People still talk to their phones and speakers. What changed is who answers. In 2023 a spoken question mostly got one result read back, usually Google’s featured snippet. In 2026 the assistants answer with AI: they look across web pages, business listings and reviews, and put together a reply in their own words.
That shift matters for a business owner, because a spoken answer has no page two: it may name a couple of businesses and stop there. This post covers what changed and the six things that still decide whether your business is the one named.
What changed since 2023
Three things, all on the record:
- Google replaced Assistant with Gemini on phones. In March 2025 Google said the classic Google Assistant would stop being available on most mobile devices, with Gemini taking over.
- Siri can hand questions to ChatGPT. On iPhones with Apple Intelligence, Siri can pass a request to ChatGPT when it decides that helps.
- Alexa got a generative rebuild. Amazon’s Alexa+ is built on large language models and holds a conversation instead of matching commands.
So “voice search optimization” and “AI search optimization” are now mostly the same job. The assistant is a voice on top of the same AI answers people read in ChatGPT or Google’s AI Overviews. If you want the full picture of how those answers pick sources, we wrote it up in how to show up in ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews.
1. Answer the questions people actually ask
People speak in full questions: “Who fixes tankless water heaters near me?” or “How long does a roof inspection take?” They rarely speak in keywords. Your pages should answer those questions in plain sentences.
Start with the questions your front desk hears every week. Each one that matters deserves a clear answer on your site, on the page where it belongs: pricing questions on the service page, coverage questions on the service-area page, and so on.
2. Put the answer first
Assistants read a page the way a busy customer does: they look for the direct answer. Lead with it in one or two sentences, then explain. “Most inspections take about an hour; here is what we check” beats three paragraphs of warm-up.
Google says there is no special trick for its AI features: a page needs to be indexed and allowed to show a snippet, and good SEO does the rest. Writing the answer up top is simply good writing that both people and machines can use.
3. Keep question-and-answer sections for readers, not for markup
The old advice was to build FAQ pages and add FAQ structured data so Google would show them. That no longer works the way it did: Google stopped showing FAQ rich results in May 2026. The markup does no harm, but it is not a switch for voice or AI answers.
What still works is the content itself. A short section of real customer questions, answered honestly, helps the reader and gives any assistant a clean answer to quote.
4. Get your listings right, because local questions lean on them
Many spoken questions are local: “open now”, “near me”, “closest”. Those answers lean on business listings, not only on websites.
- Google Business Profile (the new name for Google My Business): complete every field, pick the right categories, keep hours current, add photos, and reply to reviews. Google says its local ranking weighs relevance, distance and prominence, and that more reviews and positive ratings can help.
- Apple Maps: claim your location through Apple Business so your hours and details are right for iPhone users.
- Same name, address and phone everywhere: your site, your profiles and the directories you are listed in should match exactly.
Listings are easy to neglect, and local answers lean on them. Our Local SEO & Google Maps work starts here for that reason. If you run a trade that customers call in a hurry, our page for field service businesses shows how we approach it.
5. Let the AI crawlers in
Assistants that search the web use their own crawlers. ChatGPT’s search, for example, uses one called OAI-SearchBot, and OpenAI says a site that blocks it won’t show up in ChatGPT’s search answers. Some website firewalls and security plugins block these crawlers by default, so ask whoever runs your site to check.
6. Make the page fast on a phone
When an assistant does send someone to your site, they arrive in the middle of a task, often on a phone. A slow or jumpy page loses them. Google’s Core Web Vitals measure exactly this: how fast the main content loads, how steady the page is while it loads, and how quickly it reacts to a tap. Compress images, trim heavy scripts, and test on a real phone, not only on your office computer.
How to tell if it is working
There is no voice report to open. Search Console does not split spoken searches out, and assistants rarely pass along where a visitor came from. So measure the business side instead:
- Ask your assistant of choice the questions your customers ask, once a month, and note who gets named.
- Watch calls, direction requests and website messages from your Google Business Profile.
- Ask new customers how they found you, and write the answer down.
Where to start
If you only do two things this month, make them the listings in step 4 and the answer-first rewrite of your top three service pages in step 2. They help with voice, with AI answers and with ordinary search at the same time, which is why our SEO and AI search optimization work overlaps so much.
If you would rather have someone look at your business first, get your free game plan: answer four quick questions and you get a plan on the spot.
