From search to dialogue

Search is often the neglected touchpoint. Internal search is frequently used, which displays irrelevant content, outdated PDFs, or cumbersome forms. Here, classic search proves to be a real conversion killer. However, expectations are different: people no longer expect a list of links, but rather "instant" knowledge transfer. Ultimately, it's about advice and not about lists of results.

“Three out of four U.S. consumers (76%) report that an unsuccessful search resulted in a lost sale for the retail website.”

Harris Poll research

Game Changer AI

AI is revolutionizing search through context. Instead of searching for keywords, Gen-AI understands intent. This means that LLMs actively guide users to the right solution. Artificial intelligence makes search context-aware and interactive, and therefore proactive.

The 4 key factors for tomorrow's search experience

• Search history: continuously learns from past search interactions

• Trends and popularity: takes trends and popular search queries into account

• Semantic analysis: understands meaning, not just keywords

• Personalization: ensures greater relevance through personalized results in real time

Quick and long-term wins

The further development of your own search can begin in a modular fashion. Quick wins can be found in the interface – for example, by activating voice search or predictive search with character completion and the generation of search suggestions. But the relevance of search results can also be increased structurally with dynamic filters or personalized FAQs.

Advanced: Search as a sales assistant

An AI search that becomes a true sales assistant is based on three pillars: First, existing data sources from the corporate context such as FAQs, PDFs, or blog posts are used. Second, SEO landing pages are created that function as lead magnets. And thirdly, automated lead generation is used. The AI recognizes the intent, evaluates the lead, and can directly provide the next logical steps, such as submitting a specific offer, inviting the lead to a tech demo, or assigning them to the appropriate sales team.

Zero Clicks

In connection with the transformation of search through AI, one of the most important points is that users no longer come via Google itself; they simply ask Chat-GPT, Perplexity, or Claude. Forty-six percent of buyers already use Gen-AI tools. The way these tools are used means that they arrive at websites or landing pages with a completely different intent than was previously the case, either to check the source or to convert directly. While the conversion rate for search queries and referrals via Google was 1.8%, it is 14.2% for LLM traffic. This high engagement rate is not yet consistent across the board—in e-commerce, Chat-GPT currently converts even worse than Google—but in B2B and complex sales, the effect is immense.

Modern landing pages must fulfill four criteria: They must offer up-to-date, easily digestible data (e.g., update date), structured FAQs and sources, trust signals such as certificates and reviews, and visibility of expertise. The page had to invite users to delve deeper, whether for verification or to make a purchase decision.

Lead magnet AI search and landing page

The valuable insights into intent, the intelligence of the search, can be put to permanent use, e.g., as an asset for the marketing department or for building landing pages on the searched topic clusters. The template for this type of landing page is created from the intents logged and curated by the AI search, supplemented if necessary by automatically generated FAQs and context-specific CTAs, meta tags, etc. In this way, every relevant search query is transformed into a long-term lead magnet.