SierraHosts Web Design

05/07/2025

As more and more people shift to AI tools such as ChatGPT to search for local businesses, Nevada County businesses of all types will be affected by this massive shift in consumer behavior.

Today, on May 7, the services chief for Apple, Eddie Cue, said that AI search engines will eventually replace traditional search engines such as Google. As a result, Apple will be adding artificial intelligence services from OpenAI, Perplexity and Anthropic as search options to Apple's Safari browser very soon.

This will impact every local business who relies on legacy search engines like Google and Bing to get more customers.

What can you, a local business owner, do to prepare for such changes?

For starters, you should use a free AI web search tool to check whether or not your business shows up when you search for your primary business keyword and service area.

For example, if you are an electrician, type the following prompt into the free "Web-Search" bot on Poe(dot)com:

"please give me a list of electricians in Grass Valley California"

Is your business mentioned in the main results? Are there links pointing directly to your website in the links at the bottom?

If not, your business is falling behind because your competitors are already ahead in the quickly-developing AI search era!

Now try a different web search bot on Poe, such as "Gemini-2.5-Pro-Exp" or "Perplexity-Sonar-Reasoning" (all of these are free on Poe, by the way).

How does your business perform in those search bots? Are links to your website visible throughout the answer and at the bottom?

Have a look at the photos I included with this post.

They are the Gemini-2.5-Pro-Exp web search results for my company, SierraHosts.

In Poe Web-Search, Gemini and Perplexity, I've managed to get SierraHosts to rank #1 for the query "please give me a list of website designers in Grass Valley California".

Does your company perform just as well in AI web search results?

Many folks believe that AI is just a flash-in-the pan, or that they can't leverage it to grow their business. But that just isn't true. Like it or not, AI is the future -- and it's time to get serious about it.

To stay ahead of the competition now and in the future, your company needs to be #1 in AI web search.

Don't know how to do this? I can help.

For over 20 years, I've been helping local small businesses grow by providing website design, SEO search engine optimization, Google PPC (pay-per-click) search advertising, website maintenance/administration and more.

If you have an established local business with ten or more employees, please contact me today at https://sierrahosts.com or call (530) 205-3292 to learn more.

To your success,
Paul

07/25/2020

Just built and launched this simple new website for Blue Cow Deli in Penn Valley. Best sandwiches, salads, soups, coffees and desserts in town. Dine on the patio or take it to go. Check 'em out!

Blue Cow Deli is a Penn Valley restaurant serving hot and cold sandwiches, paninis, soups, salads, coffee & desserts. Dine in on the patio or take it to go!

05/22/2020

I can't believe iHomefinder right now.

They almost literally destroyed a local realtor's website & SEO by convincing them that they needed a new website, when all they did was create a duplicate WordPress site, changed the theme to Divi 💩, replaced all the strategically placed h2 and h3 tags with h1 tags 🤯, lost the lead form and conversion features 😳, left out all the background images AND completely changed the page URLs and page titles to what they weren't before 😱!

Complete. Amateur. Jackassery.

It's just unfathomable that an established company would bring absolutely ZERO additional value to a client of mine like this.

What exactly was iHomefinder thinking? Were they thinking?

Yes, they were... about their own revenue, not the best interests of their clients.

Fortunately I was able to catch this before the realtor gave them the go-ahead. He called them to tell them to stop all work.

Look, if you are a realtor with a website and you are looking at iHomefinder's OmniPress product, BEWARE. They will likely mess up your website and your search engine rankings because they simply don't know what they are doing.

Don't get me wrong -- they make a fine IDX plugin for real estate listings. It's great, and I hear the built-in CRM is getting even better.

But their OmniPress IDX websites? Forget about it IF you already have a WordPress website. And especially if your website has already been optimized for SEO.

If you don't have a website, then it might make sense.

But if you're not sure, talk to a professional like me *before* you make a costly mistake.