Online marketing for small business has never been a quick win. The businesses that show up consistently in search results — on Google, on Google Maps, in local directories, and now in AI-generated answers — got there through sustained, structured effort over months and years. That hasn't changed. What's changed is the number of channels that matter, the tools available to work them, and the speed at which AI is reshaping how people find businesses in the first place.

Here's how we think about online and direct marketing for small business in 2025 — and what the smartest operators are doing differently.

It starts with the website — always

Every online marketing programme, regardless of channel, points back to the website. Your Google Business Profile links to it. Your search rankings depend on it. Your email campaigns drive traffic to it. If the website doesn't convert visitors into enquiries, everything upstream is working to fill a leaky bucket.

Before any SEO or marketing work begins, the website needs to be structurally sound. That means fast load times, clean mobile performance, logical page structure, and content that gives visitors a clear reason to get in touch. It also means the SEO fundamentals are in place — correct heading hierarchy, descriptive metadata, schema markup, and internal linking that distributes authority correctly across the site.

These aren't one-time tasks. As the business evolves, the website needs to evolve with it. New services need new pages. Pricing changes need to be reflected. New case studies and testimonials need to be added. The website that works hardest for your business is the one that's kept current — and that requires an ongoing commitment, not a once-every-three-years rebuild.

On-page SEO — the foundation that everything else builds on

On-page SEO is the work done within the website itself to help search engines understand what each page is about and why it deserves to rank. It's unglamorous, methodical work — but it's the foundation that everything else depends on.

The core elements are well established: keyword research to understand what potential customers are actually searching for; titles and meta descriptions that match search intent; heading structure that signals the hierarchy and focus of each page; body copy that covers the topic in depth without keyword stuffing; image optimisation including file names and alt text; and internal links that connect related content and help distribute ranking authority across the site.

What AI has changed here is the speed of execution. Keyword research that previously took a specialist hours to compile can now be synthesised in minutes. Content briefs based on what's ranking for target terms can be generated instantly. Metadata can be drafted, reviewed, and applied across an entire site in a fraction of the time it used to take. Tools like Ahrefs surface the data; AI helps interpret it and turn it into action.

Off-page SEO — still essential, still a long game

If on-page SEO tells search engines what your site is about, off-page SEO tells them why it should be trusted. Links from other websites pointing to yours remain one of the most significant ranking signals Google uses — and that hasn't changed despite a decade of predictions that it would.

For small businesses, off-page work typically means building citations in relevant directories, earning mentions and links from local publications and industry sites, managing and responding to reviews across Google and other platforms, and creating content that's genuinely worth linking to.

Link building is slow, and anyone who tells you otherwise is selling something. But a domain with strong, relevant inbound links consistently outranks one without them — and that gap compounds over time.

The discipline is in doing it consistently. One link-building push followed by months of inactivity is far less effective than a steady, ongoing effort that builds authority gradually. This is one of the strongest arguments for an ongoing marketing programme rather than project-based engagements — the compounding effect of sustained off-page work is where the real long-term gains come from.

Google Business Profile — the most underused tool in local marketing

For most small businesses that serve a local or regional market, Google Business Profile is the single highest-return online marketing asset available — and the majority of businesses treat it as an afterthought.

A complete, well-maintained GBP puts your business in front of local customers at the exact moment they're searching for what you offer — in the map pack, in local search results, and increasingly in Google's AI Overviews. It's free. And it compounds: more reviews, more posts, more photos, and more complete information all improve visibility over time.

The work involved is straightforward: keeping business information accurate and complete, posting regularly, responding to every review (positive and negative), adding photos, and using the Q&A section to answer common questions. AI makes this faster — posts drafted in seconds, review responses generated and personalised, photo descriptions written automatically. The barrier to doing it well has dropped significantly.

Bing — the channel most competitors are ignoring

Microsoft's search engine is often dismissed by marketers focused on Google, but it retains a meaningful share of the search market — particularly among older demographics and enterprise users on managed Windows devices where Bing is the default.

More importantly, Bing powers the search results that surface in Microsoft Copilot, and it's the primary index behind several AI assistants. Being well-represented in Bing isn't just about Bing search traffic — it's about appearing in the AI-generated answers that are increasingly where people are getting information.

The effort required is relatively small once the core SEO work is done. Bing Webmaster Tools, Bing Places, and consistent structured data on the website are the main levers. Most businesses don't bother — which is precisely why it's worth doing.

GEO — the new frontier that most businesses haven't started on

Generative Engine Optimisation is the practice of structuring your content and online presence so that AI assistants — ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI Overviews, Microsoft Copilot — cite your business in their answers. It's the newest and fastest-evolving area of search marketing, and the gap between early movers and late adopters is opening up right now.

