AEO/GEO agencies are the new SEO scam

⏳ Read time: ~5 minutes

Sorry for the long time between issues. I have been busy speaking at a few conferences and just finished speaking at the Digital Marketers Conference yesterday about my ‘Franchise Trust Engine’ method.

More to come on that next newsletter.

I recently had Maddie Zook from Catalyst on the most recent The Franchise Marketer Podcast.

It’s a great listen for a free 60-minute consult with one of the world’s leading franchise marketers.

She runs a fractional CMO firm with her business partner, David Barr.

They work across 20-plus US franchise brands. Automotive. Health and wellness. Home services. Quick service. The whole spread.

Before Catalyst, Maddie spent 10 years inside MaidPro. She is also a franchisee in three different systems with her husband. She has worn every hat.

She knows what is happening across the US franchise market right now.

And most of what she said lines up with what I am seeing in Australia.

Here are the takeaways worth your time……….

Maddie has watched organic form leads drop 30 to 60 per cent year over year across her client base.

Same pattern in every vertical:

Organic traffic down

Form fills down

Phone calls up

Cost per lead on Google PPC is climbing

She calls it zero-click behaviour. Prospects no longer click through to research.

If they do convert, it is off the Google Business Profile. A phone call. Not a form.

Most franchisors have not updated their attribution model. They are reading their dashboards wrong.

A FACT YOU SHOULD KNOW

Organic search traffic is down 30 to 60 per cent year over year across most franchise industries.

This is consistent. Multiple years. Multiple verticals.

If your dashboards show declining form leads and you are blaming the website, you are blaming the wrong thing.

THE AEO AGENCY SCAM IS ALREADY HAPPENING

Maddie was direct on this one.

A few years ago she ruffled feathers calling out SEO packages sold to franchisees.

Her line: "There is nothing a franchisee can do to help their SEO but to get more reviews."

The same thing is starting again with AEO and GEO.

Her view: agencies are about to pitch AEO and GEO packages the same way they pitched SEO retainers. Same model. New acronym. Same outcome.

What she recommends instead:

Local listings are claimed and accurate

Google Business Profile is fully built out

Hyper-localised pages for every territory

Reviews are coming in consistently

Replies to every review

Short, sharp answers on your site

No agency shortcut. No $2K retainer fix.

In her words: "It is going to be so deeply rooted into every piece of your digital brand and your franchisees as well that it is something you build. It is long-term. You have to monitor."

THE 2,500 WORD BLOG IS DEAD

Three years ago, blog content meant 2,500 words. Keyword density. Internal links.

Maddie's read on where it is heading:

"AI is almost making it not an option. If you have these lengthy texts and all these forms that don't work, it doesn't want it. It is not efficient."

Short. Condensed. FAQ-heavy. Transparent pricing.

It is what both AI models and time-poor consumers want from a website now.

If your agency is still selling you long-form SEO blogs, they are running last decade's playbook.

SEGMENT BY BUYER INTENT, NOT DEMOGRAPHIC

This was the bit which stood out to me.

Maddie said franchisors are still treating their target market like one pond.

They are not. Inside any market, there are three stages of buyer intent:

Create: they do not know they need you yet

Convince: they know they need the service, but are unsure which brand

Close: they have decided to buy, choosing who

For a need-based service, only 5 to 15 per cent of the market is in the Create stage. 20 to 30 per cent are in Convince. 50 to 70 per cent are in Close.

For a want-based service, the split shifts. 25 to 45 per cent are in Create.

Your budget allocation should match where most of the market is sitting.

In her words: "Marketing is becoming more of a math formula. The people who exercise this formula and fine-tune it like a muscle are going to be the brands that win."

THE PAID ADS RULE MOST FRANCHISORS BREAK

Maddie's rule on channel selection:

Until you max out Google PPC, you have no business adding channels.

Her ceiling for home services: roughly $8,000 to $10,000 a month before demand caps out.

Google PPC is the bottom of the funnel. The Close stage. People searching there have already decided to buy and are choosing who.

You win those people first. Then you generate more demand at the top with Meta, billboards, direct mail.

