Local Businesses Will Pay for This

This is something I think people in this room should be paying close attention to....About 62% of consumers now trust AI recommendations more than traditional advertising. That's HUGE!

SEO isn’t necessarily going away…but SEO by itself isn’t enough anymore.

People aren’t clicking through lists of results the way they used to. They’re asking ChatGPT and other AI's direct questions.

And when someone asks ChatGPT something like:

“Who has the best pizza place in Kansas City?”

It doesn’t return a page of results...like Google does. It gives ONE answer. That creates a huge opportunity!

Imagine walking into a local business and asking:

“Would you like to be THE ANSWER when someone asks AI who to call?” That’s the shift.

This isn’t traditional SEO. It's AEO (Answer Engine Optimization)… making sure a business is trusted enough by AI systems to be recommended.

It is true, there’s some education involved on the client side. Most local businesses don’t even realize this is happening yet. But we’re already seeing declining clicks and CTR on the SEO side.

This feels like the next layer… not a replacement, an expansion.

First movers here will have a real advantage. Once AI systems decide who they trust in a local market, that position will be hard to displace.

Here are 3 ways to get a local business in that top position:

Make the business easy for AI to understand by clearly stating what it does, who it serves, and where it operates in plain language.
Build trust signals AI can recognize by creating consistent descriptions, specific reviews, and repeated mentions that all say the same thing about the business.
Structure content around real questions people ask so AI can confidently recommend the business as the best answer.

Just something worth keeping on your radar. I’m sharing this because there’s REAL MONEY to be made! Is this something you have heard of??

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