How do you create an AI-ready business profile?

Step 1: Build one source of truth

Write every fact about the business in one document before touching any website or listing. The list of what to include is in what an AI business listing is. The point of this step is agreement: one spelling of the name, one phone number, one set of hours, one description of the service area.

Use Google's rules as a sensible baseline even for other platforms. Google's guidelines ask for the business's real-world name, a precise address and/or service area, and only one profile per business ^[1]. They also ask owners to choose categories that are as specific as possible but representative of the main business ^[1].

Mark which facts change. Seasonal hours, prices, staff and promotions go stale fastest, so note where each appears. That list becomes your update checklist in Step 5.

Step 2: Publish the facts on your own website in plain text

Your website is the one place you fully control. Put the core facts on a page anyone can read without logging in: a clear About or Contact page, plus a page answering common questions. Google's guidance for AI features lists making sure important content is available in textual form among the SEO fundamentals that still apply ^[2]. Hours that appear only inside a photo are easy for a person to see but can be missed by systems that rely on text, so state them in text too.

Make sure crawlers can reach the page. Google lists allowing crawling in robots.txt, and by any CDN or hosting setup, as a fundamental ^[2]. ChatGPT search has its own crawler rules, covered in how to get your business found in ChatGPT.

Step 3: Verify that you control your website and listings

Verification proves to a platform that the person editing a profile is connected to the business. On Google Business Profile, verification is required to edit details such as name and hours, and reviews can take up to 5 business days ^[3]. Google says a profile can sometimes be verified instantly, for example when the website has been verified in Google Search Console ^[3].

Website verification usually means placing something only the site's controller can place. Google Search Console offers methods including uploading an HTML file, adding an HTML tag to the homepage and adding a DNS record with your domain name provider ^[4]. Google calls this ownership verification of the site; in practice, these methods show who controls the website. In our view, they don't settle legal ownership of the business, which is a separate question.

Each platform that offers verification chooses its own method, and only the person who controls the website can complete it.

Step 4: Add LocalBusiness structured data

Structured data labels your facts in a standard format, usually a block of JSON-LD in the page's code. Google's LocalBusiness documentation lists two required properties, name and address, and recommends others including telephone, url, openingHoursSpecification, geo and priceRange ^[5]. Google also advises using the most specific LocalBusiness sub-type possible ^[5].

The structured data must describe what the page shows. Google's general structured data guidelines say not to mark up content that is not visible to readers of the page, and not to mark up irrelevant or misleading content ^[6]. If your hours change, change the visible text and the markup together.

Check your work with Google's Rich Results Test, which Google recommends for validating the code ^[5]. Many website builders and CMS platforms have plugins that generate this markup; Google notes a CMS plugin may be the easier route ^[5]. Structured data is not a ticket into AI answers: Google says there's no special schema.org structured data needed to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode ^[2].

What about llms.txt and other AI files?

llms.txt is a proposal to standardize an /llms.txt file that provides information to help AI agents use a website ^[7]. It is still a proposal: its own site says the specification is open for community input ^[7].

Google says site owners don't need to create new machine-readable files, AI text files or markup to appear in its AI features ^[2]. For a small business, an llms.txt file is optional and low priority. Clear text on your website and accurate listings come first.

Step 5: Keep the profile current

Stale information is one of the easiest errors to prevent. When something changes, update your fact sheet first, then your website, then your listings, then the structured data, on the same day.

Use each platform's tools for temporary changes. Google Business Profile lets owners set special hours for holidays or other temporary periods, and Google reviews edits before they go live ^[8]. In some regions, languages and business categories, Google also shows owners information it has collected about their business, with the source and the date, under Edit profile and then Collected info ^[8]. Reviewing it is a quick way to catch facts you didn't enter yourself.

Set a recurring review, such as once a quarter, and test what assistants say about you. One answer is not a measurement, as explained in how to check whether AI knows your business. The full prioritized checklist for visibility is in how to make your business visible to AI.