· 3 min
Prospects increasingly ask an AI assistant to recommend a consultant before they ask a colleague. The assistant recommends experts whose websites state a precise specialty, a named method and verifiable results — not those with the most adjectives. A consultant’s site should therefore read like a case file: who you help, with which problem, how, and with what measurable outcome.
- Specialise in words: “operational turnaround for mid-size hospitals” beats “strategy and transformation”.
- Name your method: a named framework is quotable, a vague process is not.
- Replace adjectives with numbers: one quantified case study outweighs ten vague testimonials.
- Publish answers to the questions clients ask before hiring — they are what assistants quote.
Contents
“Can you recommend a consultant who helps family businesses prepare a succession?” More and more buyers type that sentence into ChatGPT or Perplexity before they ask anyone. The answer names two or three firms, with a sentence of justification for each. If you are not one of them, the conversation happened without you.
The good news for independents and small firms: assistants do not recommend the biggest budgets. They recommend the clearest evidence.
How an AI assistant chooses whom to recommend
When an assistant searches the web to answer a request, it reads a handful of pages and keeps those that answer the question precisely and give reasons to believe them. Research on generative engines shows that cited sources, statistics and quotations make a page markedly more likely to be used. In practice, three things decide:
- Relevance: does the page say, in plain words, that you solve exactly this problem for exactly this kind of client?
- Evidence: are there cases, figures, dates and names — or only promises?
- Consistency: do your site, your LinkedIn profile and mentions elsewhere tell the same story?
Specialise in your words, not only in your practice
Many consultants are specialists who describe themselves as generalists, for fear of closing doors. Online the opposite happens: a vague description opens no door at all, because it matches no precise request.
- Write your positioning in one sentence: “I help [whom] to [result] when [situation].”
- Create one page per problem you solve, titled the way a client would ask it.
- Keep the jargon of your trade for the second paragraph; the first belongs to the client’s vocabulary.
Name your method
A named framework — five steps, three diagnostics, a 90-day plan — is easier to understand, to remember and to quote than “a tailored approach”. It also turns your experience into intellectual property that people associate with your name.
Describe each step in two or three sentences: what you do, what the client receives, how long it takes. This page often becomes the one AI assistants summarise when they recommend you.
Replace adjectives with evidence
- Case studies with context, intervention and measurable outcome — “patient waiting time cut from 41 to 12 days in eight months” rather than “significantly improved operations”.
- Dated references: engagements, conferences, publications, teaching.
- Named clients when they agree; anonymised but precise when they do not.
- Your own data: a short annual survey of your sector gives journalists and assistants a figure to quote with your name attached.
The pages a consultant’s website needs
- Home: the positioning sentence, the problems you solve, one flagship result.
- Method: your named framework, step by step.
- Cases: three to six quantified case studies.
- Insights: articles answering the questions clients ask before hiring, each with a short FAQ.
- About & contact: credentials, languages, where you work, how an engagement starts.
Add structured data describing a ProfessionalService, with the area you serve and the services you offer, and make sure your robots.txt and your host let AI crawlers in — many do not by default.
Questions readers ask
Can a small consultancy compete with large firms in AI answers?
Yes. Assistants favour precise, well-evidenced answers over brand size. A narrowly positioned independent with quantified cases is often cited ahead of a large firm with generic pages.
Should I publish my prices?
A starting price or a typical engagement range filters prospects and gives assistants a factual element to quote. If your work is fully bespoke, explain how an engagement is scoped and what drives the budget.
How many articles do I need?
Fewer than you think. Five substantial articles answering real client questions, updated every year, outperform fifty short posts.
Are client testimonials useful?
Only if they are specific. “Excellent consultant” adds nothing; “helped us cut our financial close from 15 to 6 days” is evidence.
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