At some point in the last six months, a client has asked you some version of this question: 'Are we showing up in ChatGPT?' Maybe they heard it from a competitor. Maybe their nephew mentioned it at dinner. Either way, they're asking — and how you answer in the next 60 seconds determines whether this becomes a $300/month retainer or a dead-end conversation. AI engine optimization (AEO) is now a billable service. This post shows you exactly how to handle the moment.
Why Clients Are Asking This Now
Consumer behavior shifted faster than most agency owners realize. Perplexity now processes over 100 million queries per day. ChatGPT's search mode is used by hundreds of millions of users who never click a traditional Google result. Gemini is baked into Android and Google Workspace. Claude is integrated into enterprise tools. Your clients' customers are asking AI systems 'What's the best [plumber/accountant/marketing agency] in [city]?' — and the AI is answering with a short list of names. If your client isn't on that list, they don't exist in that moment.
The Right Answer to Give Your Client on the Spot
Don't guess. Don't say 'I'll look into it.' Don't give a five-minute disclaimer about how AI works. Say this: 'That's actually something we can measure right now. Give me your business name and category and I'll run a score in under a minute.' Then go to zygur.com, enter their info, and show them the result. You've just moved from reactive to authoritative in under 60 seconds.
What the Score Actually Shows
Zygur's free AEO score checks how visible a business is to AI systems — ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Claude — based on the signals those systems use to decide what to recommend. That includes structured data, authority signals, citation presence, and how clearly the business describes what it does and where. The score gives you and your client a concrete starting point, not a vague impression.
The Counterintuitive Part: Google Rankings Don't Predict AI Visibility
Here's what surprises most agency owners: a business can rank on page one of Google and still be invisible to ChatGPT. The reason is that AI systems pull from structured, authoritative, clearly-described sources — not just high-traffic pages. A competitor with a lower domain authority but better-structured content, cleaner citations, and clearer entity descriptions can dominate AI recommendations while your client is sitting at the top of a Google SERP. This creates a genuine new problem — and a genuine new service.
How to Structure a $300/Month AEO Retainer
This doesn't need to be complicated. A simple AEO retainer has three components your client can understand immediately:
- —Monthly monitoring — track the client's AI visibility score across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Gemini so you can show movement over time
- —Fix implementation — structured data, entity clarity, citation cleanup, and content updates based on what the score flags
- —Reporting — a one-page monthly summary showing score changes and what was done
$300/month is the floor, not the ceiling. For multi-location businesses or competitive categories, $500–$800/month is defensible. The key is that it's automated scoring and monitoring on the backend — you're selling expertise and implementation time, not hours spent manually querying AI tools.
How to Close It in the Same Conversation
Once you've shown the score, the conversation is easy. If the score is low: 'This tells us exactly why you're not showing up — we can fix most of it within 30 days and monitor it monthly from there.' If the score is decent: 'You're in decent shape right now, but this changes fast. AI systems update their training data and weighting constantly. We keep you protected.' Either result closes. The score is the sales tool.
What Happens If You Don't Offer This
Another agency will. AEO is not a future service — it's a current gap that clients are already worried about. The agency owners who start having this conversation now will be the ones collecting retainers by Q4. The ones who wait until it's mainstream will be competing on price.
FAQ
Do I need to understand how ChatGPT works to sell this?
No. You need to understand that AI systems recommend businesses based on structured, authoritative signals — and that those signals can be measured and improved. Zygur handles the technical scoring. You handle the client relationship and implementation.
What if my client already ranks well on Google?
That's not a signal of AI visibility. Run the score anyway — in many cases, strong Google rankings and poor AI visibility exist at the same time. Showing a client this gap is usually enough to open the conversation.
Can I white-label or resell Zygur's scoring?
Agency and reseller options are in development. The free score tool at zygur.com is available to anyone today. Run it for your clients in the meeting — it's fast, requires no account, and produces a shareable result.
Which AI platforms matter most right now?
ChatGPT has the largest consumer footprint for recommendation queries. Perplexity is growing fastest among research-oriented users and is heavily used for local and B2B queries. Gemini matters for Android users and anyone in Google Workspace. Claude is significant in professional and enterprise contexts. Visibility across all four is the right target — no single platform is safe to ignore.
How quickly can a business improve its AI visibility score?
Meaningful improvements are typically visible within 30–60 days when structured data and entity signals are corrected. Some fixes — like cleaning up inconsistent citations — can show impact faster. Ongoing monitoring matters because AI systems re-index and re-weight content regularly.
Check your score free at zygur.com — takes 60 seconds, no account required.