Getting found by AI search engines

For a few years now, some of your customers no longer “google”: they ask an AI. “Who’s the best accountant near me?”, “Compare two ways to redo my deck.” And the AI answers with a paragraph, often without a single list of ten blue links. So the question becomes: when an AI composes its answer, is your business part of it?

What changes (and what doesn’t)

The good news is that the foundations stay the same: a fast, clear, well-structured and trustworthy site. AIs rely heavily on the same signals as Google. What changes is the shape of the answer: instead of sending the visitor to a page, the AI reads several sources, summarizes them and cites you — or not. Your goal is no longer only to be clicked, but to be understood and remembered as a reliable source.

1. Answer the real question, early and clearly

AIs love content that answers directly. Phrase your customer’s question as a heading, then give the answer in the first sentences — no beating around the bush. The rest of the page can expand, add nuance, illustrate. This “question, sharp answer, then details” structure serves you with AIs as much as with humans in a hurry.

2. Help the machine understand your business

Structured data is a language search engines understand without ambiguity: business type, address, hours, services, reviews, prices. It doesn’t show on the page, but it clearly tells an AI “here’s who I am and what I offer.” It’s one of the reasons I build it into every site I make.

3. Lead with experience and credibility

Google sums up its quality bar in four letters: E-E-A-T — experience, expertise, authoritativeness, trust. AIs follow the same logic: they prefer to cite sources that show real competence. In practice, that means text signed by a real person, examples of real projects, visible contact details and authentic reviews.

• Sign your content and say who you are.
• Show concrete work, with context and results.
• Stay consistent everywhere: site, Google profile, socials, directories.

4. Don’t chase everything at once

The landscape moves fast, and no one can guarantee you a spot in an AI answer — be wary of anyone who promises it. The winning strategy isn’t to “hack” this month’s algorithm, but to build something solid and honest, which happens to be exactly what AIs are trying to recommend.

Search engines change shape, but they’re always after the same thing: the clearest, most reliable source.

In other words, preparing for AI search isn’t starting from scratch. It’s doing the basics well — then making them crystal clear for a machine as much as for a human. And that’s work that pays off no matter which tool your customers reach for tomorrow.