SEO is getting you found on Google — the ten blue links and the map results. "The AI stuff" is getting you named when someone asks ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, or Claude who to call instead. They used to be separate jobs. Increasingly they're the same job, because the same homeowner asks both.
Why does this matter more than it used to?
Google now answers a lot of questions above the links, and a growing number of homeowners skip Google entirely and ask an AI assistant directly. An AI assistant doesn't give someone ten options to scroll through — it names two or three businesses and stops. There's no page two to rank on. Being one of the businesses it names is worth more than being the eleventh Google result, and it takes different work to earn.
Do I need to understand the terminology?
No. You'll sometimes see this broken into a handful of three-letter industry terms — if you want the plain-English translation of each, see the three-letter terms, translated on the how it works page. You'll never need the terms to work with us. What you'll see is a weekly check of where you actually stand across Google and the four AI engines, in plain language.