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Image Credits:Otterly.AI

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Otterly.AI founders Klaus-M Schremser, Josef Trauner and Thomas Peham

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Many website saw their constituent traffic decline in 2024 , in braggart part due to the rise of AI - generated hunt results . Many queries no longer lead to click - throughs , and even when substance abuser click , it is hard for companies to get more circumstance on searches made within apps like ChatGPT or Perplexity .

The result to this problem is sometimes predict generative engine optimisation , or GEO , in a nod to SEO . “ Some call it AI lookup profile optimization , which is a bit longer , but I believe is a bit more accurate , ” saidOtterly . AICEO Thomas Peham ( on the rightfield in the image above ) .

LikeNew York - based challenger Profound , the Austrian startup builds splasher to help companies and ad agencies supervise and optimize their front in AI results . But while Profound is still in closed genus Beta , Otterly is exiting stealth mode after guide the 1,000 - user milepost , Peham tell TechCrunch exclusively .

You may have heard of Otterly before : It launched on Product Hunt originally this yearto some winner . Then Google shook everything up .

“ To be honest , the world was we reconstruct the product from scratch after Google introduced AI Overviews in May , ” Peham say .

AI Overviews areGoogle ’s implementation of AI - power resultant role , often resulting in so - called zero - click search where users never go beyond the hunting locomotive .

As AI Overviews starts rolling out globally , company who relied on organic search dealings are feeling the insect bite . Peham gave the example of a SaaS business that find out its constituent search presence decline in the U.S. , only to clear through Otterly that Google showed AI Overviews hunt termination for half of its SEO keywords .

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The next interrogation is how to make this knowledge actionable , specially when large voice communication model ( LLMs ) are often draw as a shameful box . That ’s one reason why Otterly plans to add a recommendation engine , and in the meantime , why it went from monthly to hebdomadal tracking — so selling team can lead experiments to optimize their content and rapidly see what might be work or not .

While this tinkering is partially cognate to SEO , clicks are less of a focus . “ I call back promise it AI search visibility optimisation really highlight the expression that we as marketing teams also call for to cerebrate about our brand positioning , our blade profile , ” Peham said .

Peham himself expend most of his career in marketing . A former VP of marketing atCMS company Storyblok , he bug out Otterly to scratch his own itch and understand how ChatGPT was impacting hunting from a brand name perspective .

Eventually , he team up with two co - beginner , Josef Trauner ( in the middle in the image above ) and Klaus M. Schremser ( on the left field ) , who are respectively the former CEO and read/write head of development at Usersnap , a user feedback chopine theysold to saas.groupin 2023 .

Having two co - father helps them all split tasks , with Schremser focalise on operation and mathematical product , and Trauner on technical aspects . It does n’t hurt either that the brace had an exit together . Schremser ’s incubator , GroWTF , also supported Otterly , but the inauguration wo n’t assay international financial backing , Peham say .

rather , he said Otterly plans to keep on growing with its client base , with the ambition to become what Semrush or Ahrefs are for SEO , but in the AI hunting quad .

There ’s always a risk of exposure that these caller may require to expand their scope and become direct competitors , but Otterly is skip they can work together and plan to harbinger detail of a partnership with Semrush next month , Peham said .