Why Google Will Win the AI Search Race

and other local SEO insights

April 22, 2025

Hello,

Local SEO thoughts and opinions inbound šŸ‘‡ļø

1. My 5 most favorite tips as a local SEO oldhead šŸ‘“ 

1. Change your primary category seasonally, especially if your business offers different products or services in the summer vs. winter.

For example, if you have an HVAC business, you can set your primary category to ā€œAir conditioning contractorā€ in the summer, and ā€œHeating contractorā€ in the winter.

2. If you donā€™t sell products, add your services to the Products section of your Google Business Profile.

The Products section is so prominent, it would be a shame not to utilize its visibility.

3. Put emojis in the titles of your Services to make them stand out on your Profile and in search šŸš—šŸ’Ø

The service titles are often shown in ā€œProvidesā€ justifications, so when you are the only business that jazzed up your titles with emojis, you draw in the eyes and the clicks.

4. If you want a question in your Q&A to be featured in your Knowledge Panel, get at least 3 people to upvote it.

You can also change your featured question seasonally by downvoting the old one and upvoting the new one.

Take advantage of this now, because it looks like Google will be dropping the Q&A feature soon.

5. If you want to make a change to your information without getting suspended, get a few of your friends to click ā€œSuggest an editā€ and make the change for you.

An even easier solution is to use Whitesparkā€™s $1/mo Local Platform and not bother your friends. Iā€™d choose that option.

2. ā€œI donā€™t want to ask for reviews because what if I get a negative review?

My response: ā€œIf you ask every customer for a review, your ratio of positive to negative reviews should be at least 30 to 1. If you never ask, you can expect to only get reviews when people are unhappy.ā€

Google has really cranked up the importance of review recency and continuous influx of reviews, so donā€™t be afraid of a couple negative reviews. Ask away!

People shared some interesting personal experiences on the topic - read them in my LinkedIn comments.

3. Google will win the AI search race

Thereā€™s a lot of talk about Google losing market share to ChatGPT and other LLMs, but Iā€™m confident that Google will win the AI search race, particularly with local search.

AI is the future of local search, and Google has a massive advantage thanks to the millions of Google Business Profiles worldwide.

Other LLMs have to use ā€œgarbageā€ data sources for their local results: Yelp, Facebook, TripAdvisor, etc. But these data sources are not nearly as rich, relevant, or freshly updated as Googleā€™s. I mean, when was the last time you left a review on Yelp or even used it to look up a restaurant?

Google already owns most of the search market, and now theyā€™re actively injecting Gemini into search results šŸ‘‡ļø

Keyword search will soon be replaced with conversational AI search, so optimizing and regularly updating your Google Business Profile is going to remain super important - especially if you want to rank high in Googleā€™s AI-driven results.

The future looks bright for Local SEO! šŸ˜Ž

Join the AI discussion on Facebook.

4. You have acquired a business and need to rebrand it

How do you transition the Google Business Profile without getting it suspended?

Do not create a new Google Business Profile and mark the old one as closed. This is what Google would suggest you do, but this will mean losing all the reviews and starting from scratch with your local SEO.

Hereā€™s what you should do instead šŸ‘‡ļø

1. You need to update the web BEFORE you update your Profile.

This way, when you make the updates, Google's automated checking system will be like "that tracks", and you will be less likely to trigger re-verification or suspension.

Make sure you update these key data sources first:

  • The NAP info on the webpage that the current GBP is linking to - you'll likely need to ask the current business owner to do this for you.

  • Facebook page for the location

  • BBB listing

  • Yelp listing

  • Foursquare listing

  • Data Axle

  • Any prominent industry sites like Home Advisor if it's a home services business

Once you've got those updated, now you can update the Google Business Profile.

2. You need to get ownership of the existing Profile.

Ask the old owner to add your Google account as an owner (not Manager) of the Profile.

3. Once you have access, you can make changes to the Profile, but be careful.

Too many changes too quickly may trigger re-verification or possibly suspension. Space out edits of sensitive fields one per week.

Ideally, you will keep the phone and address the same, and the only changes will be the name/brand and website URL.

āš ļø A name change usually doesn't trigger a re-verification.

āš ļø A phone number change usually does trigger a re-verification.

You'll likely also want to update the website URL. Make a page on the site for the new location, and then update the website field in Google Business Profile to point to this new page.

Leave at least a week between the name change and the website change.

You will likely also want to change some of the photos on the Profile. You can delete old ones and add new ones without any concerns.

4. You can then update the rest of the citations on the internet.

I know ainā€™t nobody got time for that, so you can use Whitesparkā€™s Listings Service for this. I hear those guys are really good šŸ‘€

There you go. Now you know how to rebrand a GBP when you acquire an existing business.

Donā€™t forget to follow me on LinkedIn, Bluesky, Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok so you donā€™t miss my local SEO posts!

Darren