How a local business gets into AI answers.

What Google says to do first.

Google's guide for site owners, last updated 10 July 2026: "The best practices for SEO continue to be relevant because our generative AI features on Google Search are rooted in our core Search ranking and quality systems." Its view of the new labels is the same: "optimizing for generative AI search is optimizing for the search experience, and thus still SEO."

The AI features page, last updated 10 December 2025, says it directly. "There are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary." A page has to be indexed and eligible to show in Search with a snippet. Meeting that does not mean Google will show it.

On r/localseo on 6 October 2026, u/keyworddotcom wrote: "You dont have to optimize separately for AI. Google also says its generative features rely on the same core Search fundamentals." u/VillageHomeF, in the same thread: "basically the fundamentals of local SEO people have been doing since before LLMs existed."

What AI Mode is, how it differs from AI Overviews, and which parts of the 15 October 2026 links update are confirmed for Hebrew, is in מצב AI בגוגל.

1. Complete the Business Profile.

Google's local ranking tips say to verify the profile and keep it complete and accurate. "Businesses with complete and accurate info are more likely to show up in local search results." Fill in the address, or the service area if customers do not visit you, the hours, and the category. If the information is wrong, Google says the profile might not show for relevant searches in the area.

Google's generative AI guide says a Business Profile "can help your products and services to be visible in both AI responses and other Google Search results." The AI features page lists "Checking that your Merchant Center and Business Profile information is up-to-date" among the fundamentals that still apply.

In BrightLocal's study of 16 September 2026, google.com, which the study labels Google Business Profile, accounted for 563,272 citations, 28.63% of 1,967,762 citations across ChatGPT, AI Mode and AI Overviews. BrightLocal sells the tracker that collected this, so read it as a vendor's measurement, not as an independent audit.

The test: open the profile. Name, category, hours, address or service area, phone and website are filled in, and the website link opens your site.

2. Use one name, one address, one phone.

Google's representation guidelines: the profile name should be "your business's real-world name, as used consistently on your storefront, website, stationery, and as known to customers." Put the address, the hours and the category in their own fields. The name must not include a phone number, a service, or a location detail that is not part of that real-world name. The address should be precise. The phone should be "a local phone number instead of a central call center helpline number whenever possible," and it should connect to that location.

BrightLocal's advice from the same study covers the copies you do not control: make the address easy to find on the website, and keep the name, address and phone consistent on the other listings. @alexgroberman made the same point on X on 30 September 2026, in a post with 106 likes: the site should say who you are, what you do, where you work and how to contact you, and the work should not replace local SEO. The author sells SEO services.

The test: write down the name, address and phone from the website, the Business Profile and two directories. Any difference is the fix.

3. Ask for reviews, and reply.

Google's local ranking page: "More reviews and positive ratings can help your business's local ranking." Replying "shows that you value their feedback. Positive reviews and helpful replies can help your business stand out." The page does not say how many reviews to collect. This one does not either.

The test: reply to the reviews that have no reply, and ask the next customer who was happy with the job.

4. Publish the service and the price, in text.

Google's AI features page tells site owners to make "important content" available "in textual form," and to make sure structured data matches the text a person can read. A price buried in an image does not meet that.

BrightLocal's study ran 200,875 non-branded prompts across 1,342 locations over 60 days. Of 116,000 domains used as sources, 108,000 were business websites, and business websites accounted for 42% of the 1,967,762 citations. The study's key takeaway puts that domain share at 93%. Its conclusion from the split is to have obvious service pages and to answer the questions clients ask.

We have already published one check of price questions. On the AI search visibility page: on 30 September 2026, every studio named in answers about fixed prices was cited from its own pricing page. Ours are in plain text.

The test: for the job you sell most often, one page names the service, where you do it, and a price or a starting price, in text.

5. Add schema that matches the page, then stop.

Google's local business structured data, last updated 8 September 2026, requires the business name and address if you want to be eligible for a local business rich result. The phone number and price range are recommended, not required. Google does not guarantee the rich result will show.

That markup is not how you get into an AI answer. The generative guide, 10 July 2026: "Structured data isn't required for generative AI search, and there's no special schema.org markup you need to add." Keep using it "as it helps with being eligible for rich results on Google Search." The AI features page says there is no special schema for AI Overviews or AI Mode, and that whatever markup you do add should match the visible text.

The test: the name, address, phone and price in the markup are the same strings as on the page.

6. Let the crawlers read the site.

For AI Overviews and AI Mode, Google's AI features page says a page must be indexed and eligible to show in Search with a snippet. "There are no additional technical requirements." The generative guide adds one Search Console condition: the site "must be included in Search generative AI features in Search Console to be eligible for display in generative AI features on Google Search." Meeting the rules still does not guarantee indexing.

For ChatGPT's search, OpenAI's crawler docs say OAI-SearchBot "is used to surface websites in search results in ChatGPT's search features." A site opted out of that bot "will not be shown in ChatGPT search answers," though it can still appear as a navigational link. OpenAI's help page says placement "is not guaranteed."

ChatGPT can also use a rough location. OpenAI's example: a person who asks for restaurants "near me" from a San Francisco IP address may have the question rewritten as "top restaurants San Francisco." A page that never names the city gives that query little to match. OpenAI says citations can be incomplete or wrong, so the page you want quoted has to say the fact itself.

The test: robots.txt does not block Googlebot or OAI-SearchBot. Search Console shows the page indexed, and the Generative AI performance report is the report Google tells you to use.

Check the answers by hand before you pay for a score.

Google, in the 10 July 2026 guide: "Be wary of third-party tools that promise ranking success or claim to use 'internal' Google metrics. No third-party tool has access to our internal ranking or AI systems." Use the tools if they help the work. Judge them against that page.

On r/localseo on 13 October 2026, u/briankato wrote: "AI visibility tools are flawed by nature. They're a barometer at best, not a source of truth." And: "Track AI mentions if you want, but don't let the tool become the strategy." u/VillageHomeF, on the 6 October thread, went further: "and then there are the visibility tools that are mostly complete scams. most LLMs don't publish citation data so they are making fairly uneducated guesses to rope people into to paying for these tools." That is one practitioner's view. The check that does not depend on it came from u/Popular-Special-7372 in the tools thread: pick 5 to 10 questions a real customer would type, run them with web search on, write down who is named and which sources are cited, and run the set again a week later, "because answers change from day to day." "A score without the answers behind it is hard to check."

BrightLocal's study is why a single run is a weak reading. On repeat runs of the same prompt, the overlap between result sets averaged 20% to 33% (ChatGPT 23%, AI Mode 21%, AI Overviews 33%). A business that appeared once showed up again in about half of later attempts. Google Maps named a tracked business in 66% of searches, against 38% in AI Overviews, 33% in ChatGPT and 32% in AI Mode. Ranking in Maps is not the same as being named.

On r/smallbusiness on 14 October 2026, u/Piper-Bob asked how anyone would get ChatGPT to recommend a business "that didn't involve SEO." u/manuelsp0507 called the work "boring housekeeping, not a new discipline": the business described the same way on the website, the Google profile and the directories, plus a plain page for the questions customers keep asking, and "how did you find us?" on the intake. That last question is check 2 in why your website is not getting leads.

Where Kinetiq fits.

We publish every price in plain text. Measuring search and AI answers, monthly, starts at $2,250 a month under AI search visibility. A citation cannot be guaranteed. If the site is the problem, the one-week audit costs $2,500, ends with a prioritised fix list, and is credited in full if you go on to build. For the call Google can place to ask a business its prices, see Google's AI now calls local businesses for prices.