How to Get Your Credit Union to Show Up in AI Responses—Insights From 7,500 Outputs
- Derik Krauss
- Jul 31
- 6 min read
Guest Editorial by Derik Krauss, Co-Founder, MetriFi
Humans are no longer your only website users. Increasingly, your website is being used by AI. And soon, AI agents could comprise most of your visitors. Instead of visiting your website themselves, people are now sending AI agents to learn about your products and services. Then, the agent brings the information back to a human within an AI app, like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Grok, etc.
The implication of this new development is web-shattering: People don't have to visit your website anymore.
I personally experienced this recently. I told ChatGPT: “I’m getting old. Find me some basketball shoes that will help my knees not hurt when I play.” ChatGPT researched options, analyzed reviews, and came back with shoe recommendations. As I reviewed the options, I asked follow-up questions.
“What about the Curry’s from Under Armour?”
“No,” ChatGPT said. “You need heavier cushioning and shock absorption. The Curry’s are built for lightweight speed, not impact protection.” It even created a comparison table on the fly to help me decide. In the end, it recommended some LeBrons from Nike. I bought them. And my knees don’t hurt anymore.
Here’s what’s crazy: Even though I considered shoes from Nike, Adidas, Reebok, Under Armour, and And 1, I didn’t visit their websites to make my decision. I got everything I needed from ChatGPT.
This is the shift credit unions need to recognize:
People no longer need to visit your website. AI can visit for them.
You still need a website—more than ever—but its role is changing.
The problem is, your website is built for humans, not AI.
That raises many questions for marketing, but let's start with this big one: Are you showing up in AI responses?
Is Your Credit Union Showing Up in AI Responses?
ChatGPT is the fastest growing app ever. It already has more than 500 million weekly users, and it's not the only AI app that's growing rapidly. Meanwhile, data shows that search engine usage is declining. Google search still has far more users than ChatGPT, but we're seeing a shift as more people rely on AI apps.
Personally, I used to turn to Google for answers many times per day. It was my go-to for getting information quickly: open search, type a question, and scan the results. But not anymore. I still use Google search for some things, but ChatGPT has changed the game.
AI is replacing search with curated answers, which makes it easier to get what I'm looking for, especially when there is nuance involved (like which basketball shoes are best for my aging knees, high arch, playstyle, etc.). Plus, I can ask follow-up questions, which is extremely useful.
AI Search Projected to Overtake Google Search by 2028
This shift toward AI has big implications for marketing. If fewer people are Googling because more people are prompting AI agents, brands need to rethink how they show up in front of people. While search engine optimization (SEO) is still relevant today, it could soon be overtaken by a new priority: generative engine optimization (GEO). One study projects that AI search will overtake Google search by early 2028, and possibly even sooner.
With GEO, you aren't optimizing to show up in search engine results, but for mentions in AI-generated responses. To show up, your content needs to provide AI agents useful, detailed, trustworthy content. If you aren't showing up when someone asks ChatGPT, "Where can I open the best checking account?" your brand is invisible in the next evolution of the internet: the Agentic Web.
How We're Collecting AI Visibility Data
When my business partner, Ryan Harmon, and I realized that the internet is on the verge of a technological revolution, we decided to take action rather than watch it happen from the sidelines. So, our company built an app that measures AI visibility. When given a set of prompts, it shows how often your brand is mentioned by AI.
So far, we've analyzed 88 organizations (mostly credit unions and banks), 2,851 prompts, and 7,500 AI responses.
How to Get Your Credit Union to Show Up
The big question is, "What causes a credit union to show up in AI responses?" To answer that question, we analyzed our dataset of 7,500 AI responses.
The prompts in our study are designed to reflect real consumer behavior. They are based on questions people ask when researching financial products and services. Examples:
"What are the best digital-only banks for opening an online checking account?"
"Where in Birmingham, Alabama can I get the best vehicle loan?"
"Tell me who can give me the best home loan in Minnesota."
These types of prompts help us understand how AI agents respond to typical questions that credit union members and prospects might enter into AI apps (like ChatGPT).
Below is an executive summary of what we've learned from our research so far.
Executive Summary of Our AI Visibility Research
Across thousands of AI answers, organizations are most frequently mentioned when they appear in authoritative content, third‑party “best‑of” lists, comparison guides, or encyclopedic resources. Authoritative information repeatedly feeds AI responses, while purely promotional pages rarely do.
Actionable Guidance
Track AI mentions of your brand. First, you need to know which prompts you are showing up for and which ones you are not. Then, you can work on the prompts where your competitors are cited but you are invisible.
Publish content that directly answers prompts. AI will reference your content only if it matches what the user asked for. So, if you want to show up for a specific prompt, then you need to provide relevant answers.
Cut fluff and focus on facts. AI avoids promotional content. For example, a blog post that reads like a sales pitch is less likely to be referenced than one that provides objective, useful information.
Make your content "AI-friendly". Unlike humans, AI agents don’t care about colors, graphics, animations, or interactive elements. They want simple markdown (or clean HTML), structured content (like Q&As), and useful schema markup that makes content easier to process.
Update your content regularly. AI exhibits a recency bias. They are more likely to cite a new piece of content than one that hasn't been updated for years. So, to stay visible to AI, refresh your content regularly.
Get listed in third-party rankings, directories, and reviews. Third-party content is often considered as more objective information. So, AI frequently references third parties and aggregator sites for recommendations.
Bottom Line
AI favors organizations that provide accurate, detailed information that is "AI-friendly" and kept up to date. It also relies on third parties to provide objective information about you and your competitors. To show up in AI responses, you need to 1) publish authoritative content that is relevant to prompts and 2) get your brand referenced by reputable third parties.
This executive summary highlights just a few insights from our six-page research report. You can download the full report from paraloom.ai.
What to Do Now
Measure your AI visibility using our app, Paraloom. It takes only 90 seconds to register and you'll receive results in 3 minutes. And it's free.
Review the full research report. It shows what you can do to improve your AI visibility. (We'll email it to you after you register in Paraloom.)
Start improving your AI visibility one step at a time: (1) Review your visibility scores weekly. (2) Choose a prompt to focus on. (3) Publish AI-friendly content weekly on your website and with third parties.
The agentic web is here. The question isn’t whether it will change digital marketing—that's already happening. The question is whether your brand is prepared for it. Those who adapt now will gain visibility and market share. Those who don’t will fade into digital invisibility.
Derik Krauss is the co-founder of MetriFi (metrifi.com). He didn’t set out to disrupt the status quo—his heart just led him to seek the truth. That passion has fueled over 100 A/B tests and helped credit unions generate ~$143M in new loans and deposits. Now, he’s building MetriFi and Paraloom to harness analytics and AI for measurable growth. He’s a family man who loves Jesus, liberty, basketball, fly fishing, and delicious food. He can be reached at dk@metrifi.com.
