Improve Your Visibility in AI-Powered Search

Maple Street CPA's practice manager has been looking at the firm's website drafts. The homepage draft explains its services more clearly. The monthly accounting and advisory draft answers questions that the old wording left unanswered. The team has also planned better links, started reviewing an existing tax article and identified professional details that need checking.

A colleague asks her a new question:

“If someone asks an AI tool to suggest an accounting firm in Charlotte, will it know what we do?”

She opens the firm’s published homepage. Its broad introduction says little about the regular reporting and ongoing support the firm wants to grow. The clearer wording is still in the team’s drafts. A search tool looking at public pages cannot read those private drafts.

Before chasing an AI recommendation, Maple Street has a more useful job: make its real services easy for people to discover, understand and check.

People can now ask longer questions in places such as Google AI Overviews, Google AI Mode and ChatGPT search. Instead of only seeing a list of links, they may also see an AI-written answer with links to supporting information.

For example, a business owner might ask:

“I run a growing business in Charlotte. What's the difference between a bookkeeper and an accounting firm that helps with monthly reporting?”

That's different from typing just accountant Charlotte. The person wants to understand a service before choosing a provider.

These tools do not all work in the same way. Google's AI search features use Google's Search systems and can show links to relevant indexed pages. ChatGPT search has its own way of finding and presenting web information. A useful page might be found by one system and not another. An AI answer can also misunderstand a detail or leave out a business altogether.

An AI mention is not a booking, and one missing mention is not proof of a website problem. We need to check what the tool actually showed, where its information came from and whether it was accurate.

The practice manager compares the published homepage with the proposed homepage and checks the status of the advisory draft. She asks a straightforward question: Which information can a stranger actually find on the live website?

The firm really does offer monthly bookkeeping and accounting support, regular financial reporting and advisory conversations. But the homepage's general wording does not explain all of that clearly. Some details may be elsewhere on the website, but the rest of the page inventory has not yet been checked.

The practice manager does not assume that the draft homepage or advisory page has been published or indexed. She also doesn't fill gaps with claims about payroll, staff licences or five-star reviews. Those details still require proof.

Try sorting the information she has collected.

A useful distinction emerges. Something can be true about a business without being clearly available on its public website. And something can sound convincing without being true at all. Before improving AI visibility, get those two questions straight.

Most of the work is familiar from earlier lessons, but now we have a reason to check it from the perspective of AI-powered search.

1. Make an important page accessible. A useful page needs to be published and available to visitors. For Google’s AI Overviews and AI Mode, a page must be indexed and eligible to appear with a search snippet to be considered as a supporting link. This does not guarantee inclusion. If you don't know the indexing status, use the checks from Lesson 10 rather than guessing.

2. Explain your real services in clear words. If the firm provides monthly reporting, explain what that involves and who it suits. Don't create a new page for every slightly different way someone might ask the same question. The homepage should introduce the practice; a dedicated service page should explain a specific service.

3. Use reliable, checkable information. Make business details, service descriptions and professional information accurate. For important financial guidance, ensure a suitably qualified person reviews the facts and dates. Do not turn a proposed claim into a published fact just because an AI tool might repeat it.

4. Make related pages easy to reach. Clear navigation and useful links help people, and can help search systems discover relevant published pages. Maple Street has planned links to its advisory service page, but it will add them only when the destination is live and checked.

You might hear that every business needs an “AI SEO file,” special AI schema or hundreds of question pages. Google does not require those things for AI Overviews or AI Mode. Ordinary, helpful SEO work is still the foundation.

A separate check for ChatGPT search

If ChatGPT search is relevant to your firm, a website specialist can check whether its search crawler is permitted to access your public pages. OpenAI calls that crawler OAI-SearchBot. It is different from GPTBot, which is associated with model training. Allowing a site to be discovered in ChatGPT search is not the same decision as allowing content to be used for training.

You don't need to change technical crawler settings yourself to complete this lesson. First check whether the relevant pages are published, accurate and reachable. If a crawler setting needs reviewing, ask whoever manages your website to confirm the current rules and your firm's preferences. Access does not guarantee an AI recommendation.

The practice manager wants to know whether people can find accurate information, not whether she can make an AI tool say the firm's name once.

She chooses a question a suitable client might really ask. She will record which tool she used, the question, the date, what appeared and any source links. Then she will check the claims against the firm's real services and published pages.

The following situations use fictional search results. Choose the most useful response in each case.

One result can change between searches or differ by location, wording or tool. A note from a single test is a useful observation, not a ranking score or proof that a platform will recommend the firm consistently.

And a cited link deserves a closer look. Does it actually support the sentence beside it? Is the article still accurate? If an AI answer says the firm offers something it doesn't, the firm should inspect the source and correct any misleading public information it controls. It should not invent the missing service to fit the answer.

Think back to the service and clients you chose earlier. Your priority might be business tax preparation, bookkeeping, monthly accounting, advisory or something else your firm actually provides.

Choose one realistic client question about that service. For example: “What does ongoing bookkeeping support include for a small business?” Start with a published page if you have one. If your best explanation is still a draft, record that honestly and make publication and review part of your next steps. If you have no website yet, you can still write the client question and the facts a future page should explain.

If you can use a search-enabled AI tool, note the tool, the date and what it actually showed. Check the source links rather than relying on the answer alone. Don't enter private client records or confidential financial details into the tool or workbook. If you haven't run a check, choose Not checked yet; that's a useful starting point too.

The aim isn't to collect mentions for the sake of a score. It's to find a useful, verifiable next action: perhaps clarify a service description, check a published article, fix an access issue or confirm a business detail before making it public.

Maple Street has not claimed any rankings, AI mentions or recommendations. The practice manager can see that the current homepage undersells its ongoing work, while the stronger pages are still drafts. She will get the business facts and enquiry route checked before approving publication, and then check what its published website actually communicates.

You now have a repeatable habit: ask a real client question, inspect the public evidence, verify the answer and choose an improvement you can support.

Next, you’ll check that a prospective client who understands your services can take a clear, safe next step.