Why Your Business Needs to Show Up in Both Google and AI Answers (And How to Do It)

Category: Local SEO / GEO / AEO
Target Reader: Local business owners & marketing agency owners
Estimated read time: 6 minutes

Search has quietly split into two lanes. Most businesses are only driving in one.

A few years ago, “ranking on Google” covered everything. You optimised your website, managed your Google Business Profile, earned some reviews, and leads came in. That still works. But it no longer covers the full picture.

Today, a growing number of buyers open ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Google’s AI Overviews before they ever click a result. They type something like “best roofing contractor near me” or “who’s a good local SEO consultant?” — and they trust the names they get back. If your business isn’t one of those names, you’ve lost that buyer without ever knowing it.

This is the shift that separates businesses winning in 2025 from those quietly losing ground.

The Two Search Realities Running in Parallel

Classic search — the Google map pack, local listings, and organic results — still drives the majority of local leads. When someone is ready to call, they Google. A clean Google Business Profile, consistent citations, genuine reviews, and healthy on-page signals still put you in front of those buyers.

That hasn’t changed. You still need it.

AI search is the new layer on top. Tools like ChatGPT and Perplexity pull from a small set of sources they consider reliable. Google’s AI Overviews do the same. If your content isn’t structured for retrieval, if your authority signals are thin, if AI tools can’t clearly understand who you are and what you do — they simply won’t name you.

The businesses that will dominate local search over the next two to three years are the ones building for both.

What “Optimising for AI” Actually Means

There’s a lot of noise around GEO (Generative Engine Optimisation) and AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation). Let me cut through it.

GEO is about getting your content cited inside AI-generated answers. When someone asks ChatGPT for a recommendation and your business name comes back as a trusted source — that’s GEO working.

AEO is about becoming the direct answer. When Google’s AI Overviews pull a specific answer from your page, or when Perplexity quotes your site to answer a question — that’s AEO.

They overlap significantly, and the foundations are the same:

• Clean, parseable structure. AI tools need to understand your content without guessing. Clear headings, logical flow, direct answers near the top of sections.
• Real topical depth. Thin pages built for keyword density don’t make the cut. AI tools favour sites that demonstrate genuine expertise across a topic — not just one optimised landing page.
• Schema markup. Structured data tells AI tools exactly who you are, what you offer, where you’re located, and what people say about you. Without it, you’re relying on the tool to infer — and it often won’t bother.
• Entity clarity. Your business needs to be a clear, consistent entity across the web. Your name, address, category, and description should match everywhere they appear. This is how AI tools verify that you’re a real, trustworthy source.
• Proof of experience. Reviews, case studies, credentials, and authored content all signal to AI tools that a real person with real expertise is behind this site.

If that list looks familiar, it should. These are also strong local SEO signals. Building for AI and building for Google aren’t separate strategies — they’re the same strategy applied with a slightly different lens.

Why Local Businesses Are Especially Vulnerable to This Shift

National brands and large publishers have dominated AI citations so far, mostly because they already have the content depth and authority signals AI tools prefer. Local businesses are behind — and the window to establish yourself as a trusted local source is still open, but it won’t stay open indefinitely.

Here’s the opportunity: most of your local competitors have done nothing about AI search. They’re not structuring their content for retrieval. They don’t have schema telling AI tools what they do. Their GBP and website are inconsistent. If you move now, you establish yourself as the local authority in your category before they do.

Consider what one of my clients — an interior designer in Montclair, NJ — experienced. She had no visibility on Google when we started. Within five to six months, she was generating around ten leads a month from local search. Then when AI search took off, she searched for interior designers in her area through an AI tool and found herself named in the answer. Two strategies. One body of work.

That’s what this looks like in practice.

What to Focus On First

If you’re a local business owner or you run an agency managing local clients, here’s a practical starting point:

1. Audit your Google Business Profile. Is every category correct? Are your services listed with proper descriptions? Are you generating a steady flow of real reviews? Is every piece of business information consistent with what’s on your website and in your citations? This is the foundation of local ranking — and it feeds AI trust signals too.

2. Fix the technical base. Crawl errors, broken links, slow load times, missing sitemaps, and incorrect robots settings all weaken how both Google and AI tools assess your site. Fix the plumbing before building anything on top of it.

3. Add schema markup. At minimum: LocalBusiness schema, FAQ schema on any page that answers direct questions, and Review schema if you’re aggregating testimonials. These give AI tools a clear, machine-readable summary of who you are.

4. Build real topical depth. Think about every question a buyer asks before hiring someone in your category. What does a roof inspection cover? How long does siding installation take? What should I look for in a local SEO consultant? Each of those is a content opportunity — and collectively, they establish your site as the authoritative source on your topic.

5. Make every page answer something clearly. AI tools retrieve answers, not pages. If a page buries its main point in the third paragraph, it loses. Front-load your answers, write directly, and structure content so the key takeaway is unmissable.

The Common Mistake Agencies Make

Many agencies are still selling “SEO” as a single service without separating out AI search. That’s a problem — not because AI search replaces classic SEO, but because clients are starting to ask about it. Business owners who use ChatGPT or Perplexity personally are noticing that they’re not in the answers. They want to know what you’re doing about it.

Agencies that can clearly explain GEO and AEO, and demonstrate results in AI citations alongside traditional ranking improvements, have a meaningful differentiator. It’s not a gimmick. It’s where the market is heading — and the agencies that adapt early will retain clients longer and win more competitive pitches.

The Bottom Line

Search isn’t one channel anymore. It’s Google and AI working in parallel, each capturing buyers at different moments. Ranking in one and ignoring the other means leaving a growing percentage of your potential customers unreached.

The good news is that the work overlaps significantly. A well-structured, technically clean, authoritative local presence wins in both channels. You don’t need two separate strategies — you need one strategy built with both channels in mind from the start.

That’s the work I do with agencies and business owners: rank you in Google’s local results, and get your content cited by the AI tools your customers are using.

If you want to understand where you currently stand in both channels, the right first step is an audit — a clear look at what’s working, what’s broken, and what to fix first.

Book a call →

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Jitender Ahlaawat is a Local SEO, GEO and AEO consultant working with agencies and business owners since 2017. He helps businesses rank in Google’s local results and earn citations in AI-generated answers.