When Ameresco CMO Leila Dillon asked ChatGPT and other AI answer engines to describe what her company did, she was shocked by the results.
The publicly traded company is an energy infrastructure provider, helping power the rapidly growing AI buildout, as well as military bases and municipal facilities. But the AI chatbots were outdated in their responses, frequently referring to it simply as a cleantech or renewable energy business — areas it still operates in, but are less of a focus — or citing smaller projects it worked on years ago.
“It was quite horrifying,” Dillon told CMO Insider. “We were like, ‘That’s not at all who we are.'”
Dillon set about overhauling the company’s messaging and how it structured its marketing content to better reflect its business.
The work has begun to take effect. Ameresco tracked how often AI chatbots mentioned the company in response to 50 questions that potential customers and investors might ask. It appeared in 61% of those answers in 2026, up from 43% in 2025, according to the company.
As more consumers turn to platforms like ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, Anthropic’s Claude, and Microsoft’s Copilot to research companies and products, marketers are racing to hone their generative engine optimization (GEO) strategies to ensure their brands appear prominently and accurately in AI-generated answers.
“I used to Google everything that I wanted to know about,” Dillon said. “I barely use Google anymore. I use Copilot, and I get better results.”
In a January survey from the Interactive Advertising Bureau, 73% of US brand and agency buyers said they planned to devote more time or resources to optimizing content for AI-generated answers in 2026, compared with last year. In a separate survey of US marketing professionals conducted by Semrush, an AI and search visibility platform, in April, 30% of marketers said AI search tools had described their brands inaccurately.
The rush by marketers to get up to speed with GEO has spawned a cottage industry of AI search experts and tools promising quick fixes. But with AI companies constantly updating their models, marketers are in a phase of constant experimentation as they scramble to figure out what actually influences the chatbots.
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“There’s no one shot that fits all to solve that for you,” Dillon said.
An AI audit identified 47 areas for improvement
In January 2025, Dillon’s team and its PR agency, Greenough, began auditing how often Ameresco appeared in AI-generated answers to 50 prompts — such as, “What are the top energy infrastructure providers in the US?” — on platforms including ChatGPT and Claude. The prompts reflected questions that investors and prospective customers, including people from universities and utilities, might ask AI chatbots.
The audit identified 47 areas for improvement, including how Ameresco described its business across its website, social media, press releases, and executive communications.
“You name it, we were doing it wrong,” Dillon said.
Ameresco began rolling out a new corporate brand identity in July this year, reflecting its broader reorganization around two business pillars: power infrastructure and buildings and public infrastructure.
It had laid the groundwork for the new corporate brand reveal by making several changes to its content strategy.
Those included:
- Updating its corporate boilerplate from “a leading cleantech integrator specializing in energy efficiency and renewable energy” to “a leading energy infrastructure company,” reflecting the new positioning across its marketing and communications.
- Refreshing its awards submission strategy to lead with its power infrastructure projects, and announcing each win with a press release that appears on wire services and industry trade publications.
- Introducing Q&A-style content formats, designed to make the information easier for AI chatbots to interpret.
- Creating more content designed for different customer groups, such as data center operators or school facilities managers, rather than relying on generic marketing materials.
- Launching a video content series called “Energy Benefits Unlocked,” highlighting the tangible results Ameresco’s projects accomplished for its customers.
- Introducing quarterly AI visibility tracking audits across the 50 different prompts, reflecting its different audiences, and adding competitor comparisons.
A constantly moving target
The strategy appears to be paying off in some ways. Ameresco said organic traffic to its website rose 50% in the 12 months to June 2026. Dillon said it’s still too early to assess precisely how those gains translate into business results, though she believes the GEO work is helping the marketing team hit its targets more quickly. The company is scheduled to report its third-quarter earnings on November 9.
Dillon said the rapid changes in AI mean the work is never really finished. Ameresco regularly revisits its AI visibility scores and has invested in training the marketing team, which shares tips, tricks, and their “epic AI fails” in its weekly meetings.
“One of the main themes is that what happened last week is not what you’re going to get this week; it’s changing that quickly,” Dillon said.
“You don’t just update your website and say: Done, woo, all set,” she added.