AI is rapidly changing the SEO playbook for hotel marketers. HSMAI's Marketing Rising Leader Council recently examined hotel search visibility and Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), highlighting a shift toward conversational queries, AI summaries, and hyper-local answers that surface immediately.

GEO is the set of strategies hotel and brand marketing teams use to improve visibility in generative search engines and AI-powered search experiences. It builds on many established SEO fundamentals, but it also raises new questions about how hotel content is structured, cited, interpreted, and surfaced when a traveler asks a detailed question rather than typing a short keyword phrase.

A quick DMV hotel search experiment

With rooftop and pool season approaching, we tested a highly specific Google query: "hotels in DC with a rooftop restaurant or bar and a pool." This type of detailed, conversational search reflects how travelers increasingly describe the experience they want rather than simply searching for a hotel by location.

In the Google AI Mode results observed for this experiment, seven hotels were recommended. Three belonged to the same major hotel brand. Two recommendations linked only to the hotel's Google Business Profile rather than its own website. One cited the website of the hotel's rooftop restaurant, and another cited a Tripadvisor "Best of" roundup.

The test reinforced an important point for DMV hotel marketers: visibility in AI-powered search is influenced by more than a property's homepage. Search engines and AI experiences may draw from hotel websites, restaurant or amenity pages, Google Business Profiles, third-party travel sites, editorial roundups, reviews, and other sources that demonstrate experience, expertise, authority, and trust.

What hotel marketers should do now

Start by testing the searches your guests are most likely to make. Search Google, Google AI experiences, ChatGPT, and other relevant tools for your property's most important attributes: rooftop dining, pools, family-friendly stays, pet-friendly accommodations, meeting space, proximity to major attractions, business travel amenities, parking, or other differentiators.

Then evaluate whether your hotel appears for the attributes you want to own. If it does not, review the full digital ecosystem supporting those topics. Strengthen property and amenity content, make key information easy to understand and verify, keep Google Business Profile information current, improve internal linking, and look for credible third-party opportunities that reinforce the property's positioning.

The goal is not to replace SEO with GEO. It is to build on strong SEO fundamentals while making hotel content clearer, more authoritative, and easier for both travelers and AI-powered discovery tools to understand.

For additional guidance, read HSMAI's full POV: How to Level Up Your GEO.