Ai search and marketing, explained plainly.
Practical guides to Ai search, SEO, social media, ads and email, plus original research and free tools: how buyers find and choose businesses now, and what you can do about it.
Start with the questions buyers are asking Ai
How ChatGPT recommends businesses
Where ChatGPT’s recommendations come from, why it names competitors, and how to become the pick.
- Recommendations are assembled per question, from live search results plus what the model already knows.
- Businesses that are described the same way on many trusted sites (reviews, directories, lists, press) get named more often.
- Your website has to be reachable by ChatGPT’s search crawler and clear enough to quote.
AEO vs SEO
Rankings vs answers: a plain-English comparison of goals, signals and measurement.
Getting into Google Ai Overviews
What Google actually requires, how query fan-out works and the steps that get pages cited.
What is GEO?
Generative engine optimization explained: where it came from, how it works and how to measure it.
How Ai engines choose sources
The retrieval pipeline, which index each engine uses, crawler access and what gets a source selected.
How we measure Ai visibility
Our methodology: buyer question sets, every major engine, repeated runs and transparent scoring.
See where you stand
Original research on how ready business websites are for Ai search, and free tools that run the same checks on your site.
Ai search readiness study
We checked 1,208 US business websites for Ai search readiness. Robots.txt is rarely the problem; bot filters and missing schema are.
Free Ai visibility checker
See whether ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, Google and Bing can crawl, read and understand your site, in about 20 seconds.
Free competitor comparison
Put your site next to a competitor’s and see who’s easier for Ai engines to read, check by check.
SEO, social, ads and email
The channels that feed search and Ai visibility, and turn it into customers.
SEO guides
Local SEO checklist
A step-by-step checklist for the map pack, local pages, citations, reviews and Ai answers.
Google Business Profile guide
Categories, services, photos, reviews and the details that help you show up in Maps and Ai answers.
How long SEO takes
What moves in weeks, what takes months, and how to tell whether SEO is working along the way.
Social media guides
Choosing social platforms
How to pick the two or three platforms worth your time, based on where your buyers actually are.
How often to post
A sustainable posting rhythm by platform, and how to keep it going without burning out.
Social media, SEO and Ai
What social activity does and doesn’t do for rankings, and how it supports Ai recommendations.
Ad management guides
Local Services Ads vs Search Ads
Pay-per-lead vs pay-per-click: how the two Google ad types differ, and when to run both.
Setting a Google Ads budget
Work out a budget from the leads you need and what you can afford to pay for one.
Why ads aren’t converting
The usual causes: tracking, search terms, landing pages, follow-up and settings, and how to fix each.
Email marketing guides
Essential email automations
Welcome, inquiry or cart follow-up, post-purchase, review request and win-back flows, explained.
Email deliverability: SPF, DKIM, DMARC
SPF, DKIM, DMARC, one-click unsubscribe and spam-rate limits, in plain English.
Email for service businesses
What contractors, clinics and firms should email, how often, and how it brings in repeat and referral work.
Weighing your options
Side-by-side comparisons for the decisions buyers make about search, Ai visibility and who does the work.
GEO vs SEO
Rankings vs Ai recommendations: goals, signals, crawlers and measurement compared.
Ai-first vs traditional agency
Pricing, speed, reporting and Ai search, and when a traditional agency fits better.
Agency vs in-house
Cost, skills, control and speed, plus the hybrid model many businesses use.
How we measure Ai visibility
Every claim in these guides is something we test. See how we build question sets, run each engine, score mentions and citations, and track change month to month.
- Fixed buyer questionsThe same questions, tracked over time, so movement is real.
- Every major engineChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, Copilot, Grok and Google Ai Overviews.
- Repeated runsAnswers vary, so we test each question more than once and report rates.
See how Ai sees your business
Find out whether ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Google recommend you, who they recommend instead, and what it would take to change that.
- Engine-by-engine checkMentions and citations across every major Ai engine
- Competitor comparisonWho gets named for your buyer questions
- Trusted-source mapReview sites, directories and publications Ai leans on
- Prioritized quick winsSite, schema, reviews and mention fixes, ranked
Request your free audit
Free and no obligation. We’ll email your findings in plain English.
Questions, answered
What these guides cover and how to get a read on your own Ai visibility.
Who are these guides for?
Owners and marketers at local, service and ecommerce businesses who want to understand how Ai search, SEO, social, ads and email work, and what actually moves results, without the jargon.
How often are the guides updated?
Search and Ai change quickly. We review the guides regularly and update them when platforms change their rules or how they find, choose or cite sources. Each guide shows its last update date.
Can you check how Ai engines see my business?
Yes. The free Ai visibility audit tests your buyer questions across the major engines and shows who gets named, which sources are cited and what to fix first.
How do you measure Ai visibility?
We run a fixed set of buyer questions in each engine on a schedule, repeat each run, and score mentions, citations and recommendations. The full approach is on our methodology page.
Your next customer is asking Ai right now. Make sure it says your name.
Start with a free Ai visibility audit, or pick a plan and we’ll get to work.