Sitefire Helps Companies Win Customers From ChatGPT Instead of Google

The Macro: Your Next Customer Might Ask an AI Instead of Searching

Search behavior is shifting. Instead of typing queries into a search engine and clicking through results, a growing number of people ask AI assistants for recommendations. “What is the best CRM for a 10-person startup?” used to be a query typed into a search bar. Now it is a question asked to ChatGPT or Gemini. The AI gives a direct answer, often citing specific brands and products.

This shift creates a new marketing challenge. Traditional SEO optimizes for search engine rankings. But AI assistants do not work like search engines. They synthesize information from multiple sources, weight certain content types more heavily than others, and produce answers that may or may not include your brand. The rules of visibility are different, and most companies have not adapted.

The companies that understand this new dynamic have a temporary advantage. If your content is structured in a way that AI assistants can easily parse, cite, and recommend, you show up in AI-generated answers. If it is not, you are invisible to a growing share of potential customers.

This is a new marketing category. Some are calling it AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) or GEO (Generative Engine Optimization). Whatever you call it, the tools for doing it well barely exist.

The Micro: A Stanford PhD and a Teenage Founder

Jochen Madler and Vincent Jeltsch founded sitefire. Jochen was valedictorian of Germany’s top finance program, studied deep reinforcement learning and optimization at Stanford, and is pursuing a PhD at Technical University Munich. Vincent founded his first company at 18, previously worked on robotics at RobCo and healthcare technology. They are a two-person team from San Francisco, part of YC Winter 2026 with Jon Xu.

Sitefire does three things. First, it identifies the content that drives AI visibility by analyzing how AI assistants generate answers about your industry and competitors. Second, it recommends actions that work: third-party sites, user-generated content, and new blog posts that AI assistants are likely to cite. Third, it synthesizes the top-cited web pages into AI-optimized, ready-to-publish web pages. You just publish and start winning leads from AI-generated answers.

The approach is data-driven rather than speculative. Instead of guessing what makes AI assistants cite a source, sitefire analyzes actual AI responses and reverse-engineers the content patterns that drive visibility. That analytical approach is more credible than the “tips and tricks” approach that most AI SEO advice offers.

The Verdict

Sitefire is building for a real market shift. The move from search-first to AI-first discovery is happening, and companies need tools to adapt. The question is how fast this shift accelerates and whether sitefire can establish itself as the standard tool before the market matures.

The competitive set includes Surfer SEO and Semrush, which are adding AI optimization features to their existing platforms. The advantage of a purpose-built tool like sitefire is focus. The incumbents are adding AI as a feature. Sitefire is building AI optimization as the entire product.

In 30 days, I want to see measurable results. Has any sitefire customer increased their visibility in AI-generated answers? In 60 days, the question is whether the content sitefire generates actually converts. Appearing in AI answers is nice, but driving leads and revenue is what matters. In 90 days, I want to know about the analytics loop. Can sitefire measure its own impact? If it can show “before sitefire, your brand appeared in 5% of relevant AI answers; after sitefire, 35%,” the sales pitch writes itself.