How to Get Your Brand Into AI Models: Lessons from Christopher S. Penn

If you have been focused solely on Google SEO, it may be time to expand your horizons. As artificial intelligence becomes the primary way people discover information, brands must learn how to appear within large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, Claude, and Meta's LLaMA. In this episode of Chatting GPT, host Maryrose Lyons sits down with Christopher S. Penn, co-founder of Trust Insights and renowned marketing expert, to explore how brands can optimise for AI systems.

Why Traditional SEO Does Not Apply to LLMs

The fundamental difference between search engines and LLMs is that LLMs have no ranking system. While Google uses complex algorithms to rank pages based on relevance and authority, LLMs generate responses based on statistical associations formed during training. If your brand name frequently appears in proximity to certain topics across the web, the model learns to associate your brand with those topics.

"LLMs have no ranking system like Google," Penn explains. "Brand presence is built through statistical associations formed by volume and proximity of text across the web." This means the strategy for appearing in AI-generated responses is fundamentally different from climbing search rankings.

The Multi-Format Content Strategy

Penn's core recommendation is to publish content in as many formats as possible. The more surfaces on which your brand appears, the more training data includes your name in association with your expertise.

YouTube videos are particularly valuable because major AI companies actively scrape YouTube content for training data. Long-form blog posts provide the detailed text that helps models understand nuanced associations. Podcast appearances put your brand in conversational contexts that mirror how users query AI systems. Q&A pairs on platforms like Reddit and Quora directly match the format of many AI queries.

Each format contributes different types of associations. A YouTube video might associate your brand with visual demonstrations. A blog post might establish technical authority. A podcast appearance might create conversational familiarity. Together, they build a comprehensive picture of what your brand represents.

Practical Quick Wins for LLM Optimisation

Penn identifies several immediate actions brands can take. Creating an LLM.txt file on your website provides a structured summary of your brand for AI crawlers. Enabling AI crawler access on YouTube ensures your video content is available for training. Posting consistently across all major social platforms increases your surface area for inclusion.

Contributing to Reddit and Quora is particularly effective because these platforms are heavily represented in training data. When you answer questions in your area of expertise, you create direct associations between your brand and the topics you want to be known for.

Measuring LLM Brand Awareness

One of the challenges of LLM optimisation is measurement. Unlike search, where you can track clicks and rankings, LLM responses do not generate traditional traffic patterns. Penn suggests using uplift modelling, a classical statistical technique, to measure indirect brand awareness driven by LLMs.

Uplift modelling compares groups exposed to different interventions to isolate the effect of specific factors. Applied to LLM optimisation, it can help determine whether awareness campaigns are moving the needle on brand mentions in AI-generated content, even when no click-through occurs.

The Future of Brand Discovery

As AI systems become the default way people seek information, optimising for LLMs will become as essential as SEO is today. The brands that establish presence in training data now will have significant advantages as these systems mature.

For organisations in Ireland and the UK, understanding LLM optimisation is becoming essential. Whether in engineering, architecture, construction, or professional services, the ability to appear in AI-generated recommendations will increasingly influence customer acquisition and brand perception.

Want the full conversation? Watch the Chatting GPT episode on YouTube here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W7Bxfba0ol8