C-stores rethink digital strategy as AI takes over search

Social media marketing can capture consumers’ short attention spans. | W. Scott Mitchell Photography

As consumers shift from traditional search engines to artificial intelligence (AI)-generated summaries, brands, including convenience stores, are losing control over when and where they appear in search results, said Kesha Alexander, chief strategy officer and founder of Supper Co., an advertising agency based in Springfield, Missouri.

Alexander spoke at CSP’s Outlook Leadership conference in August with Kyle Drenon, owner and CEO of Supper Co. 

Unlike conventional search engines, AI-generated summaries often provide fewer direct links to brand websites, significantly reducing their visibility. To counteract this trend, Alexander recommends that convenience-store retailers explore social media as a more effective and budget-friendly marketing channel.

“We must diversify your traffic,” Alexander said. “We can no longer rely on the 33% to 50% of traffic coming to c-store websites organically. We have to find other ways to reach our consumers and drive them to our website.”

Platforms such as TikTok, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts appeal to consumers’ short attention spans and preference for personable content. To be effective, brands must “speak the language of the platform,” said Drenon.

That means sharing videos that appear to be shot organically by a single person, rather than polished content that clearly comes from a brand trying to sell a product, he said.

“It feels more like a real person giving you a recommendation,” Drenon said. “Consumers are more likely to trust that type of content.”

Paid video campaigns can further strengthen this approach, he said. If a brand distributes influencer-style content, it can build an audience of viewers who watched at least 50% of the video. Those consumers, now familiar with the brand, can then be targeted with similar content—a tactic known as retargeting, Drenon said.

“That targeting strategy was popularized by Amazon and is now widely used, and it uses a psychological principle called the Baader-Meinhof effect, which is a principle that when we’re introduced to new information, we become extremely highly aware of that new information,” he said.

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