If you’ve read the news sometime in the last three years, you’re well aware of AI’s rapid proliferation. The burgeoning tech continues to come up across seemingly every platform and software.
What you may not have expected is that AI clients have also become the go-to search engine for many users. While Google still controls the lion’s share of search queries, many businesses now need to consider how they appear in an AI search, or if they’re not appearing at all.
You’ve maybe read our posts or watched our clips about integrating AI into your workplaces and workflows. Now, let’s discuss a few ways financial advisors can make their practices more visible to an AI search.
Adding Locations
Many advisors maintain multiple locations in their cities and communities to better cover their client base. Further still, it’s not uncommon for advisors to have locations across states, or even on both coasts. For advisors with multiple locations, it’s vital for those locations to be discoverable across searches.
If you’re one of these advisors, list each location on a separate page on your website. Keeping all your locations on a single page makes each location more difficult to discover in an AI search, restricting your reach. Multiple contact pages ensures your website is discoverable across all locations — and that people in those locations know you’re there.
Online Presence
Like regular SEO, AI SEO is about promoting your presence and making it more accessible with the right wording. What are prospects searching for? What are they asking for in a search? Who are the prospects that are served by your practice? Considering what appeals to the other side of the screen is integral in crafting an optimized approach.
Highlighting your media appearances, for example, associates your online name with authority and experience. At the same time, it promotes your appearances across websites and platforms; AI search engines prefer these appearances over a number of pages to a single appearance on one site. You become someone with a viewpoint that matters–and therefore a more visible advisor. What may have seemed like repeated and redundant information across different pages of your site in the past could give you a boost in the new reality of AI searches.
FAQs
Adding a page for Frequently Asked Questions might not be on the top of your site priorities. But consider this: when people are asking an AI client about financial advisors, they often phrase their query in question form. “How can I include long-term care in my retirement portfolio?” Having relevant questions which include words clients are actively using can bring your site to the top of a results page.
Your FAQ page doesn’t have to be exhaustive. But it should include questions and answers which would naturally come up in an in-person meeting. Trying to game the system too hard both suppresses your visibility and turns off clients who recognize that you’re not really speaking to them.
You can further benefit from these FAQs by taking specific questions from your dedicated page and repeating them in smaller FAQ sections on other relevant pages throughout your site. Questions covering your breadth of service or target demographics can be included on a home page. More specific questions can find a second home on service or media pages.
Google My Business Profiles
If you haven’t already, or if yours hasn’t been updated in a few years, building out a Google My Business profile solidifies your online presence, creates credibility, and makes you more relevant to an AI search.
From simple facts like your office address and phone number to more personal touches like amenities and appointment policies, your Google My Business profile is often the first image of your office a client sees — and what an AI search might pull up. Having yours updated ensures a search won’t be pulling incorrect or outdated information, or not finding you at all.
For even more tips on integrating AI into your practice, be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel. We post new content every week, with plenty of SEO tips and beyond!
