Frequently Asked Questions

Yes. The Founder Audit is built specifically for solo founders - one person running their own website and business, whether you built it yourself with an AI builder (Framer, Webflow, Wix, and similar) or you work with a single developer. It is not scoped for larger teams or enterprise sites.

No. The Founder Audit is a flat $1,500 AUD one-off fee - not a retainer, not a subscription, nothing that renews or bills again automatically. You get a bounded engagement: the audit, the free intro call, a result call plus 3 email exchanges, and a 30-day recheck call, then it's complete. If you want implementation help or ongoing tracking afterward, those are separate, individually-scoped services you choose - not a default add-on you're pushed into.

Your Founder Audit includes:

• Checked website findings against AEO fundamentals
• Dated AI-search observations - 5 AI surfaces × 10 prompts = 50 observations
• A prioritised DIY fix list, ranked by impact
• Builder-specific instructions for whichever platform your site runs on
• Copyable AI prompts you can paste straight into your own AI builder
• A verification checklist to confirm each fix actually worked

See a full worked example at the sample audit.

Yes - that's the intended workflow. Every fix in your audit comes with builder-specific instructions and copyable AI prompts you can paste directly into your own AI website builder to make the change yourself. No developer required for most fixes.

See exactly how this works in the sample audit.

That works too. The prioritised fix list and instructions are written to be handed off, not just DIY'd - you're free to give your audit report to your own developer and have them implement the fixes directly. Nothing in your terms of use restricts you from sharing your own report with your own developer.

$1,500 AUD, flat, one-off - no range, no surprise scoping fee. That price covers:

• A free 30-minute intro call before the audit starts
• The audit itself, delivered by email within 5–7 business days
• A 30-minute result call 2 business days after delivery
• 3 email exchanges within 2 weeks for follow-up questions
• A 30-minute recheck call at 30 days, reviewing what changed against your original 50 observations

There's no ongoing or continuous tracking beyond that.

Your audit includes DIY instructions and the clarification support stated in your package. If you want help implementing changes or checking later work, we agree a separate scope and fee first.

No. The audit is diagnostic and instructional - it tells you exactly what to fix and gives you the DIY instructions and prompts to do it yourself. Implementation help is optional and separately scoped and priced: Help Fixing Your Website Content, Schema Setup Help, Help Fixing Conflicting Business Information, Reusable Website Templates for Solo Founders, and an Implementation Planning Session.

5–7 business days from your intro call to the audit landing in your inbox.

No. No one can guarantee a specific AI mention, citation, or ranking - AI platforms change constantly and no agency controls their outputs. What the Founder Audit gives you is a clear, dated baseline (50 observations across 5 AI surfaces) and a prioritised fix list, so you know exactly what to change and can track movement against that baseline at your 30-day recheck.

You get a 30-minute result call 2 business days after delivery to walk through the findings, up to 3 email exchanges within 2 weeks for follow-up questions, and a 30-minute recheck call at 30 days comparing your site against the original 50 observations.

Beyond that, there's no ongoing or continuous tracking - further check-ins or implementation help are quoted separately.

Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO) is the practice of making your business visible, citable, and recommendable in AI-generated answers. While traditional SEO targets keyword rankings on Google, AEO targets the AI systems answering customer questions directly - ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, and Grok.

AEO involves four core areas: entity clarity, schema markup, answer-format content, and citation consistency. Together they tell AI systems who you are, what you do, and why they should recommend you.

SEO optimises for keyword rankings in traditional search results. AEO optimises for AI-generated recommendations and citations. AEO focuses on machine-readable structured data, entity clarity, and answer-format content that AI systems can extract and cite directly.

A business can rank well on Google but be completely invisible in AI answers - and increasingly, AI answers are where buyers make decisions. AEO and SEO are complementary, but they require different strategies.

AISearch Global's AEO work targets six AI platforms: ChatGPT (OpenAI), Google AI Overviews, Gemini (Google), Perplexity AI, Claude (Anthropic), and Grok (xAI). Each platform has distinct citation behaviour, but a strong AEO foundation improves visibility across all of them.

Entity clarity is the degree to which AI systems can unambiguously identify your business - who you are, what you do, where you operate, and who you serve. It requires your business name, address, suburb, service description, and contact details to be identical across your website, Google Maps, Facebook, industry directories, and all external listings.

One inconsistency creates doubt. AI systems move on when they are uncertain. Entity clarity is Layer 1 of the AEO Traction Stack - and it is the fastest, highest-impact thing most businesses can fix.

