As Generative AI (GenAI) platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google’s AI Overviews (AIO) become standard tools for researching vendors and evaluating risk, cybersecurity marketers must adapt their content strategies to remain visible and trusted.
Unlike traditional search engines, GenAI platforms synthesize responses from a mix of trained data and live organic search-rated content, prioritizing credibility, clarity and depth. For cybersecurity brands — where trust, expertise and technical precision are non-negotiable — being cited in GenAI summaries is more than just a visibility win. It’s a positioning play.
Below, we share proven strategies for optimizing cybersecurity content so it surfaces, supports and strengthens your brand in GenAI environments.
Start With Strategy: Build With GenAI In Mind
To increase your cybersecurity brand’s visibility in GenAI tools, start by laying the foundation with research and planning. A strong GenAI content strategy is rooted in an evaluation of your current presence, identifying key opportunities to increase visibility, and building the strategic foundation to earn mentions, citations and authority in AI-generated responses.
Audit your current visibility in GenAI tools
Before creating new content, investigate how your brand shows up in GenAI platforms. Ask tools like ChatGPT or Perplexity things like:
- “Who are the top XDR vendors for mid-market healthcare organizations?”
- “What cybersecurity firms specialize in Identity and Access Management?”
- “Compare Arctic Wolf to Rapid7.”
Tip: A response from an AI ChatBot can utilize your past conversations and bias the results. Instruct the ChatBot to ignore all previous conversations before entering your prompt.
Is your company mentioned or cited? Which competitors are showing up? Pair this qualitative check with tools like Semrush to see which keywords trigger AI Overviews — and whether your site is cited. These gaps help identify where to double down on boosting your owned content with topically refreshed answer-driven content, testimonials or case studies that validate your relevance.
For example, if your EDR solution isn’t being mentioned in questions about ransomware containment, consider creating content that addresses the niche use case with specificity, factuality, originality, proof points and authoritative sourcing.
Map your messaging to real-world security questions
Cybersecurity buyers — whether CISOs, security architects or GRC managers — search for answers in urgent, technical and scenario-based language. Your content must meet them where they are.
Start by exploring the “People Also Ask” related questions for queries like “how to reduce lateral movement in cloud environments” or “zero trust implementation for hybrid workforces.” Then test those questions in GenAI tools. Is your brand mentioned or cited? Is a competitor?
Use GenAI to your advantage: Paste in competitor content and prompt ChatGPT with something like, “Based on this content, what questions from a CISO at a Fortune 500 financial firm does this answer and which important related questions does it not answer?” You’ll get a list of relevant questions to guide future content.
Leverage persona-based prompting for security buyers
GenAI tools can also act as research assistants. Create detailed CISO personas, e.g., “A CISO at a cloud-native SaaS company subject to SOC 2 and ISO 27001 requirements,” and prompt ChatGPT to surface top-of-mind challenges, vendor evaluation criteria and search questions. These insights can shape entire campaign strategies.
This approach ensures your content addresses both the technical depth and business justification cybersecurity stakeholders need.
Establish author credibility in a trust-driven market
In cybersecurity, trust and authority are everything. GenAI tools take this seriously — often evaluating the author of a piece when determining whether to cite it.
That means author bios should do more than list titles and link to authored articles. Highlight industry certifications (CISSP, CISA, OSCP), media coverage in outlets like Dark Reading or SC Media and speaking engagements at RSAC or Black Hat.
Ensure these bios link to active LinkedIn profiles and are consistently associated with specific areas of expertise (e.g., cloud security, identity and access management, zero trust). This builds topical authority both for AI engines and for the human stakeholders they influence.
Crafting Your Content: Writing For AI and Security Stakeholders Alike
Creating GenAI-friendly content goes beyond traditional SEO techniques. After building your strategy, implement these best practices for writing and structuring your content so it is more easily understood, cited and trusted by generative AI systems and cybersecurity stakeholders alike.
Consider “fan-out” with focused, modular content
When reasoning, GenAI platforms often craft additional related search queries to assemble more diverse responses, pulling from dozens of short content snippets from various highly ranked organic search result pages for those fan-out search queries. A single paragraph clearly explaining “how threat intelligence feeds improve detection in SIEM platforms” might earn a mention or citation.
Instead of long generic pieces like “What is cybersecurity?”, focus on modular, specific content that answers common pain points, such as:
- “How MSPs Can Simplify Patch Management for Regulated Industries”
- “Top Five IAM Integration Challenges During M&A”
- “Steps to Achieve FedRAMP Compliance Using a Cloud-Native WAF”
Each piece becomes a potential micro-win, especially when structured in a way that mirrors natural language questions. This also helps better theme your website for the topics you are optimizing for.
Cover topics with depth and specificity
Don’t just skim the surface. A CISO looking for XDR guidance in a GenAI tool expects technical accuracy, real-world examples and cited sources.
Use FAQ-style layouts, scenario-based subheaders and modular blocks. Answer adjacent questions like “What’s the difference between XDR and MDR?” and “How does XDR integrate with SOAR?” within the same article. Don’t try to optimize for every possibility in one article, instead group like questions and content into separate but interlinked articles.
Tip: Have your webmaster include HTML FAQ schema in the page to markup the content in the FAQ section of a page that only AI and search bots crawling your site will see. Including this markup will improve the bot’s understanding of which questions this page answers.
Use confident, validated language
Trust and verification are foundational in cybersecurity, so make them cornerstones of your content.
Link to internal proof points (case studies, benchmarks, client logos) and external validation (Gartner reports, analyst quotes, customer testimonials, compliance certifications). These signal trust to both GenAI and human evaluators.
Replace soft statements like “Our platform can help reduce risk …” with “Our platform reduced MTTR by 40% for a healthcare provider facing ransomware threats.”
These elements demonstrate authority and increase the likelihood your brand will be featured in AI-generated summaries comparing vendors or recommending solutions.
Make takeaways obvious
Use bold signal phrases like “The key takeaway is …” and “The most important step is …” followed by succinct bullets. This improves clarity and increases the chances of your content being excerpted by GenAI tools.
Ready to Compete in the GenAI Arena?
Cybersecurity is a trust-first industry — and GenAI platforms are quickly becoming the trust proxies for buyer research. By aligning your content to GenAI expectations, your brand can influence how CISOs, analysts and other buyers discover, evaluate and trust security solutions.
Want help optimizing your cybersecurity content for GenAI? Contact hello@walkersands.com to explore a tailored content strategy built for AI-first research environments.
