On March 31, 2026, Writesonic published the results of a massive study testing 62 HTML elements across 6 AI assistants — ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, DeepSeek, Grok, and Copilot. The verdict is brutal: 9 out of 11 metadata types score 0 out of 6. Your JSON-LD, meta descriptions, og:tags, and structured data simply never reach the language models.
Put simply: a large portion of what you optimize for GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is invisible to the AI systems that are supposed to read it.
The problem: AI crawlers are not Googlebot
The study reveals that every AI crawler performs an HTML-to-Markdown conversion before feeding content to the language model. This conversion strips the entire <head> section of the document. Result:
Only the <title> tag passes reliably (5 out of 6 AI systems). The og:title is a distant second, read by just 2 out of 6. Everything else — meta description, og:description, og:image, JSON-LD — is simply ignored.
And there's more. The crawlers fall into three distinct capability tiers. Copilot (via Diffbot) and Grok execute JavaScript. ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini — the three most widely used — fetch raw HTML and convert it to text. They execute zero JavaScript — if your React site renders everything client-side, these AIs see an empty <div id="root"></div>.
What this actually changes for your AI visibility
Most current GEO advice — "add JSON-LD," "optimize your og:tags for AI" — rests on a false assumption. This data still serves Google Search, but it doesn't reach AI assistants when a user asks them to visit your page.
The implications are clear:
- Your visible content is your only signal. Static text in the
<body>is read by 100% of crawlers. That's where your key information must live — not in metadata. - CSS-hidden content is read. Accordions, collapsed tabs, FAQ sections in
display:none: AI reads them all (5/6). Good news for long pages with structured content. - Lazy loading is a blind spot. Content loaded via
IntersectionObserverat 2000px below the fold scores 0/6. No AI scrolls. - Image alt text matters — but not everywhere. Only 3 out of 6 crawlers (Claude, Gemini, Copilot) read
altattributes. ChatGPT ignores them.
What to do right now
If you're optimizing for visibility in AI-generated answers, here are the concrete actions:
- Put your key data in visible text. Company name, location, value proposition, key figures — prepare a content brief that includes these elements — everything must be in the static HTML body, not just in metadata.
- Keep JSON-LD for Google, not for AI. It's still useful for traditional SEO and rich snippets, but don't rely on it for GEO.
- Switch to Server-Side Rendering. If your site runs React/Next.js/Vue in SPA mode, the three most popular AI systems (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini) see a blank page. SSR is now a GEO prerequisite.
- Remove aggressive lazy loading on text content. Images can stay lazy, but text must be present in the initial HTML.
💡 Key takeaway: The <title> tag is your only reliable metadata lever for AI. Choose it as carefully as a press article headline. And if your SEO traffic is dropping due to AI Overviews, GEO is your plan B — but only if you execute it correctly.
Our take
This study confirms what we've been observing at Cicero for months: GEO is not technical SEO with a new name. It's a paradigm shift — one that demands a rethinking of on-page SEO. Structured metadata, a pillar of SEO for 10 years, is invisible to the systems generating an increasing share of answers. What matters now is the quality and clarity of visible content. Exactly what Google has been saying all along — but that AI systems enforce to the letter, with no safety net.
Sources
- → Writesonic — AI Crawler Study: What 60+ Tests Across 6 LLMs Reveal — original study, March 31, 2026
- → r/TechSEO — Reddit discussion — thread with 22 upvotes and 23 comments
Growth and SEO content strategist, I founded Cicéro to help businesses build lasting organic visibility — on Google and in AI-generated answers alike. Every piece of content we produce is designed to convert, not just to exist.
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