Citation consistency is the practice of ensuring your business information matches across all external sources - directories, review platforms, social media profiles, local listings, and industry databases. AI systems cross-check your business against these sources.

When information matches consistently across the sources that reference your business, AI systems treat it as more verified and trustworthy. Inconsistencies - even small differences like "Pty Ltd" vs "Pty. Ltd." - reduce AI confidence and recommendation likelihood. This is Layer 4 of the AEO Traction Stack.

Both. The foundation - entity clarity, schema markup, and initial content restructuring - is a one-time setup that typically takes 4–8 weeks. Citation consistency and content expansion are ongoing and compound over time.

AI platforms also update their citation logic regularly, which means periodic reviews are valuable. Most businesses complete the foundation once and run a light maintenance check every 6–12 months.

The simplest way: ask directly. Open ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, or Claude and type queries your customers would ask - for example, "best emergency plumber in Parramatta" or "who is a trusted mortgage broker in Melbourne?" If your business does not appear, you have an AEO gap.

The free AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator grades 20 signals - including the 3 Princeton GEO content tactics - linked to AI visibility. The Founder Audit goes deeper, recording dated AI-search observations across 5 surfaces and 10 prompts.

If your customers use AI assistants to find services or make buying decisions, yes. AEO is particularly valuable for local businesses, service providers, professional services (legal, medical, financial), trades, and any business where trust and recommendation drive conversions.

The earlier you invest in AEO, the harder your position becomes to displace - competitors who start later will find it increasingly difficult to catch up. Use the free AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator to see where you stand.

Yes - AEO and GEO describe the same practice with different terminology. GEO (Generative Engine Optimisation) is the academic term from the peer-reviewed Princeton University GEO study (Aggarwal et al., KDD 2024) - the first rigorous study of its kind, tested across 10,000 queries. It found three tactics that boost AI citation visibility by 30–40%: adding statistics, citing credible sources, and including direct quotations. Keyword stuffing actively hurt AI citation rates. AEO is the more common industry term used in Australia. The goal is identical: being found, cited, and recommended in AI-generated answers.

A zero-click search is a query where the user gets their answer directly on the results page - without clicking any link. Google AI Overviews (appearing in approximately 1 in 4 Google searches, according to Conductor's Q1 2026 benchmark of 21.9 million queries) are the dominant form of zero-click results.

For businesses, this means ranking on page one is no longer enough. If an AI system answers the question before the user clicks, you need to be the answer cited in that AI response. AEO directly addresses this shift by making your content extractable and citable before any click occurs.

AEO works by making your business machine-readable so AI systems can extract, verify, and cite it with confidence. AI assistants crawl your website and cross-reference it against structured data (schema markup), your Google Business Profile, directories, and social profiles. Where your entity signals are consistent and your content directly answers likely customer questions, the AI system has enough confidence to name and recommend your business in its response.

This is why AEO works through the four layers of the AEO Traction Stack: entity clarity and schema markup make you findable and verifiable; answer-format content and citation consistency make you citable.

Yes - AEO (Answer Engine Optimisation) and GEO (Generative Engine Optimisation) refer to the same discipline: getting a business found, cited, and recommended in AI-generated answers. GEO is the term used in the peer-reviewed Princeton study that first measured it; AEO is the term more commonly used in the Australian industry. Same goal, different label.

AEO stands for Answer Engine Optimisation - the practice of structuring a business's online presence so AI answer engines (ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, and Grok) can find, understand, and cite it directly in their responses. In this context, AEO has no connection to unrelated uses of the same acronym in other industries, such as customs or finance.

No - AEO and SEO are complementary, not competing. SEO still determines whether your website ranks and gets crawled in the first place; AEO determines whether AI systems can extract, trust, and cite what's on that website once they find it. As AI Overviews and chat assistants absorb more zero-click search volume, AEO becomes the larger share of the visibility work - but a site with no SEO foundation has nothing for AEO to build on.

The realistic shift: budgets are moving from pure keyword-ranking SEO toward AEO-informed content and structured data, not away from search optimisation altogether.

AISearch Global is Australia's pure-play Answer Engine Optimisation (AEO) consultancy, based in Sydney. We help Australian businesses get found, cited, and recommended in AI-generated answers across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, and Grok.

Unlike generalist agencies with AEO bolted on, AEO is the only thing we do - that specialisation means faster results and deeper expertise.

AISearch Global is based in Sydney, Australia, and works with Australian businesses nationally - Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, and beyond. All AEO work is remote and does not require on-site visits.

AISearch Global does one thing: Answer Engine Optimisation. Most Australian businesses offering AEO are generalist agencies with AEO added as a service line - split across SEO, paid media, social, and web design.

