AI Does Not Rank Your Brand, It Decides If You Are in the Room · Dennis Kirwan, Dymic Digital

What we talked about.

In this episode of the Sunny Ray Show, host Sunny Ray talks with Dennis Kirwan, co-founder of Dymic Digital, about how artificial intelligence is changing brand discovery. Kirwan explains that large language models like ChatGPT do not simply rank companies the way Google does, they decide which brands even make it into the conversation. He traces his path from running international business development at an Inc. 500 SEO firm, where he opened an office in Edinburgh, Scotland, through the Google algorithm updates of 2011 and 2012 that pushed him to co-found Dymic Digital in 2013. Kirwan describes discovering in 2023 that a client who ranked first on Google was absent from ChatGPT's recommendations, prompting him to reverse engineer how these tools generate answers. He unpacks the difference between traditional SEO and generative engine optimization, noting that ChatGPT relies on Bing for real time data while weighting sources like Reddit and LinkedIn differently than Google. The conversation also touches on Dymic accepting Bitcoin since 2021 and Kirwan's ongoing writing for the Forbes Agency Council.

Dennis Kirwan explains why ranking on Google no longer guarantees inclusion in AI generated brand recommendations.

The questions, and the answers.

What are you building at Dymic Digital, and what problem are you solving?

We do growth reconstruction and AI visibility. Businesses often have fragmented digital marketing with multiple vendors that do not communicate, leaving broken marketing systems. We come in, find where the leaks are, and help clients attribute revenue better instead of relying on vanity metrics. Over the last few years we have focused heavily on getting brands found on large language models like ChatGPT.

Before Dymic, you ran international business development at a company that made the Inc. 500. What did that growth feel like from the inside?

It was exciting. I have nothing but good things to say about that company, National Positions. They taught me a lot about online marketing and were the number one SEO company in the country during what I call the SEO gold rush era, back when SEO rankings were national rather than local. I eventually moved into management and opened an office for them in Edinburgh, Scotland.

What was the last straw that made you and your co-founders start something of your own?

Around 2011 and 2012, Google rolled out major algorithm updates like Panda and Penguin that wrecked rankings built on web spam and linking schemes. My old company struggled to adapt, and I lost clients I had worked hard to bring on. I felt SEO alone was limited, so in 2013 my business partners and I started our own company to tailor campaigns beyond just SEO.

You've written for the Forbes Agency Council since 2016. What has publishing regularly done for the firm?

It is more work than it seems. Forbes heavily vets every article through an editorial team, so pieces take a long time and sources have to hold up. Writing does not come naturally to me since I never studied journalism, but it forces me to research and stay sharp on what's happening in the industry, which keeps me on the leading edge.

In February 2021 you announced that Dymic would accept Bitcoin. What was the actual conversation in the room before that call?

I was skeptical for years, even dismissing it as tulip mania back in 2011 when colleagues at my old company talked about it downstairs. I finally gave it a real look in 2017 when it hit 20,000 and realized I had missed something. It took a while to bring my partners around, but we agreed accepting Bitcoin gave us more exposure and revenue.

Your line now is that AI does not rank your brand, it decides whether you're in the room. When did you first see that happen to a client?

Right when ChatGPT went mainstream in 2023, I tested it against a client who ranked at the top on Google, and the client did not appear on ChatGPT's short list at all. I started reverse engineering how it generated citations and recommendations. That was the moment I realized ranking on Google no longer meant you would rank in AI answers.

Generative engine optimization sounds like a new phrase for an old fight. What actually works, and what is just the last decade renamed?

There is truth to both. Google was built on backlinks by Sergey Brin and Larry Page, and that structure has not changed. ChatGPT actually runs on Bing for real time results plus its own core data, producing a compressed consideration set instead of ten links. Both value authority and reviews, but LLMs weight things like Reddit and LinkedIn more heavily than Google does.