From visibility to credibility: Organic strategy predictions for 2026

The landscape for organic search is set to continue to shift dramatically in 2026 as AI-driven platforms become a core part of how people discover and evaluate information. Gartner predicts that AI-powered assistants and large language models (LLMs) will handle roughly 25% of global search queries by 2026, replacing many traditional search interactions. For brands, this means organic performance will depend less on keywords alone and far more on trust, clarity, accessibility and the value that content delivers.

Here’s how our organic experts at Loom think that organic strategy, technical SEO and content will evolve in the coming year. And how brands can stay relevant across an increasingly AI-shaped search ecosystem.

Users will prioritise authentic expertise over generic AI-generated answers

2026 is going to be a year where trust and delivering genuine value is absolutely critical to audiences. With the proliferation of AI, from chat bots to AI-generated content to LLM responses, users are going to be desperate for information that is easy to consume, highly relevant to them and, most importantly, enriched with expert insight. 

The idea of going above and beyond and demonstrating lived experience and expertise is going to be critical to audience experience. Generative AI will remain good enough for some queries, but in the organic space we want to create content that delivers the level of detail and insight, and deep understanding that AI will struggle to replicate. Trust in this content and its provenance is going to be hyper critical.    

Organic strategy will continue to focus on creating meaningful visibility and engagement for businesses wherever their audiences are searching. This covers search engines and the range of SERP features, AI Overviews, LLMs, social search and other key user platforms. A deeper understanding of user requirements, journey stages and value will be critical to this.

“In an AI-saturated landscape, the quality, uniqueness and validity of information and trust in it is what will make users connect and take meaningful action.” Tom, organic strategy

Technical SEO will shift towards AI-usability and higher accessibility standards

Site health, accessibility and overall usability are set to become far more influential in 2026 as search engines and agentic AI gain the ability to actively “use” websites. Rather than relying solely on signals like Core Web Vitals, AI systems will be able to assess how intuitive a page feels, how easily content can be interpreted and whether users, human or AI, encounter friction. This will give brands richer data on how machines interact with their site, offering a new perspective on UX that goes beyond our traditional auditing.

Accessibility will also take a significant step forward. With the European Accessibility Act coming into force in 2025, it’s likely the UK will look to strengthen its own standards. If this happens, accessibility will move from a best practice to an essential baseline.

At the same time, standards governing how AI models access and use web content will begin to settle. LLMs.txt is likely to either become a widely accepted standard practice or be replaced with a more resilient alternative currently being tested. Either way, brands will need clearer strategies for managing how their content is crawled, read and reused by AI systems.

“As AI becomes more accessible, the volume of low-value SEO ‘experts’ and automated propositions will rise. Making proven expertise and ethical practice more important than ever.” Jack, technical SEO specialist

Content reporting will evolve beyond rankings and traffic

The growth of AI has placed a spotlight on content writers as more and more AI content generation tools have flooded the market. At Loom, we believe that AI can enhance what we do, but doesn’t replace the human touch. And one of the ways we’re demonstrating this is through a shift in content reporting – something that will remain a focus for marketing teams, especially as new reporting tools and more industry updates are likely on the horizon for 2026. 

As user journeys diversified across channels and zero-click searches grew, we’ve already seen a shift from keyword positions (although still valuable for now) to visibility. But showcasing this visibility can be tough if you’re only reporting on metrics like traffic and conversions. Also factoring in impressions, engagement rates and appearances in other search engines (e.g. ChatGPT) demonstrates the power of content in the overall buying journey.

“For some of our clients, we’ve moved from monthly to quarterly reporting so that we can explore these metrics in depth, painting a clearer picture while working with stakeholders to understand what their data actually means in the current landscape.“ Chloe, content writer

As AI reshapes how people search and interact with brands, the fundamentals of organic marketing are even more important now, not less. Trust, clarity and usability will define the businesses that succeed. Loom is here to help make sense of the noise and build sustainable visibility that lasts beyond the next algorithm update.

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