The Local GEO & AEO Implementation Playbook

Every website has a small file called robots.txt that tells automated visitors which parts of your site they're allowed to read. Most websites were never updated to explicitly allow the newer AI crawlers — GPTBot (ChatGPT), PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot, and Google-Extended (Google's AI training crawler). If your file is silent on these, some engines treat that as "assume blocked" and skip your site entirely. This is the single most common reason a business is invisible to AI search, and it's the easiest to fix.

The fix

Add the following to your robots.txt file. If you don't already have one, create a plain text file with exactly this name.

User-agent: GPTBot
Allow: /

User-agent: PerplexityBot
Allow: /

User-agent: Anthropic-ai
Allow: /

User-agent: ClaudeBot
Allow: /

User-agent: Google-Extended
Allow: /

Sitemap: https://www.yourdomain.com/sitemap.xml

Where it goes

This file must live at the root of your domain — yourdomain.com/robots.txt, nowhere else.

• WordPress with Yoast SEO: Yoast → Tools → File Editor → edit robots.txt directly, save.
• WordPress with RankMath: RankMath → General Settings → Edit robots.txt.
• Any other host: upload the file to your site's root directory via your hosting file manager or FTP.

Schema markup (also called structured data, or JSON-LD) is a small block of code that states facts about your business in a format machines parse reliably — your name, address, phone number, business type, and service area — instead of making an AI engine guess by reading your homepage copy. Businesses without it are far more likely to be miscategorized or skipped entirely when an AI engine is deciding who to recommend.

Which schema type fits your business

* Use the closest match to your trade — Plumber, Electrician, RoofingContractor, and HVACBusiness are all valid Schema.org types.   ** Use FinancialService or AccountingService if that fits better than legal.

Template (edit the bracketed parts)

<script type="application/ld+json">
{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "[Your type from the table above]",
  "name": "[Your Business Name]",
  "url": "https://www.yourdomain.com",
  "telephone": "[Your Phone Number]",
  "areaServed": "[Your City, State]",
  "address": {
    "@type": "PostalAddress",
    "addressLocality": "[Your City]",
    "addressRegion": "[State]"
  },
  "geo": {
    "@type": "GeoCoordinates",
    "latitude": "[Your Latitude]",
    "longitude": "[Your Longitude]"
  },
  "openingHoursSpecification": {
    "@type": "OpeningHoursSpecification",
    "dayOfWeek": ["Monday","Tuesday","Wednesday","Thursday","Friday"],
    "opens": "08:00",
    "closes": "18:00"
  }
}
</script>

Where it goes

Paste it just before the closing </head> tag of your homepage. On WordPress, Yoast and RankMath both have a "Schema" tab per-page where you can paste custom JSON-LD without touching theme files — or use a plugin like Insert Headers and Footers.

AI engines quote content that directly answers a question in the first sentence. Most business websites lead with a slogan instead of an answer, which gives the AI nothing clean to extract and cite. The fix is a formatting habit, not a rewrite of your whole site: for every page, put the direct answer first, in one sentence, then the marketing language after.

Questions worth answering directly, per page

• What does this cost? (give an actual range, not "contact for pricing")
• What areas or cities do you serve?
• What are your hours, and do you offer emergency/same-day service?
• What exactly is included?
• How fast can someone get an appointment or service?

FAQ template

<section itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/FAQPage">
  <div itemprop="mainEntity" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/Question">
    <h3 itemprop="name">[The exact question a customer would type]</h3>
    <div itemprop="acceptedAnswer" itemscope itemtype="https://schema.org/Answer">
      <p itemprop="text">[A direct, specific answer — 40 to 60 words, no fluff]</p>
    </div>
  </div>
</section>

Repeat this block for each question. Place it on the page most relevant to that question — pricing questions on your services page, hours questions on your contact page.

AI engines cross-check your name, address, and phone number (NAP) against outside sources — Google Business Profile, directories, review sites — before deciding how confident they are in recommending you. Even small mismatches (a missing suite number, an old phone number, "St." vs "Street") lower that confidence.

Check these first

How to check

Search "[Your Business Name]" "[Your City]" and open every result. Compare the name, full address, and phone number character-by-character against your website. Fix any that don't match exactly — abbreviations count as mismatches.

You don't need software for this. Once a week, open ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini and ask the exact question a customer would ask.

"best [your service] in [your city]"
"[your service] near [your city]"
"who should I call for [problem you solve] in [your city]"

Log whether you're mentioned. If you're not appearing after four weeks of the fixes above, the most common cause is Step 1 (crawler access still blocked somewhere — check for a caching plugin or CDN overriding your robots.txt) or Step 2 (schema not validating — recheck the Rich Results Test).