When someone asks ChatGPT "who are the best plumbers in South Yarra?" or "what's the most reliable business email setup for a small team?", the answer comes from somewhere. AI assistants synthesise information from across the web — published articles, structured data, authoritative mentions, and increasingly their own training data. The businesses that show up in those answers have typically done some or all of the following:

  • Published detailed, question-and-answer formatted content that directly addresses the queries their customers are likely to ask AI assistants
  • Structured their website content with schema markup that makes it easy for AI systems to understand and cite
  • Built a consistent presence across authoritative directories and platforms that AI training data draws from
  • Earned mentions and citations from credible third-party sources in their industry or location
  • Maintained consistent business information (name, address, phone, URL) across every online presence

GEO isn't a replacement for traditional SEO — it builds on it. A business with strong on-page SEO, good off-page authority, and a well-maintained GBP is already positioned better than most for AI visibility. The additional layer is content that's explicitly designed to answer the questions AI assistants field — and that's structured in a way that makes it easy for those systems to use.

The businesses showing up in ChatGPT and Perplexity answers today didn't get there by accident. They got there by publishing the kind of content that AI systems are designed to surface — specific, authoritative, well-structured, and genuinely useful.

How AI and tools like Ahrefs are changing the work

The strategic principles of online marketing haven't changed — but the tooling has, dramatically. Two categories of tools have had the biggest impact on how we deliver SEO and online marketing programmes: AI language tools and data platforms like Ahrefs.

Ahrefs is a comprehensive SEO intelligence platform that tracks keyword rankings, analyses competitor link profiles, identifies technical site issues, monitors brand mentions, and surfaces content gap opportunities. For a small business, the insight it provides used to be accessible only through expensive agency retainers or a specialist hire. It's now a core part of how we track what's working, identify what needs attention, and report back to clients in plain language.

What AI adds on top of Ahrefs data is interpretation and execution speed. A monthly Ahrefs report surfaces rankings changes, new opportunities, and competitor movements. AI turns that raw data into a prioritised action list, a set of content briefs, and updated on-page recommendations — in minutes rather than hours. The analysis-to-action cycle that used to take weeks now takes a session.

For content — the single most important ongoing input for SEO — AI has changed what's possible for a small business. A consistent publishing schedule of well-researched, properly optimised articles, FAQs, service pages, and local content used to require either a significant time commitment from the business owner or an expensive content team. AI makes it possible to produce that volume of quality content within a realistic small business budget — as long as the output is reviewed, shaped, and approved by someone who actually knows the business and its customers.

Email and direct marketing — still the highest-return channel

Organic search is a long game. Email is immediate. For businesses with an existing list of customers and prospects, a consistent email marketing programme remains the highest-return channel available — with open rates and engagement metrics that paid channels can't match.

The challenge for most small businesses isn't strategy — it's consistency. Campaigns that go out once a year, or only when there's a promotion to announce, don't build the ongoing presence that keeps a business front of mind when a customer is ready to buy again or refer someone.

A regular programme — monthly at minimum, fortnightly for businesses with enough to say — that delivers something genuinely useful to the reader compounds over time. AI makes it easier to maintain that consistency: campaign topics outlined in advance, drafts generated from a brief, subject lines tested and improved, and performance data used to refine the next send. The platform does the sending and tracking; AI handles the creation; the business owner approves and adds the human context that makes it feel real.

The bottom line — sustained effort, across the right channels, with better tools

Online marketing has never rewarded short-term thinking. The businesses that consistently show up — in Google search, in the map pack, in AI-generated answers, and in their customers' inboxes — got there through disciplined, sustained effort across multiple channels over an extended period.

What's different in 2025 is that AI has made it possible to sustain that effort at a much lower cost, to act on data faster, and to show up in channels — particularly AI search — that simply didn't exist two years ago. The competitive window for establishing a strong GEO presence is right now, before most competitors have even heard the term.

The fundamentals still apply. Do the on-page work. Build the off-page authority. Keep the Google Business Profile current. Publish content that genuinely answers your customers' questions. Stay in contact with your list. Measure what's working and do more of it.

AI doesn't change any of that. It just makes all of it faster, smarter, and more accessible for businesses that couldn't previously afford to do it properly.

EffektivWeb runs online and direct marketing programmes for Australian small businesses — covering Google SEO, Bing, Google Business Profile, GEO, and email marketing, with Ahrefs and AI running through every engagement. Find out more about our Online Marketing service →