Research that shapes how the category thinks

Read the latest insights from the AirOps Research team to keep you ahead of what's coming next.

Marketing Leaders Reality Index

Get an honest look at how 300+ marketing leaders are funding growth, reshaping teams, and responding to higher targets. See where budgets are going, which teams are gaining resources, and how often marketers are being asked to deliver more without them.

REPLACE: one sentence describing all five results.

How ChatGPT Ads Are Reshaping Fintech Answers

Weekly ad load over all in-scope fintech brands. From near zero in April to ≈ 53% in the week of 2026-07-13. The window average is 7.35%; the trajectory, not the average, is the story.

Weekly ad load starts at 0.46%, remains below 10% through June 22, then rises to 14.5% and finishes at 52%—about 113 times its initial value.

The Fastest-Growing Source in AI Search

The old AI-visibility playbook was simple: own the page that answers the question. That still matters, but as consumer behavior is undergoing a huge shift with AI search, it’s no longer the whole playbook.

Creator and social sources grew 140%, followed by reviews at 38%, marketplaces at 15%, and media or publishers at 2%. Owned brand or product sources declined 10%, educational sources declined 27%, and communities declined 28%.

The Long Tail: Where Visibility in AI Search is Won

Search behavior is changing. In AI search, people ask longer, more specific questions that sound more like real decision-making than traditional keyword searches. AirOps recent research on the influence of retrieval, ...

March 25, 2026

The Influence of Retrieval, Fan-out, and Google SERPs on ChatGPT Citations

When ChatGPT generates a response, it does more than pull a few familiar blue links. It expands queries, retrieves pages from across the web, and cites only a small fraction of what it finds. For brands trying to understand...

March 12, 2026

The 2026 State of AI Search: How Modern Brands Stay Visible

The way people discover information has shifted with the rise of the answer-first web. Instead of scanning a list of links, millions now ask AI assistants for direct answers. That changed how categories form, how...

December 2, 2025

The Community Flywheel: How Reddit, YouTube, and LinkedIn Decide Who Wins in AI Search

User-generated content and community platforms have become the trust layer of AI search. Answer engines establish credibility by surfacing spaces where real users share experiences, not only what brands publish. Our an...

November 6, 2025

More from AirOps

The New Rules of Growth: Five Takeaways From Krithika Shankarraman and Christy Roach

What are the new rules of growth? Krithika Shankarraman of Thrive Capital joined Christy Roach, CMO of AirOps, to discuss 2026 data and survey findings.

How Vibe Cut Its Competitive AI Visibility Gap in Half With AirOps

See how Vibe and AirOps built offsite authority to improve AI search visibility, lift brand mentions by 13.3%, and cut the gap with a category leader in half.

The paid layer of AI search has arrived: Introducing AI Ads in AirOps

Paid is now the third pillar of AI search. AirOps' new AI Ads feature lets teams track competitor ad activity in ChatGPT, act on those signals with on-brand Playbooks, and connect campaign performance, including spend, CTR, and CPC, to the same market data driving their organic AI search strategy.

Turn the AI-first buyer shift into a category advantage

Whether you’re starting from square one with AI discovery or ramping a successful program, our team will meet you where you are to drive results.