Why Ranking in Google AI Overviews Matters for Local Marketing Agencies

Google’s AI Overviews are changing how people find businesses online—and for agencies managing local SEO and regional marketing, this shift is especially important.

If your agency works with local clients like dentists, HVAC companies, law firms, or home service providers, getting them featured in Google’s AI Overviews could become a game-changer. Here's why it matters and how to prepare your clients for it.

What Are Google AI Overviews?

AI Overviews are smart summaries generated by Google’s AI that now appear at the top of search results, especially on mobile. They aim to answer a user’s question directly, and then link to source websites that support the answer—often before the map pack or organic listings even appear.

For example, if someone searches “best family lawyer in Miami” or “how often should I clean my gutters in Tampa,” they might now see a short, AI-generated answer citing two or three websites. Those links are clickable, trusted, and highly visible.

Here’s an example for the search term – “Emergency Plumbing Tampa FL”.

This is becoming more common in local-intent searches, especially when the query involves education, services, or comparisons.

Why Local Agencies Should Pay Attention

Local businesses already fight for space in limited SERP real estate—between ads, map packs, and organic results, it’s crowded. AI Overviews take that to another level by sitting right at the top.

When your client is cited in an AI Overview:

• They show up before competitors, even above the local map pack in some cases.

• They benefit from higher credibility—Google is essentially endorsing their content.

• They get additional clicks from users who trust the AI summary and want to learn more.

For agencies, this is a way to prove ROI and drive traffic from high-value, informational queries—not just branded or “near me” searches.

Challenges to Getting Featured

The flip side? It’s not simple to rank in these overviews—especially for smaller, local businesses.

Google's AI tends to favor:

• Authoritative, well-written content

• Websites that already rank well organically

• Pages that answer specific, localized questions clearly

If your client's website is thin on content or lacks trust signals, they’re less likely to be chosen as a citation source. And since Google doesn’t offer a checklist for being included, your strategy has to be strong across the board.

What Local Agencies Can Do to Help Clients Rank

You can’t control Google’s AI directly—but you can significantly improve your clients’ chances of being featured by following smart content and SEO practices. We’re already helping local businesses rank in AI Overviews by putting these strategies into action:

• Create local content that answers questions. Write FAQs, or service pages that address questions your customers are asking: “What’s the cost of roof repair in Miami?” or “Do I need pest control in winter?”

• Optimize for clarity. Structure content with headings, summaries, and simple language making sure answers appear early in the content.

• Maintain strong SEO fundamentals. Google is still using ranking signals—page titles, on-page SEO, and backlink authority still matter.

• Use structured data. Mark up content with schema (e.g., LocalBusiness, FAQPage) to help Google understand it better.

• Build credibility. Encourage reviews, earn citations from local directories, and keep business listings consistent. These all build trust that Google’s AI can detect.

Now Tracking AI Overview Rankings for Local Clients

To help agencies manage this evolving landscape, we’ve added AI Overview tracking to our reporting dashboard.

You’ll be able to see when your client’s website is cited in an AI Overview

This visibility helps you show clients the value of our SEO strategy.

Final Thoughts

For local agencies, Google AI Overviews are both a challenge and an opportunity.

By helping clients create localized content, acquiring citations and maintaining strong SEO, you can position them to be the go-to source Google trusts. Being featured in AI Overviews means more than just higher rankings—it means authority, clicks, and visibility no ad budget can buy.

And with dashboard rank tracking now in place, you can measure and report that value like never before.