Maruti, Tata, Renault: Why Can’t You Talk to AI?

We know that Tata Punch can take a hit. But can Tata Motors throw one — when it comes to grabbing online attention for the Punch?

Here’s the thing, people don’t go straight to car dealerships anymore. They go to search bars. They type in simple, honest questions like “Is [Car Brand] budget-friendly?” or “Is [Car X] good for families?”

Since AI overview answers queries now as a first response, we got curious. Do digital platforms of India’s biggest auto brands —Tata, Mahindra, Maruti, Renault — actually show up in reference links AI picks the answers from?

We tested it. And honestly? The results were kind of embarrassing.

Take a basic question: “How budget-friendly is Maruti?” You’d think their site or blog would pop up in the AI overview. Nope. The AI answer pointed to third-party blogs and car comparison sites as sources. Even when the brand is mentioned by name, Google’s Search Labs didn’t trust the brand platforms to provide meaningful inputs for developing its answer.

Next, we asked for features of specific cars of each manufacturer. Still, AI skipped the official websites, blogs, social media platforms and quoted review articles instead.

To give it another shot, we searched the most basic thing a buyer would search — photos of car interiors. Surely brands would show up for that, right? Not really. Many companies still failed to show up amongst images or cited links at the top. Alas, another missed opportunity.

And then, the kicker: “Is [Car X] good for families?”

Hyundai showed up in links AI overview used to develop its answer. Tata didn’t. Mahindra? The AI pulled a Reddit thread titled “Is Mahindra actually unreliable?” on top.

So what’s going wrong?

The problem isn’t that these brands don’t have the information — it’s that they’re not packaging it in a way AI understands or values. Copilot or Search Labs — they’re all scanning the web for clean, clear, trustworthy content. And most of what these brands put out just doesn’t make the cut.

Strangely enough, when searched for corporate or business content such as “Brand X turnover 2024”, brand owned platforms showed up just fine. But type in something that actually influences a customer — like “Is Car Y from Brand X good for families?” — and poof, they vanish.

The reasons are not far to fathom. Much of brand content online has been stuck in the old thinking on keywords, marketing content and using social media and platforms for hard driving marketing or PR content. Companies have simply not invested in thinking through the content LLMs – and eventually – AGIs – will use: Namely creating the data foundation that “trustworthy AI can trust”.

Build the repository of your knowledge and feed LLMs. Educate them. Most importantly, start teaching AI to trust the company.

But that is a whole different ball game. On that, we will write more another day.