AISearch Global's entire methodology, toolset, and focus is built around AI visibility. That specialisation means we go deeper, move faster, and stay ahead as AI platforms evolve.

AISearch Global works across trades (plumbing, roofing, electrical, construction), professional services (legal, accounting, financial advice, mortgage broking), healthcare and allied health, real estate, e-commerce, SaaS and technology, education and coaching, hospitality, and personal brands.

The AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator supports 14 industry categories. AEO principles are universal - implementation details are industry-specific.

Yes - AISearch Global's work is with solo founders and small Australian businesses. Small businesses have a structural advantage in AEO: they operate in specific locations and serve specific customer types, which makes entity clarity faster to achieve than for large national brands.

The Founder Audit, priced at a flat $1,500 AUD, is built with solo-founder budgets in mind.

Use the contact form at aisearch.global/#contact. You can also connect on LinkedIn or Instagram.

These are two different things:

• AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator (free) - 30 seconds. Grades 20 signals (17 structural AEO + 3 Princeton GEO content signals) on your live website. Gives you a score out of 100 and your single highest-impact fix. No email required. Run it here.
• Founder Audit ($1,500 AUD, flat, one-off) - Checked website findings, 50 dated AI-search observations across 5 AI surfaces and 10 prompts, and a prioritised DIY fix list with builder-specific instructions and copyable AI prompts. See a sample audit.

The AEO Score Calculator tells you where you stand. The Founder Audit tells you exactly what to fix - and how to fix it yourself.

The AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator is a free tool that fetches your live website and analyses 20 signals - 17 structural AEO signals plus 3 Princeton GEO peer-reviewed content signals - to produce an instant AI visibility score out of 100. You get a grade from A+ to F, an AI snapshot of how AI systems currently see your site, an AI recommendation likelihood score, and your single highest-impact fix.

No email address is required. Results are instant.

The AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator analyses 20 signals across two groups:

• 17 Structural AEO Signals: title tag, meta description, H1 heading, heading structure, JSON-LD schema markup, FAQ content, About page, contact information, word count, Open Graph tags, social entity links, reviews and testimonials, HTTPS, sitemap.xml, robots.txt, industry keyword relevance, location signals
• 3 Princeton GEO Peer-Reviewed Content Signals: statistics and data points, source citations, quotations - based on the Aggarwal et al. KDD 2024 study showing these tactics lift AI citation visibility by 30–40%

The check is industry-specific across 14 categories.

The score (0–100) represents how well your website is structured for AI discoverability:

• A+ (90–100) - Excellent. Strong AI citation candidate.
• A (80–89) - Strong. A few gaps to close.
• B (65–79) - Good foundation. Meaningful improvement available.
• C (50–64) - Needs work. Several key signals missing.
• D (35–49) - Significant gaps. AI systems struggle to identify you.
• F (below 35) - Major gaps. Unlikely to appear in AI answers.

The score reflects machine-readability and entity clarity - not your Google ranking.

Yes - completely free. No account, no email, no credit card. Available at aisearch.global/aeo-score-calculator. For a full analysis with a prioritised DIY fix list, see the Founder Audit.

Run the AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator after any significant change to your website - a redesign, new service pages, schema markup added, or contact details updated. As a baseline cadence, every 3 months is reasonable. The calculator reflects your live site, so any improvement you make will show in the next run.

The calculator shows your single highest-impact fix. For most low-scoring sites, the top issues are:

• Missing schema markup - add JSON-LD structured data (LocalBusiness, Service, FAQPage)
• No FAQ content - add a FAQ section answering 5–10 customer questions
• Inconsistent entity signals - check your business name and address match across Google Maps, Facebook, and directories

These three actions address the majority of low scores. For a full prioritised DIY fix list, the Founder Audit shows you exactly what to fix and how.

The most direct measure: ask AI platforms manually. Open ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Claude and type the queries your customers would ask. Compare results before and after implementation.

Re-running the AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator every 90 days tracks score improvement. The Founder Audit gives you a dated baseline of 50 AI-search observations across 5 surfaces, which you can compare against at your 30-day recheck call.

The AEO Traction Stack is AISearch Global's four-layer framework for building AI visibility systematically. Layer 1: Entity Clarity - consistent business identity everywhere. Layer 2: Schema Markup - structured data AI can read. Layer 3: Answer-Format Content - pages that directly answer customer questions. Layer 4: Citation Consistency - matching information across all external sources.

