This October, I traveled from Florida to Philadelphia for my first WTSFest conference. It was also my first time visiting Philadelphia, which made the experience even more exciting.
As someone working in SEO and digital marketing, I was looking forward to hearing from industry experts, learning new strategies, and gaining fresh perspectives on how search continues to evolve, especially with the growing influence of AI.
Throughout the conference, speakers covered everything from AI search visibility and technical SEO to content strategy, brand reputation, and career development. While each presentation brought something different to the table, one theme stood out to me: SEO is expanding beyond simply being found, to also being understood, trusted, and remembered.
Of course, not every recommendation will apply to every brand or industry, and many of the ideas shared are still evolving. My biggest goal coming out of the conference is to explore how these emerging approaches can complement the SEO and organic visibility strategies we’re already using. If you’ve been following Arc Intermedia’s ShopTalk and email newsletters, a lot of this will sound familiar.
Here are some of the key takeaways and insights shared at WTSFest Philadelphia.
1. AI Search HasChanged How Brands Get Discovered
One of the biggest themes throughout WTSFest was how AI is reshaping the customer journey.
During her presentation, “AI Picks the Shortlist. Are You Even Showing Up Locally?”, Krystal Taing from Uberall explained how consumers are increasingly relying on AI platforms like ChatGPT and Gemini to narrow their options before ever visiting a website.
Instead of browsing through multiple pages of search results, users can now receive a shortlist of three or four recommended brands.
This adds another consideration to how we think about visibility. Ranking well in traditional search results remains valuable, but brands also have opportunities to appear in AI-generated recommendations.
Krystal highlighted five core signals influencing local AI visibility:
- Entity accuracy
- Consistency
- Reputation
- Content
- Authority
Krystal also emphasized creating content that directly answers users’ questions, reinforcing an established SEO best practice that supports visibility in both traditional search results and AI-generated responses.
2. Technical SEO Needs to Account for AI Crawlers
Lea Scudamore from Aimclear and Grace Frohlich from Amsive discussed how technical SEO can influence content accessibility across traditional search engines and AI platforms.
They highlighted the differences in how Google and certain AI crawlers handle JavaScript. While Google can render JavaScript, some AI crawlers have more limited capabilities, potentially making important content or navigation elements harder to access.
Lea also raised considerations around page size, tables, and the effectiveness of newer AI optimization tactics like llms.txt files.
Grace’s presentation, “Beyond the Crawl: Building Technical SEO Audits That Actually Ship,” emphasized prioritizing technical issues based on business impact. Rather than treating every issue equally, she recommended using metrics like traffic, conversions, and other meaningful actions to determine what deserves attention first.
3. Brand Reputation Is Just as Important as Visibility
Celeste Gonzalez from Lastmile Retail presented “From Rankings to Reputations: Why Being Cited Isn’t Enough,” which explored the relationship between brand visibility and trust.
Celeste emphasized that while a company’s website communicates what the brand says about itself, customer reviews provide additional perspectives that can reinforce or challenge those claims.
Reviews are more than a local SEO ranking consideration. They’re a form of user-generated content that can reveal what customers value, what frustrates them, and what influences their purchasing decisions.
Celeste also encouraged looking at competitor reviews to identify potential trust gaps.
For example, recurring complaints about slow response times, unclear pricing, or poor communication can reveal opportunities for another brand – i.e. yours — to address those concerns directly.
Another point discussed was that the tone and wording of AI prompts can influence how brands are evaluated and described.
4. Content Strategy Should Balance Visibility with Memorability
Another thought-provoking presentation came from Wil Reynolds, CEO and Founder of Seer Interactive.
His session, “AI Forward vs AI Foolish: How I See People Losing Brand Trust for Speed & What to Do About It,” encouraged marketers to think beyond efficiency and consider how their work influences brand trust.
