Archive for October 2025

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is becoming critical as discovery shifts from traditional search clicks to AI answers, social feeds, Maps, and Local Services Ads—particularly for local contractors. The guidance emphasizes optimizing for calls over clicks by producing answer-ready, structured, local content with concrete details, proof, and clear conversion options. It recommends diversifying channels into LSAs, Maps/Bing, and short-form social/video while keeping search campaigns tightly controlled and call-focused. Finally, it encourages using AI for drafting with human review and feeding CRM-based offline conversion data (booked jobs, revenue, job type) back into platforms to drive smarter optimization.

Google Ads is tightening enforcement around prescription drug terms across ads, keywords, and landing pages, with enforcement beginning October 29 and ramping over 4–6 weeks, including seven‑day warnings before suspensions. In the U.S., Canada, and New Zealand, advertisers must be certified to keyword‑target Rx terms, while most promotion is banned in the rest of the world aside from narrow exceptions. The update will likely cause stricter reviews, more disapprovals, and spillover that can affect non‑health advertisers, especially those using broad or phrase match or with medical language on landing pages. The post advises contractors and other non‑Rx advertisers to tighten match types, expand negative lists, clean landing page copy, set alerts, appeal calmly with evidence, segment edge cases, and obtain certification if Rx targeting is truly needed.

Microsoft Bing now supports the data-nosnippet HTML attribute, aligning with Google and allowing site owners to surgically exclude specific on-page text from search snippets and AI-generated answers like Copilot. This keeps pages crawlable and indexable while preventing selected content from appearing in previews or summaries. It’s especially useful for contractors to hide fine print, proprietary details, and clutter that can dilute conversions or leak premium information. The result is tighter brand control, higher-quality clicks, and consistency across Bing, Google, and their AI experiences.

ChatGPT now runs a web search in roughly 31% of prompts and heavily emphasizes local intent, recency, reviews, and comparisons. For home service contractors, AI increasingly acts as a search engine wrapper, assembling answers from the open web that can bypass traditional SERP clicks. To capture more calls, optimize Google Business Profile, grow recent high-quality reviews, publish helpful 2025 updates with sources, and build comparison/decision pages with clear CTAs. Paid search should concentrate on high-intent, call-first queries while content and local signals earn visibility inside AI-generated answers.

Amazon has reduced its presence in Google Shopping, easing auction pressure and leading to lower ad costs and higher CTRs across related auctions. This creates a near-term opportunity for local service contractors to gain more impression share and phone calls at lower CPAs, particularly on mixed-intent queries. To convert these gains into revenue, advertisers should expand coverage on proven service keywords, enforce tight match controls and negatives, refresh RSAs with high-intent messaging, prioritize qualified call conversions, optimize landing pages for click-to-call, use dayparting, and geo-focus profitable ZIP codes. Google’s AI tools (like Performance Max) can help if used with guardrails such as strong audience signals, brand exclusions, and a primary focus on calls.

This article explains that in Google Ads Performance Max, audience signals and search themes act as hints rather than strict targeting controls. Real influence over performance comes from accurate conversion tracking, appropriate bidding strategies, and strong, service-specific creative assets and landing pages. Contractors should organize asset groups by distinct services, feed high-quality first‑party data, and avoid duplicating asset groups just to test different signals. It also warns against soft conversions, emphasizes the use of Target CPA/ROAS once data is stable, and suggests running Search campaigns for strict keyword control.

The piece argues that AI-generated answers on search engines are compiled from the same indexed pages and profiles that traditional SEO targets, so contractors must win in search to appear in AI results. For HVAC, plumbing, and electrical shops, strong local SEO via Google Business Profile, reviews, Q&A, and tracking is the foundation for driving calls. Building authoritative, intent-specific service and location pages, evergreen FAQs, seasonal updates, and proof content helps both humans and AI trust and cite the site. Technical enhancements like structured data and on-page basics improve machine interpretation and visibility, and performance should be measured by calls rather than clicks.

The article explains that ChatGPT Shopping is driven by structured merchant feeds via OpenAI’s Agentic Commerce Protocol, not traditional web crawling. Contractors should model each service as a product SKU with rich, current data, and align their feed with site schema to appear in conversational recommendations and drive booked jobs. It details required and optional feed fields, how to use character limits effectively, and the controllable ranking signals like freshness, consistency, completeness, performance, and rich media. A 30-day execution plan begins with auditing top services and mapping IDs, pricing, availability, service areas, and media assets.

Google Performance Max now supports vertical 9:16 image assets (minimum 600×1067, recommended 1080×1920, max 5MB), unlocking mobile-first placements like YouTube Shorts. For contractors in HVAC, plumbing, and electrical, the guidance is to design creatives that drive “call now” outcomes rather than chasing cheap impressions. Because Shorts-style feeds are high-attention but often low-intent, the piece advises isolating these assets in their own PMax asset group, capping spend, and optimizing to phone-driven leads, with brand exclusions to protect branded search. A quick deployment plan includes creating a dedicated asset group, uploading 2–4 vertical images, and writing call-focused headlines and descriptions while tracking cost per qualified call.

Google is adding AI-generated summaries to Discover and introducing a “What’s new” sports feed in Search, which is likely to reduce organic clicks from Discover and shift user attention, especially on mobile. Contractors should assume fewer free visits and pivot to call-first strategies that prioritize phone conversions over site traffic. Immediate actions include strengthening Local Services Ads and call-only campaigns, maximizing call-driving ad assets, and using Demand Gen/YouTube with Lead Form Extensions to refill top-of-funnel. Performance Max should be run with guardrails, prioritizing phone calls as primary conversions, using first-party data when available, and excluding brand terms while feeding it strong service creatives.