How Contractors Can Get Noticed in AI Searches

Meet the moment and avoid getting buried in the avalanche of ChatGPT updates with this guide to AI search marketing strategies for contractors and home services.

You’d finally wrapped your head around the concept of SEO when –

AI showed up and crashed the party.

Now your search traffic is suffering and you’ve got a bunch of new marketing acronyms to learn.

And the pace is mind boggling. 

Only recently, ChatGPT launched an instant checkout feature allowing customers to buy products right from their chats. And sure, you can shrug it off, convince yourself this doesn’t really impact the trades, to which we say…

YET.

How long before customers are asking ChatGPT to source job estimates from multiple companies? Or book service calls? Or select which company to reward the work?

The future is here. This article will help make sure your marketing strategy is ready.

SEO vs. AEO vs. GEO: What’s the difference?

Seeing as each new search advancement brings a new acronym to make sense of, let’s wrap our heads around this alphabet soup of engine optimization, shall we?

SEO - Search Engine Optimization

This remains the trusty old standby of using keywords and other tactics to help your content rank at the top of the results when people use search engines (like Google).

These days the results list tends to be a mix of webpages and videos – basically whatever form of content the search engine determines will be most helpful for the user. 

It’s also dominated by a dedicated section (an AI overview) giving a summary of the answer the user is looking for. This overview is pulled from the online sources the algorithm deems most relevant and trustworthy, and tends to focus on content that is well-structured and concise.

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AEO - Answer Engine Optimization

Whether or not you’ve known it as AEO, you’ve almost definitely encountered it over the last several years. These results could appear as highlighted phrases in the overview (like in the example above) or as direct answers to questions, for example in Google’s “People also ask” section.

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GEO - Generative Engine Optimization

Alright, now for the gorilla of the bunch. (Gorilla Engine Optimization? Nevermind, let’s get down to it.)

GEO comes into play whenever searches are being conducted in AI-driven engines, like ChatGPT, Perplexity, or even an embedded tool within a traditional search engine such as Google’s AI Mode, which uses their Gemini assistant.

In these cases, the responses are generated from online sources and tend to focus on providing detailed, informative answers.

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These solutions function as one-stop-querying, giving the user everything they’re looking for without needing to venture anywhere else… 

Which as we’ll see in a moment is exactly what makes things tough for contractors.

In the meantime, if you want to dig a little deeper into these concepts, this video will make you an expert in less than seven minutes.

How AI has changed contractor marketing

More online searches are being conducted with AI assistants than ever before. According to Datos research, the volume has doubled in the last year. 

AI assistants use large language models (LLMs) to generate conversational responses to prompts and questions, which are impacting contractors’ click-through-rates (CTRs) in various ways:

• AI responses tend to be fairly in-depth, giving answers instead of telling people where to go for answers. In fact, 60% of AI searches yield no clicks at all. That’s right. Zero.
• While AI responses cite sources, those sources aren’t really featured in the way they are in traditional search engine results. (See if you can find the tiny link icon in the images above.)
• The websites that are cited are usually just the very top ranked sites.
• Overviews now take up so much real estate on the results page that even highly ranked pages can’t be found without the user scrolling through two or three screens of other stuff. 

All this to say, it’s more challenging than ever to get noticed. But before you start writing an eulogy for your SEO marketing strategy, it’s worth looking a little closer at this because the challenges are more nuanced than it first appears.

Should you scrap your SEO strategy?

In a word… No! SEO still has a vital role to play in your marketing efforts. While GEO is certainly growing, AI assistants are not taking over yet. Research has shown that customers have embraced both search engines and AI assistants. For now at least, the realm of engine optimization has simply expanded. 

While contractors may experience a drop in their website traffic due to GEO, the quality of the visitors they do get is likely to be much higher because they’re already further along in the funnel – they’ve done their research.

GEO is a developing technology and still has a few quirks to work out. It’s probably best to think of it like adding another tool to your toolbox. You wouldn’t toss out your hammer just cause someone invents a fancier mallet, right?

SEO has been around for a long time because it works. Even according to Google, landing in the coveted overview comes down to mainly one thing: solid SEO.

How to optimize your marketing for AI

All that being said, GEO definitely has a purpose and will only continue to improve over time. Here are four ways to create AI-friendly content and become the cited source in responses.

#1: Create comparative content

Comparative content delves into the contrasts between different methods, features or approaches of products or services, and it tends to perform extremely well in searches.

For example, while researching an upcoming project customers might ask whether it’s better to go with asphalt or paving stone. Another customer might be looking for options on how to upgrade their radiant floor heating.

There’s a huge opportunity in this content arena for home services companies because AI tools currently don’t have a lot of quality content to draw from when generating answers.

Master tip: Video is a really powerful medium for this, as long as you include a transcript for AI to pull from.

#2: Lean into FAQs

You know all those repetitive questions from customers you’re constantly answering? Those are AEO and GEO gold.

To stand out in the AI atmosphere, create content that answers real questions customers have. Don’t worry too much about keywords, just formulate answers that provide genuine value and showcase your expertise on the topic.

Again, these can be posted as videos… just don’t forget the transcripts! Without them, the algorithm will just crawl on by.

#3: Rock your reviews

Reviews and testimonials go a long way towards boosting your legitimacy and helping pull your company up the rankings. AI agents prioritize trades companies with copious glowing reviews.

If this is an area where you’ve been a bit slack, now’s the time to start getting serious about how you’re seen. This episode of Contractor Evolution will teach you The Easy Way to Get More 5-Star Google Reviews.

#4: Keep an eye on AI

If someone asks ChatGPT for the best trades companies in their area, you want your business to be on the top of that list. Every week or two, jump on ChatGPT and ask that very question. If your brand name doesn’t appear, ask it the following questions:

• How did you come up with that list?
• How can I get my company on it?

Nothing beats going straight to the source.

For more tips on how to get a handle on your marketing in today’s AI-driven age, take a look at this video loaded with tips for contractors.

You don’t have to go it alone

If the AI technology tsunami is feeling like a bit more wave than you care to ride, that makes total sense. It is a LOT to stay on top of. 

Fortunately, you don’t have to get drowned by it. Breakthrough Academy has a fantastic community of smart, hard-working contractors who are all finding their way through this together. There’s always room for one more.

In the meantime, stay up to speed with the most in-depth and current thought leadership on business for contractors by subscribing to our YouTube channel, Contractor Evolution.

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