With AI making it easier to produce content at scale, there are more opportunities than ever to expand organic visibility and reach audiences across different stages of the customer journey. At the same time, it’s important to consider how that content contributes to a brand’s identity and relationship with its audience.
Wil emphasized the importance of understanding why people choose a brand in the first place and focusing on what won’t change, even as technology evolves.
One idea emphasized was the need to create content that sticks in people’s minds.
In SEO, we often evaluate content based on organic traffic, keyword rankings, and conversions. These are essential metrics for understanding performance and identifying opportunities for growth. However, they don’t always capture whether someone remembers a brand or develops trust in it.
A comprehensive content strategy should balance content that targets relevant keywords and drives organic traffic with content that creates a lasting impression on audiences. Together, these approaches can expand visibility, answer customer questions, strengthen brand recognition, and build long-term trust.
5. AI Content Creation Is Only as Good as the Direction You Give It
Niki Mosier from NASM shared practical advice for using AI to improve content ideation and production.
Her presentation, “Transform Content Creation: Using AI Prompts to Generate 10X More Ideas in Half the Time,” focused on how better prompts lead to more useful outputs.
Niki also emphasized that defining a brand voice requires more than simply providing AI with a list of descriptive adjectives.
Simply telling AI to write something “professional, friendly, and engaging” doesn’t provide enough context to produce content that genuinely reflects a brand.
Niki also emphasized the importance of defining a specific audience. When we ask AI to create content for “everyone,” we often end up with something too generic to resonate with anyone.
She recommended structuring prompts around five components:
- Role: Who should the AI act as?
- Context: What background information does it need?
- Task: What specifically should it accomplish?
- Constraints: What requirements or limitations should it follow?
- Format: How should the output be structured?
She also emphasized incorporating relevant offers and calls to action to guide readers toward the next step in their journey.
This aligns with a recent ShopTalk from Mike, “Stop Telling AI What to Do. Start Defining the Outcome.”, which explores the importance of clearly defining the desired outcome when working with AI, rather than focusing solely on the instructions.
6. Data Quality and Specificity Matter More Than Ever
Several presentations reinforced the importance of providing AI systems with accurate, structured, and specific information.
Kelly Stanze’s session, “Shopping with Robots: Preparing Product Feeds for Agentic eCommerce,” explored how product data can influence AI-assisted shopping experiences.
Her biggest point was straightforward: high-quality inputs create better opportunities for high-quality outputs.
For eCommerce brands, that means maintaining clean, accurate product feeds to help AI systems understand and present product information.
Hana Hajebian from Profound expanded on this idea during “Marketing in the Age of AI.”
She discussed the importance of publishing fresh, detailed content that gives AI systems more accurate information about a brand, its products, and its services.
One takeaway was the value of creating granular content that answers specific questions, alongside broader content that supports topical authority and organic visibility.
7. SEO and PR Have More Opportunities to Work Together
Britt Klontz, Founder and CEO of Vada Communications, presented “How SEOs Can Work With PRs: A Practical, Repeatable Collaboration Playbook.”
One of the most important ideas from her presentation was that data alone isn’t the story. The story is what the data means.
As SEOs, we have access to valuable information about search behavior, customer interests, emerging trends, and the questions people are asking.
But presenting a collection of statistics isn’t necessarily enough to generate media interest or create meaningful content.
The opportunity comes from interpreting that data and identifying why it matters to a particular audience.
This also reinforces the importance of improving media literacy and collaboration between SEO and PR teams.
Final Thoughts on My First WTSFest
Attending WTSFest Philadelphia was an exciting experience as I came away with fresh perspectives, practical ideas to test, and a better understanding of how AI is shaping the future of search.
One of the biggest themes throughout the conference was the importance of adapting to emerging AI opportunities while continuing to build on proven SEO strategies, with a growing emphasis on brand trust, reputation, and visibility across platforms.
As search continues to evolve, I’m excited to explore new ways to strengthen organic visibility, build brand trust, and create content that’s not only easy to find but also worth remembering.
