AI tools like ChatGPT are recommending businesses to your dream clients right now. Here’s what your website needs to get in the mix.

Picture this: A bride-to-be is sitting on her couch at 11pm, scrolling through her phone. She’s been putting off finding a photographer for months, and tonight she finally opens ChatGPT and types:

“Find me a wedding photographer in Columbus who specializes in editorial style.“

ChatGPT spits out three recommendations with names, descriptions, and reasons why each one might be a great fit.

Your name isn’t one of them. Not because you’re not good enough, or you don’t have the right style. Purely because your website wasn’t set up in a way that AI could understand.

That’s the world we’re living in right now, and it’s changing fast 👀

So… what is AI search, exactly?

Let’s back up for a sec, because if you’re thinking “I can barely keep up with Instagram,” you’re not alone.

Here’s what’s happening: More and more people are skipping Google entirely and asking AI tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Google AI a direct question… the way they’d ask a friend.

Here’s the kicker: you could be ranking fine on Google and still be totally invisible on AI search.

Only about 12% of results overlap between the two.

So, your SEO work isn’t automatically protecting you here.

Is my current site set up for this already?

Probably not. Whether your site was built last year or five years ago, this layer really wasn’t on anyone’s radar… and definitely not with the specificity it is now.

AI search optimization is actually so new that it only recently got its own acronym: AEO (Answer Engine Optimization). Fancy! 💃🏼

Even a few months ago, most designers were still optimizing for Google rankings, speed, design, and copy. AI search has added a whole new dimension that the industry is still catching up to.

The good news is that it’s fixable, whether you’re starting from scratch or working with an existing site. And if you take action now, you’re still ahead of the game 💪

What needs changed so I can get found by AI search?

The good news is that it’s mostly behind-the-scenes stuff, not a redesign. Here are some of the things that need to be considered:

Can AI get in? There’s a file on every website that acts like a bouncer. Some accidentally tell AI to stay out, which means no matter how great your content is, AI can’t see it.

Is your site organized clearly? Google ranks pages, but AI extracts answers. That’s a higher bar… your content needs to be clear enough that AI can not just find it, but pull a specific answer from it.

Does it say who you are? Google rewards relevance… AI rewards specificity. “Creating magic for dreamers” might feel on-brand, but AI has no idea what to do with it. The more literally descriptive your site is (who you are, who you help, where you’re based) the more confidently AI can recommend you.

Do you have schema markup? Schema markup has been around for a while, but its importance has skyrocketed now that AI uses it to decide who to recommend. For most websites built on visual platforms, it’s not something that gets set up by default. Without it, AI is guessing. With it, AI knows, and is far more likely to recommend you.

Does your site answer real questions? AI pulls from content that directly answers what people are searching for. Think about the questions your clients ask you all the time: How does your process work? What’s included in each package? Who are your services best for? And make sure your site actually answers them. An FAQ section is one of the highest-impact things you can add for exactly this reason. (Note that we offer FAQ content creation as an add-on to the AI Search Boost.)

How important is this?

You worked hard to build your business, and you invested in a website that looks beautiful and represents your brand.

The last thing we want is for that investment to go to waste because of something happening behind the scenes that you didn’t even know to think about.

AI search isn’t coming… it’s here. And it’s only going to become more important as the way people search continues to shift.

The businesses that show up in AI recommendations in the next year or two are the ones that are making small but strategic updates right now (while most people are still sleeping on this).

And you don’t have to figure this out alone… that’s literally what we’re here for 💖

Ready to get your site AI-ready?

We’re working on baking AEO into every site we build going forward, and we also want to make sure our existing clients aren’t left behind.

Already have a Showit site? Check out our AI Search Boost: a done-for-you service where we go under the hood and handle all of it for you.

Building something new? Let’s make sure your site is set up right from day one. Inquire about a new project →