Layers 1 and 2 account for 80% of measurable AEO improvement. Most businesses skip them and go straight to content - that's why they don't see results.

Start with Entity Clarity - check your business name, address, suburb, and service description are identical across your website, Google Maps, Facebook, and industry directories. Then add JSON-LD schema markup to your homepage and key service pages.

Use the free AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator first to see your current score and single highest-impact fix - it takes 30 seconds.

Most businesses see meaningful AI visibility improvement within 8–12 weeks when all four AEO Traction Stack layers are implemented. Entity clarity and schema markup take 1–4 weeks. Answer-format content takes 3–6 weeks. Citation consistency builds over 3–6 months and compounds over time.

Yes. Schema markup (JSON-LD structured data) is Layer 2 of the AEO Traction Stack. Without it, AI systems must guess what your information means. With it, you tell them directly: your business type, location, services, and contact details - no interpretation required.

The most important schema types for small businesses: LocalBusiness or ProfessionalService, Service, FAQPage, BreadcrumbList, and Organization.

AI systems are built to answer questions. FAQ pages are the most direct form of answer-format content - they present questions and answers in a structure AI can extract and cite verbatim. A FAQ section with FAQPage JSON-LD schema is one of the highest-impact content changes you can make for AEO.

Each FAQ question should directly answer something a customer would ask an AI assistant - not marketing copy, but genuine answers with specific detail.

Social profiles are citation consistency signals. AI systems cross-reference your business across LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and industry platforms. Consistent business name, description, location, and contact details across all profiles increases AI confidence in your entity.

They also appear in the sameAs property of your Organization schema - telling AI systems these profiles belong to the same business entity as your website.

Yes - but only if structured correctly. Generic blog posts written for keyword rankings have limited AEO value. Articles that directly answer specific customer questions, use clear headings, include FAQ sections with schema markup, and are written with answer-format structure are highly citable.

Quality and answer-specificity matter far more than volume. One well-structured article that directly answers a real customer question is worth more than ten generic posts.

Yes - the foundational work (entity clarity, basic schema markup, FAQ content) can be done by a business owner with guidance. Use the free AISearch Global AEO Score Calculator to see your score and read the AEO Traction Stack framework for the implementation sequence.

The Founder Audit is for solo founders who want a complete, prioritised DIY fix list without having to research and diagnose it themselves - and for founders where a competitor is already appearing in AI answers and they are not.

AI systems evaluate your entire web presence as a coherent whole. Key factors:

• Entity clarity - consistent business name, location, and service everywhere
• Structured data - JSON-LD schema markup AI can read directly
• Answer-format content - pages that directly answer customer questions
• Cross-source consistency - information matching across directories, review platforms, and social profiles

AI systems recommend businesses that are clear, consistent, and well-structured - not necessarily the largest or most established. Read more: How AI decides which businesses to recommend.

Google AI Overviews are AI-generated summaries that appear at the top of Google search results for many queries - especially informational and local service queries. They draw from Google's Knowledge Graph, structured data on your website, and high-authority web sources.

AEO - particularly schema markup, entity clarity, and FAQ content - directly improves the likelihood of your business being cited in AI Overviews.

ChatGPT draws recommendations from its training data and real-time web browsing. To improve your likelihood:

• Ensure entity signals are consistent across your website, Google Maps, and directories
• Add structured data (schema markup) to your key pages
• Build content that directly answers the questions your customers ask
• Get cited on authoritative external sources - industry directories, review platforms, PR mentions, and Reddit and Quora threads

The more sources that consistently describe your business the same way, the more confident ChatGPT becomes in recommending you.

Yes - significantly. Google Business Profile (GBP) is one of the highest-weight entity signals for Google AI Overviews and Gemini. A verified, complete, and active GBP tells Google's AI systems your business is real, trusted, and current.

Ensure your GBP business name, category, address, hours, and description exactly match your website. Consistent reviews, regular posts, and up-to-date photos all contribute. For local businesses, GBP optimisation is often the single fastest AEO win available.

Yes - more than most businesses realise. Reddit has become one of the most cited sources in AI-generated answers - a 2025 analysis of over 150,000 LLM citations found Reddit present in approximately 40% of responses across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Claude. Quora also ranks among the top cited platforms.

AI systems treat authentic community answers as high-trust sources. Genuine participation in relevant Reddit communities (r/smallbusiness, r/AusFinance, industry subreddits) and substantive Quora answers builds citation signals that directly complement your website's AEO work.

E-E-A-T stands for Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness - Google's framework for evaluating content quality, and the same qualities AI systems use to decide what to cite.

