How to make your website more AI-friendly in 7 simple steps

Whether you’re a fan of it or not, find it useful or not, AI is increasingly influencing how businesses are discovered and presented in online search.

According to research by McKinsey, 64% of European consumers use AI to compare brands, prices, and reviews as part of their purchasing journey.

Regardless of whether someone is using Google’s AI-powered search features, asking an AI assistant for recommendations, or relying on automated tools to compare providers, the same principle applies: if your website is easy to understand, is externally trustworthy, and well structured, it’s more likely to be surfaced and referenced.

That doesn’t mean you need to rebuild your website for robots, but making your website clearer and easier for search systems to interpret with confidence is increasingly becoming a priority.

The good news is that many of the improvements that make a website more AI-friendly are also the same ones that make it more useful for human visitors – talk about a win-win situation!

Why businesses need to make their websites more AI-friendly

For years, businesses focused mainly on SEO and getting webpages to rank in search results. That still matters, but it’s no longer the full picture.

AI-powered search tools are now summarising information, comparing businesses, and helping users make decisions before they ever click through to a website.

That means your website increasingly needs to do two jobs at once: help real people understand your business quickly and help search and AI systems understand what you do, who you help, and why you are credible.

If your site is vague, poorly structured, outdated, or difficult to interpret, it becomes harder for those systems to use your content confidently. But if your site is clear, complete, and trustworthy, it gives you a better chance of being included in the moments that matter.

While being online is key for long-term digital visibility, being understandable online is increasingly becoming the priority to many businesses.

What happens if I don’t?

If your website is not AI-friendly, the risk isn’t that it suddenly disappears from the internet. The bigger issue is that it may become easier to overlook.

As AI tools increasingly summarise answers and recommend businesses based on what they can clearly interpret, companies with weak website foundations and loose digital marketing strategies may lose visibility to competitors with stronger content and clearer signals.

That could mean:

  • Fewer chances of being referenced in AI-generated answers
  • Weaker visibility in search journeys that start with comparison or research
  • Less brand trust if your website feels thin or unclear
  • Fewer enquiries from people who never make it past the search stage

In short, if your website doesn’t explain your business well, AI-led search experiences may skip you and move on to a business that does.

Some of this work is straightforward, but some of it is more technical or strategic. That’s where a visibility-focused agency like Submerge can help – not just by making changes, but by making sure those changes support your wider digital marketing goals without negatively impacting other efforts.

7 simple steps to make your website more AI-friendly

1. Explain what your business does in clear, direct language

One of the simplest and most important improvements you can make is also one of the most overlooked: clearly say what your business does.

Many websites rely too heavily on clever headlines, brand slogans, word play, or general marketing language. That may look polished, but it can make it harder for AI tools and search systems (and even real people) to understand what the business actually offers.

AI tools work better when your content is direct and unambiguous. If your homepage and service pages clearly explain what you do, who you help, and what makes your offer relevant, you’re give those systems something useful to work with.

You could start with:

  • Rewriting vague headlines so they describe your services properly
  • Stating clearly who your customers are
  • Explaining your core services in plain English
  • Making sure this information appears early on key pages

Explore our digital marketing strategy services, including strategic planning.

2. Structure your pages so the information is easy to follow

A well-structured page is easier for people to read and easier for AI systems to crawl and interpret.

That means using headings properly, separating ideas into logical sections, and avoiding long walls of text that bury important information. If your content is scattered or difficult to scan, it becomes harder for platforms to identify what information matters most.

This is a simple change with a big impact, especially on core pages such as your homepage, service pages, and location pages.

You could focus on:

  • Using one clear H1 per page
  • Breaking content into helpful H2 and H3 sections
  • Keeping paragraphs reasonably short

3. Build pages around the questions your audience is already asking

AI-powered search is increasingly built around question-based discovery. People are asking fuller, more natural questions, and search systems are trying to respond with useful, trustworthy summaries that can interacted with in a more conversational way.

That means your website should not only describe your business, but also answer real questions.

Think about what potential customers want to know before they contact you. This could include pricing, process, timescales, service areas, differences between options, or common concerns.

Content that addresses these points clearly gives AI tools more confidence in using you as a trust-worthy source.

This is often where businesses benefit from expert input. Knowing what your audience asks is one thing, but turning that into a useful content structure is another. Submerge can help businesses identify the right search intent and build content around it in a way that supports both visibility and conversion.

Useful actions at this point could include:

  • Adding FAQs to service pages
  • Writing blog content around common customer questions
  • Using natural phrasing that reflects how people actually search

4. Strengthen the trust signals across your website

AI visibility is not just about clarity, but also confidence.

Search systems and AI tools are more likely to cite and showcase businesses that appear credible, current, and well supported. If your site lacks these trust signals, it could be harder for it to stand out in a crowded market, even if your services are strong and effective.

Trust signals you may want to include across your website include testimonials, customer reviews, case studies, accreditations, contact details, and team information – all things that, when clearly signposted and structured, show your business is legitimate and experienced.

A good place to start is:

  • Adding testimonials to relevant service pages
  • Including recent examples of your work
  • Making team or company information easy to find
  • Showing professional accreditations, memberships, or credentials where relevant

See our case study portfolio and discover how we’ve helped businesses just like yours.

