Tripadvisor bets on AI-first search; CEO Matt Goldberg says SEO still matters

Tripadvisor CEO Matt Goldberg on AI Search: SEO Still Matters, But the Playbook Is Shifting

SEO isn't dead. It's evolving alongside AI-driven search. That's the practical view from Tripadvisor CEO Matt Goldberg, who says the core skills that help content get crawled and cited still apply in an AI-first search era.

Tripadvisor is leaning into brand trust, real traveler content, and partnerships to stay visible as zero-click results and generative answers take more space in search.

The core idea: trusted brands and crawlable content win in AI

Goldberg's take is simple: the same fundamentals that made SEO work-clear structure, quality signals, and credibility-also help models find and cite you. He points to Tripadvisor's strength in trust and real reviews as durable advantages as AI rewrites how people discover and plan trips.

Google's AI-forward experiences, like AI Overviews, amplify this shift. Being the source that answer engines reference is the new rank-one.

Adapting to zero-click and generative results

Tripadvisor expects more searches to end without a click. The response: strengthen direct demand to Tripadvisor, Viator, and TheFork while optimizing content for AI answer engines.

Goldberg says the company is positioning content, data, and SEO signals to surface high in AI-first search. The goal is simple: get selected, get cited, get chosen.

Partnerships power discovery in AI-first search

Tripadvisor integrated AI summaries and trip planning in 2023 and is working with major model providers to test multimodal and agentic use cases. The company was listed as an OpenAI partner and has also been connected to Perplexity through announced collaboration in trip planning.

Goldberg says they've signed five deals in six months. Each partnership has a clear "learning agenda," ranging from licensing and traffic exchange to co-building new experiences with shared revenue.

User-generated content remains the moat

Real reviews from real travelers are a key asset. Tripadvisor is doubling down on making it easier to rate, review, and share perspectives-while keeping AI-generated reviews out.

According to Goldberg, AI-first traffic is growing fast from a small base-and it converts better. High-intent queries meet high-trust content.

What marketers, product teams, and developers should do now

• Optimize for citations, not just rankings: use schema, clean IA, canonical URLs, and strong internal linking.
• Prioritize brand trust: expert signals, transparent authorship, and consistent review quality.
• Design for zero-click: summaries, FAQs, and crisp answers that answer engines can lift.
• Invest in UGC quality: provenance checks, anti-spam systems, and clear contributor incentives.
• Track AI-first traffic separately: measure impressions in answer engines, citations, and assisted conversions.
• Test partnerships: APIs, licensing, and agent integrations where your data improves model answers.
• Ship multimodal assets: images, maps, and short videos with descriptive metadata.
• Speed still matters: server-side rendering and fast pages to improve crawl, parse, and inclusion.

KPIs to watch

• Share of answers: how often your brand is cited in AI-generated responses.
• High-intent referrals: traffic quality and conversion from AI-first surfaces.
• UGC growth and integrity: review volume, verification rates, and authenticity signals.
• Direct demand: repeat usage, saved itineraries, and logged-in activity.

Bottom line

SEO isn't obsolete-it's being refocused for systems that compose answers, not just rank links. Tripadvisor's move: brand trust, authentic content, and smart partnerships to stay selected in AI-first discovery.

If you're retooling your skills for this shift, see our AI Certification for Marketing Specialists for practical training on AI-era search and content operations.