How to get found by Google and AI assistants

1. Give each service its own page, in plain language

A brochure site often describes everything on one 'Services' page, in a paragraph or a slider. That is hard for a person to scan and close to useless for a machine trying to work out what you actually do and for how much. Every service you offer deserves its own page: one URL, one clear heading naming the service the way a customer would type it, and a plain description of what is included.

• Name it the way customers search: "Emergency plumber Brisbane", not "Our Services".
• Say what it costs, or how pricing works: a number, a range, or a plain sentence such as "quoted per project after a short questionnaire".
• Answer the next question: how long it takes, what is needed from the customer, what happens next.
• Link to proof: the reviews or examples that relate to that specific service.

2. Add structured data so software can read the page too

Structured data is a layer of markup on the page, written in the schema.org vocabulary, that states facts about your business in a fixed format a machine can parse without guessing: this is a Service, this is its name, this is the business that offers it. Google's own structured data guidelines recommend using the most specific schema.org type available for what is actually on the page, rather than a generic one.

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "Service",
  "name": "Emergency plumbing",
  "areaServed": "Brisbane",
  "provider": {
    "@type": "LocalBusiness",
    "name": "Your Business"
  }
}

Start with Organization or LocalBusiness on your homepage and Service on each service page. This is not decoration. It is the difference between an assistant inferring what your business does from a paragraph of marketing copy, and being told directly.

3. Complete and align your Google Business Profile

Google ranks local results on relevance, distance and prominence, in its own words. You cannot move a customer closer to you, but relevance and prominence are both within your control, and both come from the same place: a Business Profile filled in completely and kept current, with categories, services, hours and photos that match what is actually on your website.

Prominence also comes from being described consistently elsewhere: directories, industry bodies and other business listings that state the same name, address and phone number as your site. Mismatched details across these listings work against you in the same way a typo in your own copy would.

4. Earn reviews with real detail in them

Reviews are read by more than the person deciding whether to call you. Consumers reading reviews before choosing a business has climbed sharply, and AI assistants draw on the same reviews to describe what customers actually experienced. A three-word review does little for either audience. A review that names the service, the outcome and a specific detail gives both a person and a model something to repeat.

Ask for a review at the moment a job finishes well, and ask a specific question rather than a generic one, such as what the customer would tell a neighbour who needed the same job done. That produces the kind of detail an assistant can quote, not just a star rating.

5. Write pages that are easy to quote directly

Being retrieved by an AI assistant is not the same as being cited. Research covering hundreds of millions of AI citations finds they cluster around sources that state a clear, extractable answer, backed by a source that is easy to attribute, rather than sheer volume of content. Put the direct answer to the obvious question in the first sentence of a section, then explain.

Keep the page current. An assistant weighing several candidate answers favours one that looks freshly maintained over one that has clearly not been touched in years. Update the date, the price if it has changed, and the detail if your process has changed, and say so on the page.

6. Measure what is actually changing

Since May 2026, Google Analytics has grouped recognised visits from ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude under a native AI Assistant channel inside its Default Channel Group, kept separate from ordinary referral traffic. Check that channel alongside organic search, and check it again a few months after you make these changes.

Also watch branded search. People who hear your name from an assistant often go and type it into Google afterwards to check you out before they call. A rise in branded search with no matching rise in advertising is a reasonable sign the recommendations are starting to happen.

• In Analytics: the AI Assistant channel in Default Channel Group reports, and any conversions from it.
• In Search Console: growth in branded queries and impressions for your business name.
• By hand: ask new enquiries how they found you, with "an AI assistant" as an option, not just "Google" or "word of mouth".

Putting it together

Almost none of your competitors are doing this properly yet. Only a small fraction of local business listings are ever recommended by ChatGPT for a given local service query, and fewer than a quarter of marketers currently track whether AI assistants send them any traffic at all. Getting the basics right is not competing in a crowded field. It is being one of the few businesses an assistant can actually describe.

Start with the service pages and the structured data, because everything else depends on the facts being right and readable. Then work down the list. None of it replaces ordinary SEO. It is the same discipline, extended to a reader that cannot guess what you meant and will only repeat what it can verify.

Key takeaways

1. 1

   AI assistants now supply local recommendations nearly as often as Facebook does, and they read from what your site and profile actually state, not from a general impression of your business.

2. 2

   Structured data and Google Business Profile details are read by both Google's ordinary search and AI assistants. Get them right once and both benefit.

3. 3

   Reviews with real detail and consistent business details across the web build the same prominence signal that gets you recommended.

4. 4

   Almost nobody measures whether AI assistants send them customers yet. Adding one enquiry-form question puts you ahead of most competitors.

Frequently asked questions