GEO, SEO and the Role of Modern PR: Insights from our Client Joloda Hydraroll
Website traffic has taken a real hit this year, with more of us content with the answers we’re getting from AI before a single click onto another webpage.
To put it into perspective, recent data suggests nearly 60% of Google searches now end this way. That’s already a huge figure, and it’s forcing brands to put a far greater emphasis, and quickly, on how they build awareness across AI-led search.
Google’s own guidance on this makes clear that its systems reward helpful, reliable content. Signals from across the web, including links, mentions and references, are indicators that a source is trustworthy.
In practice, that means the brands that earn authoritative online mentions, citing original data and expertise, and demonstrating real-world experience, are more likely to be surfaced. All of which ties in beautifully with how modern PR plays out in search visibility.
Gary Warner, Marketing Manager at Joloda Hydraroll, has worked with Neo PR for more than four years. In this Q&A, he explains why PR is so important to Joloda Hydraroll’s digital marketing strategy and how it is evolving in response to AI visibility and zero-click search.
Q1. Where does PR fit into your digital marketing strategy?
We see the value of PR in its traditional sense – raising brand awareness, building credibility, helping with reputation management, and so on. However, we have a particular interest in how PR directly impacts our digital marketing results.
It started with SEO. As with any effective SEO strategy, ours is built around three core pillars:
- Technical, which is ensuring the coding and links work and so on;
- On-site, which is our web content;
- And off-site, which is all about building high-quality backlinks.
Neo PR supports us with both our on-site and off-site SEO, particularly through content development and media coverage.
Coverage in trade media directly influences how authoritative our website is seen through the eyes of a search engine, and the content Neo develops – which is a mix of thought leadership, case studies and research white papers – can be repurposed for our website and social media channels.
Ultimately, all of this helps us to demonstrate aspects of Google’s E-E-A-T framework, which looks for online content with strong experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness.
Q2. What impact is AI and zero-click search having on your digital marketing?
In the time we have been working with Neo PR, our off-site strategy has become particularly important. AI is obviously having a massive impact on how search engines are used, and it’s one of the main influencing trends that caused our website traffic to drop by as much as 50% last year. This is something lots of websites are experiencing.
Fewer people on our site means less engagement with live chat, fewer completed forms and fewer details to capture, so there’s less information for the sales team. On the flip side, those who do visit the website are better qualified, further along the sales funnel, and therefore more likely to convert.
As such, we need to build AI visibility, and that has meant a big shift in focus to GEO, or Generative Engine Optimisation. I look at SEO and GEO as two separate campaigns that work side by side; AI tools gather lots of information, including first-party data such as on-site content, and third-party references such as mentions in publications from our PR work, to help build the picture of what we’re doing within our space.
Q3. What does this look like in practice?
Joloda Hydraroll manufactures loading and unloading solutions for companies transporting all types of cargo. A recent example I can share of PR influencing our GEO was following an installation we completed for a large aviation services company. Neo PR secured several pieces of coverage for a case study, which helped to create a strong association between our brand and some very specific, high-intent search terms.
Having a testimonial out there linked to internal data about how this system will help benefit the customer is concrete evidence that feeds into the experience and trustworthiness components of Google’s E-E-A-T framework. That same story is then used in different ways across our own channels. So it helps create consistent authority on and beyond our website.
We monitor a series of high-intent queries, and when we checked these within AI engines after the case study was published, we saw that Joloda surfaced more frequently in AI-generated responses as a result.
Q4. What other types of content are most valuable for GEO?
Authority is built on more than just messaging; it’s rooted in real expertise and evidence. Opinion articles from our leadership team, comments within trade features, research white papers – they all demonstrate that we are authentic and have authority within our space. Then, case studies are invaluable, as I say, because they demonstrate our capabilities and how we are solving real-world challenges through data and proven results.
Q5. Why does PR matter more as search evolves?
PR is great for building trust through external validation, which in digital marketing terms, is the foundation of any off-site strategy. This is becoming increasingly important as search evolves because AI tools prioritise external links over self-promotion to assess a brand’s credibility.
Another reason is that brand websites often receive fewer citations, so a broad third party presence has a bigger influence over AI recommendations. The more stories we have to tell demonstrating what we’re able to achieve, the more credible we become, which leads to more AI visibility.
A note from Neo PR
As Gary’s experience shows, PR is now an integral part of digital marketing, actively influencing how brands are discovered, understood and trusted across search engines, the media and AI-generated results.
As zero-click behaviour grows, PR will help brands to build the authority, credibility and third-party validation needed to surface in modern search and provide answers to potential leads.
Get in touch to find out how PR can support your SEO, GEO and wider content marketing goals.
