Why every SEO should care about brand mentions in the age of ChatGPT and LLMs

I’ll be honest, if, as a fellow SEO professional, you’d asked me five years ago whether unlinked brand mentions would ever rival backlinks in importance, I’d have laughed you out of the room. For most of my career in SEO, backlinks were the holy grail. They were the currency we all traded in, and for good reason, Google’s PageRank loved them.

However, here we are in 2025, and the landscape appears quite different. Generative AI is rewriting the rules of search, content discovery, and brand reputation. And suddenly, brand mentions, those little shoutouts in articles, forums, reviews, even Reddit threads, are stepping into the spotlight.

This isn’t theory. I’ve seen firsthand how the importance of brand mentions has skyrocketed as AI models, from Google’s AI Overviews to ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity, increasingly shape how people find and evaluate businesses. 

If your brand isn’t being talked about, you’re invisible to both machines and humans.

So, let’s unpack why AI and brand mentions are now inseparable, what that means for our strategies, and how actually to win in this new reality.

What are brand mentions, really?

Before I go full nerd, let me clarify that by brand mentions, I mean any time your brand name or product is referenced in online content such as blogs, forums, news, or reviews, whether it’s linked or not. These can be:

• Unlinked references (“SEOPro did this thing…”)
  
• Linked brand anchors (“Click here for X tool by SEOPro”)
  
• Mentions inside AI model outputs, summaries, AI search results, etc.
  

When we discuss the importance of brand mentions, we’re expanding our frame beyond “just links” and focusing on being part of the conversation, the one AI models are reading, ingesting, and utilizing.

From backlinks to brand mentions: A shift I didn’t see coming

Let me tell you a quick story.

A few years back, one of our SaaS clients was obsessed with links. Every monthly report: “How many new referring domains?” They were ranking decently but struggling to break into conversational AI search results. 

Then something interesting happened. A journalist from a niche industry blog wrote about their tool, no link, just a mention. Then another mentioned them in a “top 10 tools” list without linking.

Fast-forward a few months, and when I tested prompts like “Best SaaS tools for remote collaboration” in ChatGPT and Gemini, guess whose name showed up? Our client.

No backlink. Just mentions.

That’s when it hit me: brand mentions in AI search results are becoming as valuable, if not more so, than traditional links. 

Why? Because large language models (LLMs) don’t only crawl hyperlinks, they absorb text, context, and sentiment. They don’t care if it’s a hyperlink or plain text; what matters is that your brand name keeps popping up in credible, topical contexts.

Digging up the numbers!

Because I know we SEOs like numbers, here are a few stats I pulled together:

• Web mentions correlate most strongly: From the Ahrefs study, titled “An Analysis of AI Overview Brand Visibility Factors (75K Brands Studied)”,  branded web mentions had a ~0.664 correlation with appearing in AI Overviews. That is much higher than many traditional SEO metrics.

Ahrefs 

• Backlinks still matter, but less so for AI mentions. In the same study, the number of backlinks, domain rating, and other factors had weaker correlations (around 0.2-0.3) compared to brand mentions.
  
• AI search engines often cite third-party content: A study by SEJ, using xfunnel.ai, analyzed 40,000 responses across major AI search tools and found that, depending on the platform, there are, on average, multiple citations per response. And “earned content” (third-party, not your own) was a big portion.
  
• Prevalence of AI mentions across LLMs: According to Semrush data, in non-branded queries, 26-39% of responses across various LLMs included brand mentions. For example, Google AI Overview (~37%), Perplexity (~30.5%), Gemini (~31%), etc.
  

These numbers aren’t trivial. They suggest that brand recognition strategies built around mentions aren’t speculative; they’re quite literally what’s moving the needle.

Why generative AI loves brand mentions

So why is there such a strong connection between generative AI and brand mentions? Well, check out a few reasons:

1. LLMs feed on text, not just links.

When AI systems like GPT-4 or Gemini train, they don’t give backlinks special treatment. They’re looking at co-occurrences, entities, and context. That’s where brand mentions in large language models (LLMs) come into play; they build the associations machines use to connect your brand with your niche.

2. AI-powered brand mentions boost trust signals.

Think about AI-driven brand reputation. If hundreds of articles, Reddit comments, and blog posts casually name-drop your brand in a positive way, the model learns that this brand is relevant, credible, and trusted. This ultimately influences both AI-generated answers and human perception.

3. Unlinked mentions drive visibility in AI summaries.

Search Engine Journal ran a test showing that content with authoritative citations and statistics had up to a 99% better chance of appearing in AI responses compared to similar content without. That’s massive and proof that being referenced matters as much as traditional rankings.

4. Machine learning thrives on frequency & sentiment.

It’s not just about whether your brand is mentioned. The impact of AI on brand mentions is that algorithms care about how often and in what tone. A few negative Reddit threads can sting; dozens of neutral or positive forum shoutouts build credibility.

The role of brand mentions in AI algorithms is growing rapidly. They’re part of how AI decides who to trust and recommend.

How to build brand mentions that count (Not just noise)

Alright, so we agree that AI-powered brand mentions matter. But how do we actually get them? Here’s what I’ve seen work for clients (and my own experiments):

Where brand mentions beat traditional SEO

I want to draw a few side-by-side contrasts, because sometimes people ask: “Why bother with mentions if I can still build links/keywords?”

• Visibility in AI Overviews vs. SERP first page

Brand mentions have a much stronger correlation with visibility in AI Overviews than many backlink metrics. If you’re focused only on traditional SERP rankings, you might get Page 1, but show up nowhere in AI-driven summaries or answer boxes.

• Quantity of mentions + Quality of source vs. link count

A single mention in a high-credibility industry report might carry more weight for AI than several low-quality backlinks. Also, sentiment and context matter hugely for brand mentions and machine learning associations.

• Resilience against algorithm changes

Search engine link algorithms sometimes penalize low-quality links or change weighting. Mentions are broader, more diffuse, more “human” signals. They’re harder to game or penalize aggressively, because they come from natural discourse.

The hard truths & risks

Because I’m not painting this as a pure utopia, there are pitfalls and things to watch out for.

• Negative mentions are still mentions: If people are complaining, that shows up. If your brand is often mentioned in negative or low-trust contexts, AI might associate you with problems.
  
• Spammy mentions or shallow mentions don’t always help: Mentions from irrelevant sites, or throwaway references, may not move the needle or might even harm credibility.
  
• It takes time: These effects compound. You often won’t see brand mentions pushing you into AI Overviews overnight.
  
• Tracking is messy: Unlike backlinks, many mentions are unlinked across various platforms, including forums, podcasts, and social media. Capturing everything is challenging.

Unveiling the future of mentions & machine learning (Yep, it’s already here!)

If I were peering into my SEO crystal ball but with some solid data in hand, I’d say this:

• AI search experiences (voice assistants, chatbots, AI Overviews) will increasingly become the default for many queries. People will use them instead of typing.
  
• The visibility game will shift from “who has the best backlinks & keyword density” to “whose brand shows up in relevant conversations, trusted recommendation chains, expertise clusters”.
  
• Brands that ignore AI-driven brand reputation, brand mentions, and machine learning associations will risk being left out when the AI model answers turn off the classic blue-link reliance.

The road ahead

On that note, if you are contemplating the relevance of resource link-building activities in your SEO journey, you might want to consider reading ~ Resource link building: An effective strategy for the future or just an old-school play?