A few months ago, I typed a question into ChatGPT that I would normally have Googled. Instead of getting a list of links, I got an answer—confident, specific, and pulled together from sources I probably never would have clicked on.
That’s when it dawned on me: the way people find information has changed. And financial advisors need to start thinking differently about how they get found.
Investors are now doing the same thing I did. Instead of Googling “best financial advisor in Portsmouth” and working their way through a page of search results, they’re asking ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, or Google’s Gemini—and getting an answer that may refer them toward only a few firms.
That’s a pretty big shift for an RIA.
Your firm’s visibility is no longer just about where you rank on Google. It’s also about whether AI can find you, understand what you do, and decide whether you can provide a credible answer to the question someone is asking.
And that’s the part I think a lot of RIAs are missing.
If your website, content, reviews, and online presence aren’t giving these systems enough information to work with, you may not only rank lower—you may not show up at all.
And that’s happening at the exact moment a prospective client is trying to figure out who they can trust with their money.
The ground shifted before most of us noticed
For a long time, “how investors find advisors” was pretty straightforward: It was a Google search, an advertisement, or a referral from a friend or family member.
I don’t think that world is gone. But I do think it’s changing faster than most advisory firms realize.
Today, an investor can ask ChatGPT, “Help me find a fee-only financial advisor,” and get an answer—not a page of ten blue links. That answer is pulled together from a relatively small number of sources.
Your firm is either one of those sources, or it’s not part of the conversation.
And this isn’t some far-off, someday issue. It’s already happening in a few pretty obvious ways:
- AI Overviews are showing up above traditional search results for more advisor-related questions, giving a summary instead of a long list of links.
- Conversational AI—ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini—is becoming another step in the research process. Ask, “Help me find a fiduciary who specializes in retirement planning,” and you may get recommendations rather than a list of websites.
- Voice and AI-assisted search are making the process even more compressed. What used to require opening five tabs, reading a few articles, and comparing firms can increasingly start with one question and one answer.
The important point for advisors isn’t that you need to “do AI.”
It’s that you need to start thinking about whether your website and online content actually answer the questions investors are asking—and whether those answers are clear enough, useful enough, and credible enough for AI to find and use them.
What “Being Findable” Actually Means Now
For years, SEO was pretty straightforward: get your firm onto page one of Google.
That still matters. But there’s another layer to think about now.
What’s often called Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) or Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is less about ranking a page and more about being part of the answer.
That distinction matters.
AI tools aren’t just looking for the pages that rank highest. They’re looking for information they can understand, evaluate, and use to build an answer.
If your website clearly says, “Advisor Guidance provides RIA registration services for SEC and state registered investment advisors,” there’s no guessing what you do. That’s the kind of straightforward information an AI tool can understand and potentially use when someone asks a related question.
Compare that with a page built around a clever tagline or a vague mission statement. It might look great to a human, but it doesn’t necessarily tell an AI model—or a prospective client—what you actually do.
I’ve started thinking about it this way:
Write for a reader who is in a hurry, knowing an AI model may be reading over their shoulder.
Both want the answer up front.
Tell them what you do. Answer the question. Be specific. Then, if they want to learn more, give them the brand story.
Why trust signals matter more, not less
Here’s the part that surprises advisors we work with. AI models are, if anything, more sensitive to credibility than a traditional search ranking ever was. When a generative engine cites you, it’s effectively vouching for you — so these systems lean hard on what’s called E-E-A-T: Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness.
For an RIA, that boils down to a few concrete things:
- Put a real name on it. Content written under a named person with real credentials — a compliance director, a founder with decades in the business — simply reads as more trustworthy to a person, and to an AI model parsing the page.
- Be specific, not promotional. Getting the details right — Form ADV, the IARD system, SEC requirements — signals real expertise. Vague marketing language does the opposite.
- Say the same thing everywhere. AI models cross-reference. Your bio and credentials should match, whether someone’s reading your website, your LinkedIn, or a mention somewhere else.
- Keep it current. Content that gets reviewed and updated regularly reads as an active authority. A page that hasn’t moved since 2022 reads like a firm that stopped paying attention.
It’s Not Just Discovery — It’s Due Diligence Too
Here’s the part I think a lot of firms miss: this shift doesn’t stop at how prospects find you. It also changes how they evaluate you once they do.
Investors are asking AI tools questions like, “Does this advisor have any disciplinary history?” “How does this firm charge its clients?” or “What exactly does this advisor do?” And much of the information needed to answer those questions is already sitting in your Form ADV. It describes how your firm operates, the services you provide, how you’re compensated, your fees, potential conflicts, disciplinary information, and a whole lot more.
That’s where I think good, plain-English content can make a real difference. Take the information that’s already disclosed in your Form ADV and explain it in a way a real person can understand. What do you charge? How do you work with clients? What services do you provide? How are you different from other advisors?
Now you’re doing two things at once: helping a prospective client understand your firm and giving AI systems clear, accurate information they can use when someone starts asking questions about you.
That’s a pretty good reason to stop treating your Form ADV as just a regulatory document and start thinking about the information in it as a source for your marketing, too.
Where To Start?
The good news is, I don’t think most firms need to blow up their existing website to get ahead of this.
In fact, a lot of what matters most here is just good marketing: answer real questions, be specific, keep your content current, and make it clear who actually knows what they’re talking about.
The difference is that these things now matter to more than just the person visiting your website. They also matter to the AI tools trying to understand your firm and decide whether you’re a useful source.
So where should you start?
Look at the content you already have. Are you actually answering the questions your prospects are asking? Is the information specific? Is there a real person behind it? And when something changes, are you updating it?
You probably have more to work with than you think.
Over the next few posts, our team will dig into some of this in more detail—how AI intersects with compliance and the SEC Marketing Rule, whether it makes sense to bring AI tools in-house or lean on outside help, and a simple way to look at your own website and see whether it’s built for how people—and AI—are finding information today.
If you’re not sure where your firm stands, that’s where we can help. At Advisor Guidance, we can take a look at your website and content, identify the gaps, and help you build a practical plan to make your firm more visible—both to prospective clients and the AI tools they’re increasingly using to find advisors. Get in touch with our team to start the conversation.
