A growing number of people don't type their searches into Google any more. They ask. They ask ChatGPT, they ask Copilot, they ask the AI summary at the top of a Google results page. And those AI tools give them an answer, not a list of ten links to scroll through.
For local businesses, this shift matters more than most people realise. Here's what's actually happening and what you can do about it.
how AI search is different from traditional search
When you type "plumber Bury" into Google, you get a list of results. You click a few links, compare websites, and make a decision. The businesses on page one are visible. The ones on page three are not.
When someone asks an AI assistant "who's a good plumber in Bury?", they get a short, confident answer. Maybe two or three businesses are mentioned. The AI has synthesised information from across the web and made a recommendation. There's no page two. There's no "also consider". There's just the answer.
Getting into that answer matters. Not being in it means you don't exist for that person at that moment, even if you're the best plumber in the borough.
what AI tools use to make recommendations
AI assistants like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google's AI Overviews and others pull from a range of sources when forming local recommendations:
- Your website: its content, how it describes your services, who you serve and where
- Your Google Business Profile: your name, address, category, reviews, and completeness
- Review platforms: Google reviews, Trustpilot, Yelp, industry-specific directories
- Mentions of your business in articles, blog posts, local directories, and other websites
- Structured data on your website: schema markup that tells AI tools exactly what your business is and does
Businesses that are well-represented across all of these are more likely to be surfaced. Businesses that are poorly documented online, have thin website content, or have few reviews are likely to be invisible in AI-generated answers.
google's ai overviews
Google has been rolling out AI Overviews: a summary answer at the top of search results, generated by AI, that appears before the traditional blue links. For many informational searches, the AI Overview is what users read and act on. The links below it get fewer clicks as a result.
For local searches, Google still shows the map pack prominently. But for questions like "what should I look for in a web designer?" or "how much does an EPC cost in Greater Manchester?", an AI Overview might answer the question entirely. If your website is a source that gets cited in those overviews, that's valuable. If it doesn't, you're invisible to that part of the search experience.
AI search doesn't create a new set of rules. It amplifies the existing ones. The businesses that were well-represented online are the ones that AI tools recommend. The ones that weren't, still aren't.
what you can do now
The good news is that the foundations of being AI-visible are the same as the foundations of being search-visible. You don't need to do something entirely different. You need to do the fundamentals properly:
- A clear, well-written website that describes what you do, who you serve, and where, in plain language that an AI can interpret
- A complete Google Business Profile with accurate categories, up-to-date hours, photos, and regular review responses
- Genuine reviews on Google and other relevant platforms. AI tools weight these heavily
- Schema markup on your website so AI tools understand you're a local business with a specific service area
- Consistent presence in local directories and across the web
Beyond the basics, AI-visible businesses tend to have richer content. Not just a homepage with five bullet points, but pages that actually answer the questions people ask. If someone asks an AI "how does an EPC assessment work?", a business with a detailed FAQ page that answers that question is more likely to be cited than one with a thin services page that just lists the price.
the opportunity is now
Most small businesses haven't adapted to this yet. That's an advantage if you move quickly. Being well-structured, well-reviewed, and well-represented online right now, while your local competitors are still figuring out what AI Overviews even are, means you're ahead of the curve rather than catching up.