u/blunder_boss95

A while back I helped a friend set up a website for his solo consulting business, and honestly we made it way harder than it needed to be. We spent so much time comparing platforms and looking at features we probably didn’t even need yet.

At the end of the day, he really just needed a simple site. Something that clearly explained what he does, had a contact form, maybe a way for people to book or pay him, and looked professional enough to send to clients.

But once we started trying different builders, some felt bloated fast or became annoying to manage once we added basic stuff. Now I’m curious what people are actually using for solo consulting or freelance businesses that stays simple without becoming a headache later.

I keep noticing smaller brands showing up in AI answers even when their actual sites are not that strong from a traditional SEO perspective. No huge backlink profile, not dominating rankings, nothing that would normally make you think they would get picked up so often.

But then you look closer and their name is everywhere. Reddit threads, niche communities, blog mentions, random discussions, people casually recommending them in comments. It feels like AI tools pay a lot of attention to repeated presence across the web, not just who has the best optimized page.

Lately I have been wondering if distribution and brand mentions are becoming just as important as on page SEO for GEO. Curious what others are seeing. Are you spending more time trying to get your brand talked about in different places now, or still mostly focused on improving content on your own site?