Seems pretty valuable to me

I’ve long been out of the business of trying to “convince” businesses they need a website. But with AI answering questions through platforms like ChatGPT or directly in the search results with Google’s AI responses, I see the question come up a lot more:

“Does my business even need a website?”

I can understand why business owners might think that. If AI is going to answer any question someone has, why do they even need a websites that fewer and fewer people are visiting?

But what they’re missing is where AI is getting those answers.

Go ask ChatGPT about any business with a great online presence. Not only will it tell you about them incredible detail — it will often cite the sources.

I don’t think that’s significantly valuable in terms of backlinks, but it does tell us something really important: where it’s getting its information.

If it’s not from your website, what other sources can it pull from? Because I’d sure as hell rather have it quote what I say on my website instead of what competitors, reviews, or other external sources say (even if it’s not bad, it’s not always accurate or up-to-date).

Either it can get the answer from the source, or assemble one from scraps.

I don’t know about you, but as a business owner, I’d rather steer that narrative.

In some ways, AI answers are making company websites more valuable.

Websites aren’t just a marketing tool anymore, they’re a source document. It’s not the only source, but it’s certainly an authoritative one. In all the testing I’ve done, LLMs seem to agree — citing the company itself as much as (or more than) anything else (example 1, example 2, example 3, example 4, example 5, example 6).

Whether we like it or not, the internet has a new spokesperson now.

Businesses shouldn’t be asking “do I need a website?”, the should be asking “How do I want AI to describe my business?”. Websites might be the most powerful influence there is.

Seems pretty valuable.