accelerate refresh cycles.

"Content refresh is always in my top 3. I've seen this over and over again, whether we talk about, you know, blog content, landing page content, which is often forgotten. But also, you know, aggregator sites or bigger platform, bigger sites like a Tripadvisor. Right is if they get a lot of new fresh reviews. Google rewards that with a freshness signal." — Kevin Indig

Leverage AI to Scale and Improve Refresh Velocity

AI tools have transformed content refresh from a labor-intensive process to a strategic advantage. By automating research and initial drafting, teams can dramatically increase their refresh velocity while maintaining quality through human oversight.

• AI tools can help teams identify decaying content and automate parts of the refresh process for greater efficiency.
• This approach is not just a ranking play—it also increases the chances of being cited in LLMs and AI Overviews.

"It doesn't only translate as a signal to LLMs. But it also goes the other way around, where we, as companies, we as marketers or seos can use AI to speed up our refresh velocity and make our process much more effective." — Kevin Indig

Implement Data-Driven Refresh Workflows

The most successful teams don't refresh content randomly—they build systematic approaches to identify, prioritize, and update their most valuable assets. This data-driven approach transforms content refresh from a reactive tactic to a proactive strategy.

• Use dashboards and automated workflows to monitor URL performance, flag content decay, and trigger refreshes.
• Systematic tracking provides a competitive edge and ensures no high-value pages are left behind.

Adapt to Shifts in User Behavior and Platform Trust

The introduction of AI Overviews has fundamentally changed how users interact with search results. Understanding these behavioral shifts is crucial for maintaining visibility and influence in the customer journey.

• AI Overviews reduce organic clicks, concentrating user attention at the top of the AI result.
• Younger audiences increasingly validate AI answers on Reddit and YouTube, making brand presence on these platforms crucial.

"Especially younger people will read the AI overview and then validate the answer with what they perceive as a human answer from Reddit or Youtube. So it's really that kind of 1, 2 Punch combo... brands, most likely, with some exceptions, need to invest in Reddit and Youtube." — Kevin Indig

Build Authentic Engagement on Reddit and YouTube

With users increasingly turning to community platforms to validate information, brands need strategic approaches to build presence and trust on Reddit and YouTube. Success on these platforms requires a fundamentally different approach than traditional content marketing.

• Direct promotion rarely works; success comes from authentic, gradual engagement and ongoing publishing.
• Attribution from these platforms is challenging, so focus on visibility and trust-building.

Audit and Build Topical Authority with Automated Workflows

Topical authority has become the cornerstone of visibility in both search and AI platforms. Kevin shared frameworks and tools for systematically building authority through comprehensive coverage and strategic content refreshes.

• Use tools like AirOps to benchmark your authority on key topics, identify content gaps, and generate prioritized refresh plans.
• Topical authority is driven by three pillars: coverage, quality, and references/backlinks.

"Topic authority comes to play here because it is essentially whether people know you for a certain topic... participants of the study often browse the search results and then say, Oh, yeah, here here is Kelly Blue Book. I know them. I trust them when it comes to car information." — Kevin Indig

"The framework that we use is basically a very simple formula out of 3 variables. The 1st one being content coverage... The second variable is how well they do that. And the 3rd variable is how that's supported with backlinks and references from other sites, which is kind of more of the authority piece." — Kevin Indig

Engineer Content for AI Citations

Kevin's research revealed surprising insights about what actually drives AI citations. The factors that matter most for LLM visibility are often different from traditional SEO metrics, requiring teams to adapt their content strategies accordingly.

• Freshness and structure consistently rank as the most important factors for LLM and AI Overview citations.
• Readability, comprehensive coverage, and clear evidence blocks outperform traditional SEO metrics like total traffic or backlinks.

"If I had to stack rank these, I would probably put fresh signals and structure at the top... they're most incentivized to search on the web when the when it's when it's about fresh information." — Kevin Indig

"You see some of these like total traffic, whole keywords hold backlinks things. They're basically 0 or negative, which means that just the volume does not automatically transfer to Llms." — Kevin Indig

Apply No-Regret Moves to Earn More AI Citations

Based on his extensive research, Kevin identified several "no-regret moves" that consistently improve AI citation rates regardless of industry or content type. These tactical adjustments can be implemented immediately for measurable results.

• Refresh anything older than 12 months
• Add or update schema markup on high-intent URLs.
• Front-load evidence and compress paragraphs for better extractability
• Map FAQs to key landing pages

"After no regrets framing. So this really is no regret. I think this looks solid." — Kevin Indig

Turning Content Refresh Insights into Results

The most successful brands in the AI era aren't just creating content...they're building systems that continuously monitor, refresh, and optimize their digital presence. These organizations are developing proactive refresh workflows that catch content decay before it impacts performance and damages visibility.

With AI Overviews and LLMs raising the bar for content quality, winning strategies now require a combination of technical excellence and editorial rigor. Content must be fresh, structured for machine readability, and authoritative enough to earn citations. Teams that leverage automated workflows to systematically build topical authority are seeing the strongest results across both traditional search and AI-powered platforms.

The multi-platform approach is equally critical. As user behavior shifts toward validating AI answers on platforms like Reddit and YouTube, brands need to establish authentic presence wherever their audience seeks information. This isn't just about distribution—it's about building trust through genuine engagement and consistent expertise.

Final Thoughts: Future-Proofing Your Content for AI-Driven Search

Success in the AI era requires a strategic blend of technical optimization, editorial excellence, and systematic content operations. By building workflows that prioritize freshness, structure, and topical authority, you can maintain visibility across both traditional search and emerging AI platforms.

Book a strategy session to learn how AirOps can transform your content operations.