The way parents discover, evaluate, and trust infant nutrition information is evolving faster than ever. Traditional Google search once served primarily as a link-finder, delivering ranked webpages based on SEO keywords. Today, AI-driven search tools such as Google’s AI Overviews to Perplexity, ChatGPT, and other large language model (LLM) powered assistants, now act as answer engines – answering 60% of healthcare queries directly, yet most brands still only optimise for traditional website traffic. LLMs synthesise information, summarise expert opinion, and shape understanding without even requiring a single click through.
For brands in infant nutrition, this represents a profound shift. The first interaction a mother might have with a brand is no longer a website visit, press article, or social media post. Increasingly, it is an AI-generated answer that combines multiple sources, delivering a distilled response in seconds. This makes it critical for communications to be not only accurate and evidence-based but also structured in a way that AI systems can recognise, verify, and surface to users.
Search behaviour trends highlight the scope of the challenge. Parents are asking nuanced, emotionally-driven questions about infant gut health, probiotics, HMOs, allergy management, digestive comfort, and personalised nutrition. They aren’t just searching for what to feed their baby, they are searching for why it matters, what outcomes they can expect, and reassurance from trusted voices. These queries are long-tail, contextual, and often phrased in natural language, which aligns perfectly with AI-driven summarisation. Brands that fail to provide credible, structured answers, risk being bypassed.
Why AI and LLMs are changing PR strategy
For infant nutrition brands, these developments require a rethinking of PR:
- AI-optimised content is essential
- Messages, claims, and expert commentary need to be structured so AI systems can parse, verify, and surface them accurately
- Schema markup on websites, FAQs, structured expert quotes, and clear citation of sources improve discoverability
- Expert voices must be surfaced digitally
- AI relies on authoritative signals. Thought leadership, clinician quotes, and expert-backed content must be visible online to be used in AI-generated summaries. Having a credible healthcare professional author brand content, carries significant weight.
- Insight-driven storytelling wins
- Traditional PR focused on awareness or media coverage. Modern PR must focus on what parents actually search for, what questions they ask in forums, social media, and search bars, and create content that answers those questions credibly
- Digital PR and monitoring AI-generated results
- Strategic digital PRthat places your brand in high-authority health publications. AI models consistently cite sources like Healthline, WebMD, BBC, and Forbes. When these outlets mention your brand or reference your expertise, AI models notice and are more likely to include you in their answers.
- Brands need to track not just mentions in traditional media but how AI tools are summarising content. Are answers accurate? Are competitors being surfaced instead?
The implications for PR are clear. Communications strategies can no longer focus solely on awareness or traditional media coverage. They must start with insight, understanding the real questions parents are asking across forums, Reddit threads, Facebook groups, social listening, and search data. This insight becomes the foundation for storytelling that answers those questions directly, with empathy, authority, and clarity. Expert voices, clinical guidance, and advisory board findings must be publicly visible, structured, and optimised so AI can reference them accurately.
Furthermore, AI-driven search demands continuous monitoring. It is no longer enough to track media placements or social engagement. Brands must now also track how AI systems are interpreting and summarising content. Are parents being presented with your expertise first, or are competitors dominating the AI answer landscape? PR strategies must evolve to actively shape this digital narrative, ensuring science, claims and expert voices can be processed and surfaced (over competitors).
For infant nutrition brands, this is both a challenge and an opportunity. By combining scientific credibility with AI-optimised, insight-led communications, brands can ensure that when parents ask, “what’s best for my baby?” the first answer they receive is trustworthy, relevant, and aligned with real-world evidence. The future will reward those who understand that infant nutrition extends beyond the formula itself – it extends into the way families discover, understand, and act on information in an AI-first world.
Speak to EatMoreFruit Communications for a free audit of where your brand appears in AI models and how to improve your visibility.