Most franchisors run this backwards. They add channels before they have captured the available demand.

THE 12 TO 15 IMPRESSION RULE

This is the one to show your franchisees.

Maddie's framing: "For someone to give your business a yes, even just clicking on the link or giving you a call, they need between 12 and 15 impressions."

But not all impressions are equal.

T-shirt sighting: 1 to 2 impressions

A "really nice business card" moment, the kind where you wrote their dog's name on it (her example): 5 to 6 impressions

This reframes the conversation every local franchisee has with their franchisor. "Billboard, how many leads did I get from it?"

Wrong question. The billboard is not generating a lead. It is contributing to a threshold.

McDonald's franchisees spend 5 percent of weekly revenue on marketing. As Maddie put it: "What makes you think, as an ex-franchisee, you do not have to pay for leads?"

FIRE YOUR VENDORS ON A SCHEDULE

Maddie's rule: RFP every two years. No exceptions.

In the Australian language, review your marketing agencies constantly!

Her line: "If you are not outgrowing your suppliers or at least making them win back your business, then you are probably stalled. Everybody should be growing and evolving."

The bigger problem she sees: franchisors give vendors a target, not a range.

The call centre is told "60 per cent conversion is the standard."

So 60 per cent is the ceiling, not the floor.

Her fix: give vendors a range.

Conversion rate floor: 60 per cent

Cost per lead acceptable range: $50 to $110

Vendors who only see the target will game the metric. Vendors who see the range will work to the floor.

One more rule from Maddie: never bring in a non-franchise-experienced agency. Corporate multi-location is not the same as a franchise.

The model is too specific for generalists.

Her closing line on this: "These franchisees are your children. You owe it to them to provide the best. You do not owe the business to any of these suppliers."

WHAT AI IS GOING TO DO TO FRANCHISING

The hype answer is AI replaces departments.

Maddie's answer:

"It is going to make your B players potentially A players. It will get rid of your D and C players."

Not department elimination. Performance sorting.

A players stay A players. B players use the tools and close the gap. C and D players who refuse to learn lose their jobs.

5 to 10 years, not 5 to 10 months.

THE AMAZON BAR

The quote that stopped me. Maddie heard it from Abby Fogle at Unleash Brands and shared it on the pod:

"Consumers are not comparing you to your competitor all the time. They are often comparing you to the last thing they purchased. And that is often on Amazon."

Amazon set the bar.

Fast. Efficient. Clear pricing. Real reviews. One-click decisions.

If your franchise prospect researches your brand and runs into a dated website, a slow form, no recent video, and no reviews, you are losing them to the Amazon expectation. Not to a competitor.

Maddie's broader point: stop optimising for the lowest cost per acquisition. Optimise for the longest lifetime value.

WHAT YOU SHOULD DO THIS WEEK

Monday: Open ChatGPT and Gemini. Type three questions a prospect would ask before inquiring about your franchise. "Is [your brand] worth buying." "How much do [your brand] franchisees earn." Screenshot what the AI says about you.

See if you are even in the answer.

Wednesday: Audit your Google Business Profile for one location. Description current. Photos recent. Reviews answered. Fix the gaps and document the steps as a template for the rest of the network.

Friday: Pull your vendor list. Mark down the last time each one had to win the business. If any one of them has been on retainer for more than two years without an RFP, schedule one.

THE TAKEAWAY

Maddie's view on where franchise marketing is heading lines up with everything we are seeing here.

Zero-click behaviour is shifting the buyer journey.

The agencies will repackage foundation work as premium AEO retainers. Vendor loyalty will cost franchisors money.

The franchisors who win will treat marketing like a math formula, not a vibe.

If a prospect asked an AI tonight whether your franchise was worth buying, what would the AI say back?

PS: Full conversation with Maddie Zook is up on The Franchise Marketer Podcast. Spotify and Apple.

She also puts her strategy decks out on LinkedIn for free.

Worth a follow if you want to see how a US fractional CMO thinks about this stuff.

CHECK IT OUT HERE:

Each week, I interview marketing experts or share insights from the strategies I have used to help grow Jim’s by 2,000+ franchisees.

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