The way people find a local business is changing. More of them ask AI (ChatGPT, Perplexity, the answer at the top of Google) and act on the name it returns. So we read a business the way a machine does, then show what it'd take to get found.
Below are five sample audits, one per industry, each built exactly the way we run a real one. The businesses are made up; the findings are the kind we see every week.
Great reputation, weak digital setup
The best-reviewed shop in town hands Google and AI almost nothing to cite. The reviews are already won; the website doesn't carry them.
Read the audit →A trusted shop with a brochure for a website
They own the map pack on 430 reviews, then lose every search the website should win, because there's barely a website to win it.
Read the audit →A 4.9 behind a front door that won't open
No way to book online, and the two questions that decide a new patient (do you take my insurance, can I get in this week) are buried where AI can't read them.
Read the audit →Trusted lawyers, a website too thin to cite
A bigger firm's content library wins the AI referral Birchwood should get. The reputation is real; there's just nothing published for a machine to quote.
Read the audit →The contrast case: good bones, hidden catalog
The Shopify site is technically fine. The gap is that the catalog isn't legible to Google Shopping or AI, and a 14k-follower Instagram isn't wired to actually sell.
Read the audit →These are illustrative samples for fictional businesses, written to show the format and depth of a here // forward audit. Any resemblance to a specific real company is coincidental.