If you’ve already run the audit from our last post and confirmed that AI doesn’t know you — or describes you badly — it’s time to fix it. Here’s the list of what actually moves the needle, ranked by impact.
One thing before we start: almost everything below also makes your site better for every human visitor. You’re not chasing a trend here — you’re explaining yourself more clearly.
1. Make sure it can be read (before anything else)
This sounds obvious, and it’s where most websites fail.
- Put your text in text. No prices, services, or contact details buried inside an image. And definitely nothing locked inside a PDF visitors have to download
- Content that’s actually in the HTML. If your site renders content with JavaScript after the page loads, some crawlers will never see it. Check by viewing the page source
- Crawlers you’re actually letting in. Check your
robots.txtand make a deliberate call on whether GPTBot, PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot, and Google-Extended are allowed through
Without this, nothing else on this list matters.
2. Structured data (the best return for the least effort)
Structured data is invisible markup that tells a machine exactly what each piece of your page is. It changes nothing for a human visitor; for an AI model, it’s the difference between guessing and knowing.
The ones that matter for a small business:
- Organization / LocalBusiness — who you are, where you’re based, how to reach you, your opening hours
- Service — what services you offer, and who they’re for
- FAQPage — your frequently asked questions in a format AI can quote directly
- Article — on blog posts, with an author and a date
- BreadcrumbList — the structure of your site
If you’re on WordPress, plugins like Yoast or Rank Math already generate some of this. It’s worth checking it’s complete and accurate — not just switched on.
3. Answer real questions, and answer them fast
A model quotes passages that clearly answer something. If your answer is buried in paragraph fourteen, it’s far less likely to get picked.
What works:
- Headings that are real questions — the ones your customers actually ask you on the phone
- The answer right below the heading, in two or three sentences. Expand on it afterwards
- Concrete detail: prices, timelines, what’s included and what isn’t. Vague doesn’t get quoted
- A genuine FAQ section, built around your customers’ actual questions
Practical tip: go through your inbox and the messages customers send you. The questions that keep coming up are exactly the content you should have published.
4. Say clearly who you’re for
This is the point most small business websites ignore — and the one that sets you apart the most.
When someone asks “which accountant would you recommend for a freelancer just starting out?”, the model looks for a match to that specific situation. If your website says “comprehensive solutions for businesses”, you match nothing. If it says “we work with freelancers and small businesses with under 10 employees in Manchester”, you match.
Be specific: who you serve, where, in what industry, what problem you solve. Specificity is what makes you recommendable.
5. Get other people talking about you
A model trusts what third parties say more than what you say about yourself. This won’t get sorted in an afternoon, but it does more than anything else to cement your presence:
- A complete Google Business Profile with reviews — one of the most consulted sources there is
- Industry directories and professional associations
- Mentions in trade press or industry blogs
- Absolute consistency of your name, address, and phone number everywhere they appear
6. The old basics still count
A slow website, one that’s broken on mobile, or one running on content from five years ago is less likely to get cited. There’s no shortcut that makes up for that.
Speed, mobile performance, up-to-date content, HTTPS. The usual suspects. (If that side of things has been neglected, that’s where to start — get in touch and we can help.)
What you should NOT do
Every new discipline attracts shortcuts. Avoid these:
- Hidden text or instructions aimed at AI tucked away on the page. It’s the modern version of keyword stuffing, and it will get penalised the same way
- Making things up — awards you haven’t won, inflated numbers. If other sources contradict you, you lose credibility with the model and with the customer
- Publishing a hundred AI-generated articles with no editorial judgement. Generic content that adds nothing doesn’t get cited
- Paying anyone who promises to get you “ranked first on ChatGPT”. There’s no such thing as “first place” — nobody controls what a model answers, and whoever’s selling that is misleading you
Where to start tomorrow
If you can only do three things:
- Check you’re not blocking AI crawlers in your robots.txt (5 minutes)
- Add structured data for your organisation and services (one afternoon)
- Write an FAQ page with the 10 questions your customers ask most, with concrete answers (one morning)
Do that, and you’re already ahead of most websites in your industry.
If you’d rather we handled it
We’re putting together a GEO/AIO audit and implementation service: we look at how AI systems see you today, compare that with your competitors, and put the improvements in place on your site. Not just the report — the implementation too, which is usually where these things stall.
If you’d like us to take a look at your situation, get in touch and we’ll talk it through, no strings attached.