Controlling AI visibility: For SMEs that want to be found by prospects and customers

Products and services are increasingly being found via AI platforms such as Perplexity and ChatGPT; traditional search remains important. This article shows why AI visibility is key and how to achieve it.

Customer Benefit

• More qualified inquiries: The right pages appear in AI answers.
• Control & compliance: Steer visibility while preserving data privacy.

• Measurable: Citation rate, time-to-citation, qualified leads.

Starting Point

• AI platforms deliver answers instead of link lists.
• Many SMEs are structurally not AI-discoverable.

• Goal: Prioritize what should be public; hide what must remain internal.

Solution Concept - from SEO to GEO

• AI sitemap + Frontmatter v1.3 for machine readability.
• JSON-LD/OG consistent with canonicals & freshness signals.
• robots.txt by design: allow what should be visible; block internal content.

• Monitoring via Matomo + Server-Logs.

Methods and Tools

• Tools: n8n (Workflow), Frontmatter v1.3, JSON-LD/OpenGraph, robots.txt, sitemap_ai.xml,  Matomo/Plausible, Caddy.
• Planning + Realisation: Experience Innovation.
• Basis: KMU Opensource KI Hub

More about SME Opensource AI Hub

Project Contribution and Role

• Tolksdorf.digital: Analysis, concept, setup (AI sitemap/frontmatter/robots), CMS implementation, monitoring & evidence, training.

Reference Customer

• Ammann Components, Tägerwilen

Reference Contact

• On request

Frequently asked Questions (FAQ)

Why should an AI find a company’s website?

• So your offerings appear in answers, not just search results—boosting relevance and conversion.

May an AI platform use my data at all?

• Yes, for public content and within robots/terms. You control this via robots.txt, noindex, and license notices.

Are my data truly safe when an AI reads them?

• Public pages are meant for that. Sensitive content: don’t publish it; protect access; block crawlers.

Will Google and Bing become irrelevant?

• No. They remain core infrastructure; many AI systems build on them. You need both: classic SEO and AI visibility.

What is Answer Engine Optimization (AEO)?

• Optimizing to show up in direct AI answers (structured content, Q\&A, clear signals).

What is Generative Engine Optimization (GEO)?

• Optimizing for generative systems (long-form answers). Focus: context, structure, freshness, source clarity.

What is Search Engine Optimization (SEO)?

• Tech + content + authority so pages are found in traditional search.

Why is SEO important for SMEs?

• SEO provides the baseline visibility. Without it, AI systems often lack reliable signals.

How can older websites be made accessible to AI platforms?

• Incrementally modernize: add an AI sitemap, backfill Frontmatter/JSON-LD, set canonicals, review robots, prioritize key pages.

If more and more people are searching with AI platforms, what does that mean for searching on the internet?

• Often ready-made answers get served instead of lists of links—this saves time, but requires critical review. - AI summarizes sources and cites them (sometimes well, sometimes incompletely) - Sources require - Demand becomes part of the search - Hybrid search with PI platforms and search engines - Have reports generated by the AI platform for download​

Sources and Further Reading

• How people use ChatGPT (NBER Working Paper):  https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w34255/w34255.pdf 
• SME Opensource AI Hub (Overview): https://tolksdorf.digital/kmu-opensource-ki-hub
• Frontmatter v1.3 (concept): https://tolksdorf.digital/ai/sitemap_ai.xml(https://tolksdorf.digital/ai/sitemap_ai.xml)
• Tolksdorf.digital Specification Frontmatter v1.3: OpenGraph & Schema.org (v1.3): https://tolksdorf.digital/ai/spec/index.html