5 Things Your Website Needs Before AI Will Recommend You

AI will not recommend a business it cannot understand. Full stop.

I look at local business websites every single day. Across Hitchin, Letchworth, Baldock, all over North Hertfordshire. And most of them are basically invisible to ChatGPT. Not because they're bad websites. Because they're missing a few fundamental things that AI needs before it'll stick its neck out and name you.

Here are the five that matter.

1. FAQs that match what people actually ask

This one drives me mad because it's so easy to do and almost nobody does it properly.

AI tools exist to answer questions. That's literally the whole point. So if your website already has those same questions written on it, with clear answers underneath, the AI can just grab your content and cite you. Simple.

The trick is using real questions. Not marketing questions like "Why are we the best?". Actual questions your customers ring you up and ask. How much does it cost. Do you cover my area. How long does the job take. What's included.

I worked with a plumber in Hitchin last year who added twelve FAQs to his service pages. Proper questions, proper answers. Within about three weeks his business started appearing in ChatGPT results for local plumbing queries. I won't pretend that always happens that fast. But it happened.

2. Service descriptions that actually say something

"We offer a wide range of services to suit your needs."

That sentence is on about ten thousand websites and it tells AI absolutely nothing. Worse than nothing, really, because the AI just skips right past it and moves on to someone who bothered to be specific.

Compare that with: "We install and repair combi boilers for homes across Hitchin, Letchworth, and Baldock. Most jobs completed same day."

See the difference? One gives AI everything it needs. The other gives it bugger all.

Be specific about what you do. Be specific about where you do it. Be specific about how you do it. AI rewards specificity because specificity is useful to the person asking the question.

3. Named location coverage

This is the one that catches people out. AI will not guess your service area. It can't and it won't.

If someone asks "who's the best electrician in Royston?" and your website never mentions Royston, you're invisible for that search. Doesn't matter how good you are. Doesn't matter if you've worked in Royston for twenty years. If the word isn't on your site, the AI doesn't know.

List every town you serve. Mention North Hertfordshire by name. Mention Hitchin, Letchworth Garden City, Baldock, Royston, Stevenage, Knebworth. Put them on your homepage, your service pages, your about page, your footer. It feels repetitive. It works.

4. Proof that you're actually good

AI needs evidence before it recommends anyone. Would you recommend someone you know nothing about? Neither will ChatGPT.

Case studies are gold. Describe a real project. What the customer needed, what you did, how it went. Even one decent case study puts you miles ahead of competitors who have none.

Testimonials help too, but only if they say something useful. "Great job, thanks!" doesn't give AI much to work with. "Fixed our leaking roof in Stevenage within 24 hours, brilliant communication throughout" gives it loads.

I spoke to a landscaper in Stevenage a few months back. Nice bloke, good at his job. His website had zero proof content. No case studies, no testimonials, no photos of finished work. Just a phone number and a list of services. AI had no reason to recommend him, and it didn't.

5. Consistent business information everywhere

Your business name, phone number, and description need to match across your website, Google Business Profile, Yell, Checkatrade, Facebook, everywhere.

If one place says "North Herts Plumbing" and another says "North Hertfordshire Plumbing Services Ltd", AI gets confused. It can't tell if these are the same business. And confused AI doesn't recommend anyone.

Boring to fix. I know. But this is one of the biggest AEO mistakes local businesses make, and probably the easiest to sort out once you sit down and do it.

That's your foundation

Without these five things, AI will keep recommending someone else. With them, you give ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity what they need to name your business when someone asks.

None of this is complicated. It's just work that most people haven't done yet. Which, honestly, is the opportunity.

If you want help putting all of this in place properly, book a call and we'll audit your site and build your AEO system for North Hertfordshire.