The new playbook for localized AI search optimization
AI has become part of nearly every industry, integrated into apps, company processes, and everyday life. As someone who’s been doing local SEO since it became a thing, I’m seeing a major shift in how people search and the answers they get.
In the good old days, the average local business could rank well by optimizing its website, optimizing its Google Business Profile, building about 50 citations, and asking for reviews. In an AI search world, those activities are table stakes.
To perform well in AI-powered local search, you also need to shape what the broader web says about your business, or, in other words, how well-known your brand is.
Think of local search as a digital “word-of-mouth” system.
- What are people saying about your brand?
- Are you mentioned in publications, blogs, or industry sites?
- Do people talk about you on social media?
- What sentiment exists around your business beyond your website and GBP?
These are the questions AI systems ask when users request local business recommendations. Here’s how to shape the reputation signals AI search engines rely on.
How to do competitor research for AI visibility
One of the first steps in an AI search strategy is identifying which brands LLMs recommend most often and finding out what they’re doing.
Identify which businesses get mentioned most in AI responses
AI responses change constantly, so you need to run the same query multiple times to study patterns.
Run your most common brand searches at least 20 times in your preferred LLM. You can do this manually or use software like Gumshoe or Waikay. These tools run synthetic prompts based on your business details and show how often you appear.
Identify the sites that AI most often cites
After identifying your competitors, look at the sources LLMs use. You can dig through the results manually or use one of the tools mentioned above.
Get your brand mentioned on those sites
Once you have that list of sites, try to get your brand mentioned on them.
If AI systems cite blogs, offer to contribute expert content. If they mention podcasts or YouTube channels, ask to be a guest. The goal is to amplify your brand.
The SEO toolkit you know, plus the AI visibility data you need.
How to build reviews for AI
Since Google has been the primary discovery channel for the past decade, most businesses have focused only on getting reviews on Google. To perform well in AI results, you also need reviews on other sites.
Diversify your review strategy
Ask for reviews on a wide range of sites: Yelp, BBB, Facebook, and other review sites prominent in your industry. Frequent reviews across diverse platforms increase your brand’s visibility and can also help rankings in traditional search results.
Optimize the way you ask for reviews
Don’t ask for generic reviews. Give customers direction. Guide them toward experiences or product qualities AI searchers may ask about.
For example, if you have a plumbing company, your review request might sound like this:
Hi [Name],
Thank you for trusting us with your hot water tank repair. If you have a moment, could you please leave us a review on [Link to Platform] and tell us how we did? Some things you could mention in your reviews:
— What plumbing issue did we help you with?
— Are you happy with the quality of our service?
— Did your plumber arrive on time and have a professional attitude?
— Do you think the cost matches the quality of the service?
Your review is a big help to us and to others looking for a quality plumber.
Thank you!
[Name]AI systems directly cite review content, so you want to make sure you’re getting detailed reviews.
Respond to all reviews
If you aren’t responding to reviews, start now. AI systems read and consider the content in review responses.
Be everywhere
AI systems often scour the web for even obscure mentions of your business and use them to build responses. Your business should be present and active across platforms, including:
- YouTube.
- Reddit.
- Industry forums.
- Social media, especially LinkedIn.
- Industry publications.
- Local and hyperlocal blogs.
- Local news sites.
- Local and industry podcasts and video channels.
- Best-of lists in your city or industry.
- Press releases.
Be active on the platforms your peers and customers use. A tool like Sparktoro can show where your audience is active so you can focus your efforts there.
How to write content that AI models love
You’re no longer writing only for humans. You’re also writing for machines, so your content structure has to change.
Dan Petrovic researched Google’s “grounding snippets,” or the sentences it selects from your page to build answers.
One of Petrovic’s key takeaways is that Google prefers sentences that are semantically close to the query and early on the page.
Get straight to the point
While humans might appreciate a well-written introduction that provides context, LLMs scan pages for answers to specific questions.
Because AI systems often scan content higher up on the page, present your key points in the first paragraph. Then make sure the rest of the page supports them.
Understand what questions to answer
This goes back to keyword research and query fan-out. Identify what people type into the search bar, or AI bar, to find businesses like yours. Your website needs to become an answer engine for those prompts.
For local businesses, these are the must-answer questions:
- What do you do?
- What products or services do you offer?
- Who are your products or services for?
- What problems do you solve?
- Where are you located?
- What neighborhoods or cities do you serve?
- Do you offer on-site services, or do customers need to visit your location?
- What are your business hours?
- Do you offer emergency or same-day services?
- Do you work weekends or holidays?
- How can customers contact you?
- What’s the booking process?
- Do you offer quotes or consultations?
- Is your business appointment-only, or do you accept walk-ins?
- Why should someone choose your business?
- What sets you apart from competitors?
- Do you have awards or certifications?
- Are you best known for a specific product or service?
- How much do your products or services cost?
- Do you offer discounts or packages?
- What do customers say about you?
- Can you display reviews and testimonials?
- Can you show case studies or before-and-after examples?
- What are the answers to your most frequently asked questions?
- How do you demonstrate authority and expertise?
- What does your work process look like?
- Do you educate people in your field through tips, guides, or blog articles?
AlsoAsked is a great tool for expanding this question-generation process.
Once you answer these questions, you can use a free tool like Qforia to do query fan-out and generate additional questions AI systems may ask in relation to users’ initial searches.
Answer these questions on your website. Then make sure your answers stay consistent across brand mentions on the web, including citations, guest articles, and press releases.
Structure your content in a machine-friendly way
Most local businesses describe their services like this: “Services we provide: plumbing, drain cleaning, pipe replacement, etc.”
You should do a better job of helping machines understand your business in a clear and concise way by using semantic triples.
A semantic triple consists of:
- [Subject] + [predicate] + [object]
The subject is what you’re defining. The predicate describes the subject’s relationship to the object. The object is what defines the subject.
For example:
- [Rescue Plumbing] [is] [a plumbing company in Denver].
- [Rescue Plumbing] [provides] [drain cleaning services].
Drop the “we” and replace it with your brand name. Machines still need clear signals, so you need to explain what your business is and what it does as clearly as possible.
Have something new to say
Information gain is essential for AI search. Your content shouldn’t reiterate existing information. It should contribute something new.
LLMs want content that enriches their knowledge about your brand, your industry, and your location.
Draw on your personal and professional experience. Answer questions that haven’t been addressed in your industry. Describe on-the-job experiences only you can speak to. This is your opportunity to surface for AI searches your competitors don’t appear in.
Track, optimize, and win in Google and AI search from one platform.
Your AI visibility to-do list
AI visibility depends on more than your website and Google Business Profile. Use this checklist to strengthen the reviews, citations, content, and brand signals AI systems rely on.
- Shift your local SEO strategy. Optimize and maintain your website and Google Business Profile while cultivating broader brand visibility across the web.
- Identify your competitors and study their content and citation strategies.
- Identify the sources LLMs cite in relation to your industry and location, and get your brand mentioned in them.
- Diversify the sites where you collect reviews, optimize your review requests, and respond to all reviews.
- Build your presence across blogs, social media, forums, YouTube channels, podcasts, and the press.
- Write unique, informative, and comprehensive content on your website, citations, and brand mentions across the web. Structure key information using semantic triples.
There’s much more I could write about optimizing for localized AI search, but I’ve probably already exhausted your attention span, so stay tuned for the next article.
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