Why is nobody finding my website? A solo consultant's checklist

I run AI CMO Studio, and the free tools I mention below are ours. What Google, OpenAI and Perplexity say here is linked to their own pages, checked on 17 October 2026.

What are the three reasons a site gets no visitors?

A website with no visitors is a site that no route leads to. Visitors arrive by three routes: a search engine lists the page, someone shares or links it, or an AI assistant names it in an answer. If all three are closed, the site is live and silent.

Picture a solo consultant who checks analytics on a Monday and sees almost nothing for the month. The homepage has not changed in a year. She assumes the site is broken. Usually it is not; one of the routes was never opened. The steps below go in the order that wastes the least time.

Step 1: How do I check if Google has indexed my site?

Indexed means Google has stored the page and can show it in results. Google's own tool for this is URL Inspection in Search Console, which, in Google's words, provides the current index status of a page.

1. 01Open Google Search Console and add your site if you have not.
2. 02Paste the full address of your homepage into the inspection bar at the top.
3. 03Read the status: “URL is on Google” means the page is indexed, “URL is not on Google” means it is not.
4. 04Repeat for your services page and your newest article.

Google's Page indexing help says to check your homepage and key pages this way, and that all of your important pages should be indexed. If a page shows as indexed in URL Inspection but is missing from the Page indexing report, it was probably indexed recently and will appear there soon.

If a page is not on Google, the same tool lets you test the live URL and ask Google to crawl it. Google's page on recrawling says crawling can take anywhere from a few days to a few weeks, and that asking does not guarantee the page will appear in results instantly, or at all.

If your homepage, services page and newest article all show “URL is on Google”, this step passes. Move on to Step 2.

Step 2: Why is my website not showing up on Google for what I do?

Google can only match a page to a search by what the page says. If your homepage never says “pricing consultant for accountants” in words, it has little to match when someone searches for that, and a visitor who does land there cannot tell whether you are the right person.

Open your homepage in a private window and read only the top of the page, as a stranger would. Answer three questions in ten seconds:

• What do you do?
• Who is it for?
• What does it cost, or where does the price start?

If any of the three answers is missing, that is the fix. “Helping businesses thrive” fails. “Pricing strategy for solo accountants, from a fixed-fee audit” passes.

Write the answers as plain sentences near the top, not inside an image or a slider. Then list your services on their own page with one paragraph each: the problem, who it suits, what the client gets, what it costs. Our free Roast my homepage tool reads the first screen if you want a second pair of eyes.

Step 3: Is my site visible when people ask ChatGPT, Perplexity or Gemini?

Some buyers now ask an assistant who to hire before they search. Test it yourself tonight, with no tools:

1. 01

   Open ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini

   A fresh or logged-out chat, so you get the answer a stranger gets.

2. 02

   Ask what a client would ask

   Who is a good <your service> for <your kind of client>?

3. 03

   Write down who is named

   And what each answer says about them: services, prices, places.

4. 04

   Open the named sites and compare them with yours

   Do they state services, prices and audience in plain words where yours does not?

Our AI Visibility Check does the same for you: five buyer questions to ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini, free, no account, and it shows whether the answers name you or a competitor. It also reads your homepage, robots.txt, llms.txt and sitemap.

Can ChatGPT and Perplexity reach your site at all?

Check your robots.txt. OpenAI uses OAI-SearchBot for ChatGPT search, and its crawler page says sites that block it will not be shown in ChatGPT search answers, though they can still appear as navigational links; OpenAI recommends allowing it. GPTBot, which gathers content that may be used for training, is a separate setting, so you can allow one and block the other.

Perplexity's crawler page says PerplexityBot is what surfaces and links websites in its search results, and that it is not used to train AI models. Perplexity-User visits a page when a person asks a question and may link to it in the answer.

User-agent: OAI-SearchBot
Allow: /

User-agent: PerplexityBot
Allow: /

Access is only the start: being readable does not mean being named. The longer account is in Why doesn't ChatGPT mention your website?, and the free llms.txt generator writes a ready-to-publish llms.txt from your own pages.

Why does a site that never changes miss new buyers?

A site that has not changed in a year only answers the questions it answered a year ago. Each page answers one question a buyer can arrive with, so a question with no page is a question you cannot be found for.

The practical test: list the questions clients asked you in the last three months, and search your site for each. Every question without a page is a place where you cannot be found.

How do I get found online as a consultant? What to publish first

Publish one page per question your buyers ask, starting with the ones closest to a purchase.

1. 01Your main service page. What it is, who it is for, what it costs or where pricing starts, how to book.
2. 02A comparison page. If clients ask “freelancer or agency?” or “you or doing it myself?”, answer it with a table: cost, time, what each rules out.
3. 03A page for the question you hear most. Write the answer first, then the detail.
4. 04A page on what working with you looks like. Steps, timeline, what the client provides.

Write each in your own words, using the offer and prices you already quote. For a model, see our own cost comparison, what marketing costs a small business, where the options sit side by side.

How long until a consultant gets found online?

On Google, days to weeks: a page can show once it is indexed, and Google says a crawl you request takes anywhere from a few days to a few weeks. For being named by an assistant, nobody can honestly give you a date; it depends on what your pages, and other people's pages, say.

What you control is the order: indexed pages first, a plain homepage second, one useful page per buyer question after that. Then re-check Search Console and your three assistant questions once a month, and compare.

Working with AI CMO Studio

AI CMO Studio reads your website, learns your offer, prices, buyers and competitors, and writes a plan for the month. Specialists draft articles, posts and newsletters, and nothing goes out without your yes. The set-up is free with no card: a site read, a plan and brand documents in about ten minutes. Creator is $59 a month for people with no website, Business is $159 a month for a website that should bring customers, and single agents start at $5 a month; everything is on the pricing page. The studio is in beta.

Start free and see what it reads from your own site.