5. Make sure your business information is consistent everywhere

Your website does not exist in isolation, and the nature of search now involves AI systems looking to multiple places for trust signals about your business, from social media and directories to maps platforms and business listings.

If your website says one thing and other platforms say another, that inconsistency can weaken trust.

At a basic level, your business name, address, phone number, service descriptions, and location details should all match across your digital presence. It sounds simple, but it is one of the most common problems we’ve noticed businesses overlook!

You may want to check that:

  • Your business’s contact details match across all platforms
  • All service descriptions are aligned
  • Your business’s location information is accurate and current
  • Your brand messaging is reasonably consistent everywhere it appears

Discover 5 things you need to do to have your local business appear in AI Overviews.

6. Improve your website’s technical foundations

Some parts of AI-friendliness are content-based, while others depend on how well your website functions behind the scenes.

If your site is slow to load, difficult to use on mobile, poorly indexed, or technically messy, it becomes harder for search systems to crawl and understand it properly. These issues also create a worse experience for users, which can indirectly affect visibility and performance

Identifying the fixes in your website’s technical foundations is one thing, but carrying them out is another. When working on a website, particularly larger or older ones, making technical fixes without a complete understanding of web development and design can create more problems than it fixes.

It’s often worth bringing in technical support here, particularly if you are unsure what condition your site is really in.

Key priorities to start with may include:

  • Improving page speed
  • Checking mobile usability
  • Fixing broken links or crawl issues
  • Making sure important pages can be properly indexed

Explore our full range of foundation services, from technical SEO and structured data to web development and design.

7. Keep your website active, accurate, and up to date

An AI-friendly website is not something you set once and forget – just as the nature of searches changes, so must your website to stay discoverable and relevant to your target market.

Search systems tend to favour content that feels current, maintained, and relevant. If your site contains outdated service information, broken pages, or stale blog content, it can weaken trust over time.

That doesn’t mean you need to publish constantly, but keeping your content accurate and the content marketing cycle turning.

This is where consistency matters. Businesses that regularly improve and refresh their websites tend to build stronger long-term visibility than those that leave them untouched for years.

Practical next steps for this might be:

  • Reviewing your key pages every few months
  • Updating outdated service or location details
  • Refreshing old blogs with more accurate and relevant information
  • Removing or optimising pages that no longer add value

Moving forward with making your website more AI-friendly

Making a website more AI friendly may sound like a technical job, but in reality it often involves a mix of content, SEO, development, and brand clarity.

Some actions are quick internal fixes, while others may need specialist input to get right.

But where would you even begin with a full-agency project like this? This table might help you plot your next steps forward…

Step What needs to happen Useful tools Who should own it?
1. Clarify what the business does Rewrite key website messaging so services, audience, and value are explained clearly in plain English Customer research notes, Google Search Console, AI assistants for drafting, messaging frameworks Marketing lead, content writer, brand strategist
2. Improve page structure Organise pages with clear headings, logical sections, and easy-to-scan layouts CMS editor, Screaming Frog SEO Spider, Yoast Content team, SEO specialist, web manager
3. Answer real customer questions Add FAQs, blog content, and service-page copy based on what customers actually ask Sales/team FAQs, Google Search Console, AlsoAsked, AnswerThePublic, Reddit Content marketer, SEO specialist, customer-facing teams
4. Strengthen trust signals Add testimonials, case studies, credentials, team details, and proof of real experience Trustpilot, Feefo, Google Business Profile, Clutch Marketing team, account managers, business owner
5. Check consistency across platforms Align contact details, service descriptions, and location information across website and listings Google Business Profile, Apple Maps, directory listings, citation tools SEO specialist, operations team, marketing manager
6. Improve technical performance Fix speed, mobile usability, crawlability, and indexing issues that affect discoverability Google Search Console, PageSpeed Insights, Lighthouse Developer, technical SEO specialist, web agency
7. Keep content accurate and updated Review and refresh core pages + social media regularly so information stays current and useful Google Analytics, Google Search Console, Semrush, Hootsuite content planner Marketing team, content lead, website owner

For many businesses, the challenge is not knowing what to improve – it’s knowing what to prioritise, who should handle it, and how those changes fit into a wider visibility strategy. That is where expert support like that from Submerge can make the process much more effective.

Become friendlier with Submerge

Making your website more AI-friendly doesn’t have to mean chasing every new development in search, but it will require a structured plan to create effective change.

In most cases, it comes down to doing the basics well: being clear, being useful, being trustworthy, and making your website easy to understand. Those are the same qualities that help real people choose and trust your business, which is why this work has value beyond AI alone.

Some of these steps are quick wins, while others will need more technical or strategic input to get right. If your business wants to improve visibility, but isn’t sure where to begin, Submerge can help you identify what is holding your website back and where to focus first. Our team works in tandem across content, technical, and web development to create AI visibility strategies and actionable plans that create meaningful upticks in your business data.

Because as search continues to evolve, the businesses that stay easiest to understand will usually be the ones that stay easiest to find.

Book a free consultation with our team and let’s start making your business’s website AI-friendly today.