Ranked in the links, and named in the answer
Search stopped being ten blue links. A growing share of people asking about your service get an answer without ever seeing a website, and the businesses named in that answer are winning work from businesses that still rank fine.
Proof
“Mike has been a blessing for our marketing efforts. He has helped us show up when people are searching for us, and even has us showing up for AI results.”
The Work
- Local rankings. Google Business Profile, the map pack, service areas, reviews, citation cleanup.
- Technical. Speed, crawl issues, broken redirects, the structural problems that cap everything else.
- Content that answers. Pages built around what people actually type, not a keyword volume export.
- Structured data. The markup that tells a search engine plainly what you do and where.
- Reporting you can read. What moved, what did not, what I am doing next. One page.
On AI Search
I have run AI content further than the people selling it to you
Most agencies pitching AI content have run it across a handful of blog posts. I built a publishing pipeline and pushed it to full novel length, repeatedly, on my own money, specifically to find where it falls apart.
It falls apart in ways that matter to you. Quality sags rather than collapsing, so nobody notices until forty pages sound identical. Left alone it writes the most average version of any topic, which is precisely how a service page ends up indistinguishable from two hundred others. And it cannot know the things that actually make a local page win, because those live in your head and nowhere else.
So I use it where it earns its place: research, first drafts, structured data, the tedious middle of a technical audit. I will not fill your site with generated pages.
Asked Often
How long does SEO take to work?
Technical fixes can move rankings within a few weeks. Local rankings in a competitive market usually take three to six months. Anyone promising page one by next month is either guessing or about to get your site penalised.
What is the difference between SEO, GEO and AEO?
SEO gets you ranked in a list of links. GEO, generative engine optimisation, gets you named inside an AI-generated answer. AEO, answer engine optimisation, targets featured snippets and voice results. They overlap, but the tactics differ.
Can you actually influence what an AI says about my business?
You cannot control it any more than you control Google. You can make yourself the easiest business to quote accurately, with clear claims and clean structured data, which turns out to be most of the battle.
Is GEO real or is it just a buzzword?
Both, a bit. The acronyms are marketing. The shift underneath them is not, and you can watch it happening in your own search behaviour.
How would I know if it worked?
You ask the assistants the questions your customers ask and see whether you are named. I do that on a schedule and show you the before and after.
How much does SEO cost for a small business?
It depends on the state of the site and how competitive the area is. I quote a real number after looking at it rather than selling a package tier.
Do you require a long contract?
No. There is no minimum term. If the work is not paying for itself you should be able to stop.
Can you do SEO for HVAC and home services companies?
Yes, that is most of what I do. I plan digital strategy for home services brands at an agency by day, which means HVAC, plumbing and outdoor power equipment are the verticals I know best.