Can you believe that 58.5% of Google searches now end in zero clicks?
Consumers are increasingly turning to large language model (LLM) tools, like ChatGPT, Gemini and Google’s AI overviews, to discover, evaluate and compare the way they eat and drink.
And honestly, who can blame them? LLM search collapses the entire shopping funnel into one place: inspiration, product info, suitability, ratings and reviews. What used to be a journey across multiple tabs is now compressed into a single interaction. For consumers it’s a one stop shop while for brands, it’s a whole new frontier to conquer.
Interestingly, within the food and drink space, it’s novice cooks and culinary enthusiasts leading the charge. According to Greenpark’s latest data, among AI users searching for recipes, 74% turn to ChatGPT, while 52% use Gemini. Dedicated cooking tools are also gaining traction: ChefGPT grabs 36% of searches, followed by Mr Cook and SuperCook at 28% each.
In addition to pure convenience, these tools help people learn, experiment and fall in love with cooking, meaning the brands that show up here are connecting with people who really care about food.
That growing reliance on AI-driven answers introduces a competition centred less on ranking positions and more about how your brand is interpreted by LLMs that inform the customer how they should feel about you.
The rise of algorithmic sentiment
Which brings us to the tricky bit of getting in front of these customers to begin with: influencing algorithmic sentiment.
Before you start panicking, no AI doesn’t have feelings, and we aren’t all trapped inside a Matrix style simulation.
“Sentiment” is how an LLM interprets and communicates trust, reputation and tone signals across your digital footprint. Product reviews, forums, social posts, your website, all of it counts.
And the story AI tells off the back of all this becomes the default answers for queries like “which chocolate brand is best for baking?” The model is making a judgement call based on the consistency and depth of information it has available. Which means that if your presence across the web is patchy or contradictory, you’re far less likely to feature.
This is where food and drink brands can end up working against themselves without realising it. Inconsistent product descriptions across retailers, outdated ingredient information, missing nutritional data or poorly managed reviews all create friction for an LLM trying to understand who you are and what you offer. Over time, that weakens the confidence it has in presenting your brand as an answer.
Once you see it through that lens, the next step becomes less about quick wins and more about operational alignment.
So, what can brands do to make sure AI “likes” them?
First, it’s all hands on deck. SEO teams may lead, but everyone has a part to play: customer service must stay on top of reviews, merchandising and ecommerce teams need accurate product data and marketing should make sure messaging is consistent everywhere.
Fragmented digital footprints get penalised, simple as that.
Here’s the kicker: smaller brands have a shot at outsmarting the big guns. Traditional search has often favoured those with the biggest budgets and the strongest backlink profiles. But by focusing on consistency and highlighting unique strengths such as sustainability, ethical sourcing and interesting flavours, smaller businesses can stand out in LLM search.
Invest now, shape your narrative and you get the first mover advantage, owning the story for AI-powered discovery before competitors even know what LLM stands for. If you can establish a strong, coherent narrative early, it has a habit of compounding as models continue to learn from the same signals.
Gone is the pre-historic view that LLM “is just another channel”. It’s actively shaping how people discover, evaluate and fall in love with food and drink brands now.
Those brands that make it easy for AI to understand them by making information accurate, consistent and clear across their different digital touchpoints will be the ones remembered, trusted and chosen.
On the other hand, those that fight back against LLM search risk ceding control of their brand narrative to their competitors and a hefty portion of the $24.92 billion market that LLM search is predicted to grow to by 2031.