For AEO, E-E-A-T signals include: named authors with professional credentials, first-person case studies, specific data and statistics, external citations from authoritative sources, and a clear business entity with verifiable contact details. High E-E-A-T content is significantly more likely to be cited by AI systems than generic, unsigned content.

Topical authority is the degree to which AI systems consider your website a trusted, comprehensive source on a specific subject. It is built by covering a topic depth-first - multiple interlinked articles on related subtopics - rather than creating isolated posts.

Build it with a content hub: a pillar page on your core topic (like the AEO Traction Stack) with supporting articles that address specific sub-questions. This signals to AI systems that your site is the authoritative source, not just a passing mention.

Perplexity actively searches the web in real-time - unlike ChatGPT which draws primarily from training data. To get cited:

• Ensure your website loads fast and is crawlable
• Include direct factual answers near the top of key pages - Perplexity favours pages that lead with answers, not pages that bury them
• Get listed in industry directories and review platforms Perplexity frequently indexes
• Create content around the specific questions your customers ask

Freshness and crawlability matter more for Perplexity than for other AI platforms. An updated, fast-loading page will outrank an older authoritative one.

Work through the AEO Traction Stack in order: (1) fix entity clarity - make your business name, address, and service description identical everywhere; (2) add JSON-LD schema markup to your homepage and key pages; (3) restructure content into answer-format - FAQ sections, direct answers near the top of pages, clear headings; (4) build citation consistency across directories, review platforms, and social profiles.

Run the free AEO Score Calculator first to see which layer needs attention most.

Optimising for AEO means removing every point of ambiguity between your business and the AI systems evaluating it. In practice: use consistent NAP (name, address, phone) details everywhere, mark up your pages with schema (Organization, LocalBusiness or ProfessionalService, Service, FAQPage), write content that leads with a direct answer before explanation, and back claims with statistics, sources, and quotations - the three tactics the Princeton GEO study found increase AI citation rates by 30–40%.

Once the foundation - entity clarity and schema markup - is in place, AEO improves through ongoing work: expanding answer-format content around the specific questions your customers ask, tightening citation consistency across new directories and platforms as your business grows, and re-testing your visibility every 90 days with the free AEO Score Calculator to catch drift before a competitor closes the gap.

Professionally, AEO is done in three stages: diagnose, prioritise, implement. First, test how a business currently appears across AI platforms and audit its entity signals, schema, and content against the AEO Traction Stack. Second, prioritise fixes by impact - entity clarity and schema markup first, since they account for roughly 80% of measurable improvement. Third, implement and re-test. AISearch Global's Founder Audit delivers this as a prioritised DIY fix list with builder-specific instructions; businesses with the time and technical ability can also work through it themselves using the Traction Stack framework.

Yes - and it works particularly well. Trades businesses operate in specific suburbs and serve specific customer types, which makes entity clarity fast to achieve. Customers frequently ask AI assistants for local trade recommendations - "emergency plumber in Parramatta", "roof repair in Castle Hill", "electrician near me open now."

Businesses with clear entity signals, LocalBusiness schema, location-specific service pages, and FAQ content covering common trade questions get cited in these answers consistently.

Yes - and trust signals are especially important. AI systems treat professional service recommendations with higher scrutiny. ProfessionalService, MedicalBusiness, and LegalService schema markup, professional association citations, review platform presence, and FAQ content covering common client questions all drive recommendation likelihood.

The AEO Score Calculator supports Healthcare, Legal Services, and Finance as distinct industry categories with industry-specific signal analysis.

Yes - local businesses are among the biggest AEO beneficiaries. AI assistants are widely used for local service discovery. A local business with strong entity clarity, a verified Google Business Profile, consistent NAP (name, address, phone) across directories, and LocalBusiness schema is well-positioned to be cited for suburb-specific AI queries.

This is a significant early-mover opportunity - most local Australian businesses have not yet optimised for AI search.

Yes. For e-commerce, AEO focuses on Product, Offer, Review, and AggregateRating schema, brand entity clarity, and answer-format content covering product comparisons, buying guides, and "best X for Y" queries.

E-commerce businesses that appear in AI-generated buying recommendations gain a significant traffic and conversion advantage over competitors that do not.

Yes. Personal brands benefit from Person schema markup, consistent bios across LinkedIn, website, and media mentions, and answer-format content that directly addresses the questions their audience asks AI assistants.

Coaches and consultants who build a clear entity signal - what they specialise in, who they help, where they are based - are far more likely to be recommended when AI systems answer relevant queries like "best executive coach in Sydney" or "AEO consultant in Australia."