Hybrid marketing: how AI redefines the brand-user connection
In our first article, we explored how artificial intelligence is transforming consultancy, driving it to take on a strategic responsibility that goes beyond technological adoption to include governance, ethics, and reputation. The analysis left us with a key takeaway: transformation does not end with internal processes or regulatory compliance—it profoundly reshapes the relationship between brands and users.
In this context, artificial intelligence acts as an active intermediary, and hybrid marketing is emerging as a crucial element in maintaining relevance within an ecosystem where visibility, trust, and decision-making no longer depend solely on people but also on the systems that represent them.
A new balance between creativity and data
This paradigm shift is particularly evident in the fields of marketing and communication. Today, artificial intelligence has evolved from being a mere support tool to becoming a new functional link between companies and customers, locating, citing, and recommending brands throughout the entire user journey.
Against this backdrop, hybrid marketing emerges as a strategic response capable of combining human judgement —creative, ethical, and contextual— with the analytical, predictive and operational capabilities of automated systems.
Under this framework, relevance is no longer built from a single perspective. Dual optimisation becomes essential: content must remain persuasive and meaningful to people—drawing on storytelling, creativity, and design—while also being structured in ways that machines can interpret, assess, and prioritise through data and algorithmic logic.
AI as the user's digital representative
This evolution of hybrid marketing introduces a new player into the digital ecosystem: an AI that acts as a digital representative of the user, able to filter, synthesise and prioritise information before the consumer makes a decision When analysing large volumes of data, it makes a first selection of options and conditions which brands are in or out of the conversation.
In this context, visibility is no longer ensured by traditional SEO alone, but AEO, which focuses on language models (LLMs) so that information is presented as a direct and reliable response, is gaining in importance.
By 2026, traditional search volume will drop by 25%
In this regard, Gartner projects that by 2026, traditional search volume will drop by 25% due to the rise of AI chatbots and virtual agents.
If a brand is not part of the AI-generated answer, it will fall out of the digital conversation—making it essential to strengthen governance and technical infrastructure.
Dual optimisation as the core of hybrid marketing
The emergence of AI as a new intermediary between brand and user reinforces the need for a fully integrated hybrid marketing model. Its essence lies in the requirement for a dual optimisation approach, where the real strategic challenge is to remain relevant simultaneously to humans and machines without compromising coherence or trust.
This dual optimisation is articulated along two complementary lines. On the one hand, consumer optimisation seeks to strengthen emotional connection and credibility through storytelling that generates deep bonds with the customer.
SEO professionals plan to strengthen E-E-A-T principles
It also requires verifiable attributes of authority, such as the E-E-A-T principles (experience, expertise, authoritativeness and trustworthiness), which search engines and LLMs prioritise as expert and rigorous sources.
According to Search Engine Journal's 'State of SEO 2026' report, 49.6% of SEO professionals already plan to strengthen these attributes in response to the advance of AI.
On the other hand, AI optimisation ensures that information is readable and actionable by digital assistants, allowing them to process and share it with the end user. Structured data is crucial for advanced language models to understand, synthesise and prioritise brand content.
In turn, algorithmic logic —or Language Model Optimisation (LMO)— focuses on how LLMs interpret and present information, cementing algorithmic trust as the new SEO standard and ensuring that the brand is perceived as the most logical, reliable and accessible option.
45.7% of information and communications companies already use generative AI
Clearly, it is essential that managers recognise the differences in technology adoption by sector.
According to the Bank of Spain's Survey on Business Activity (EBAE), the use of artificial intelligence is notably more widespread in information and communications services, where 31.6% of firms use predictive AI and 45.7% use generative AI.
This high penetration in service sectors highlights the urgency of adopting optimisation for both objectives.
A new field of competition
With the emergence of AI, brands are no longer competing just with their direct rivals, but with the search engine itself. Even a flawlessly executed classic SEO strategy will fall short if a brand does not appear within AI generated responses—effectively excluding it from the digital conversation.
In our next publication we will delve deeper into concrete strategies to achieve visibility and trust in this new ecosystem, thus closing the analysis of the impact of AI on marketing and communication consultancy.
Article co-authored by Luisa Cáceres and Liseth Martínez.
Related article: Marketing in the age of AI: a new responsibility