Decision Engine Optimization Case Study: How Soft Surfaces Won a £572,000 Contract Through AI Search

James Dooley: AEO official case study. Today I'm joined with Kasra Dash and we're going to be talking about why a Decision Engine Optimization strategy managed to win Soft Surfaces a £572,000 project and it's one that we would not have won if we hadn't have started to adapt the strategies to get AEO, GEO or AI SEO. We now call it in-house part of the strategy, Decision Engine Optimization. And it's about that 11th hour trying to make certain if you're being compared against competition when they've got them different quotes, who are they going to decide who they're going to place the order with? So many clients now are seeming to ask places like ChatGPT and the, and the places that they recommend when they insert the quote is one that then they're choosing to win the work. And this all happened to be a £572,000 3G football pitch that we secured. When we asked the head teacher, they basically said ChatGPT was the one that made the decision. So that is a huge case study for us that we want to shout and scream about. But we also want to make certain that people are watching this that are just going to think an AEO case study is about AI visibility, how many more clicks, how many more mentions that they have. It's not just about discovery and it's also about that 11th hour trying to convert those clients. So Kasra, over to you with regards to the Decision Engine Optimization case study.

Kasra Dash: Yeah. So I think one very important thing that you actually touched on is there's almost two sides to AEO or GEO or AI search, right? There's, there's one side which is obviously discovery, which is what I feel like most people are focusing on, just trying to get their clients discovered or trying to get their own business discovered, which is great. But what actually ends up happening after you have been discovered, or maybe even after you've spoke to a potential client that might be looking for your services, that's where Decision Engine Optimization comes in at. So, few things that James obviously mentioned on this was for a 3G football pitch um for a school in Manchester. The entire contract was valued at £572,000. Um, which we were actually the second most expensive out of all of the quotes that this um, that this client actually had. Now, one thing that obviously helped us in favor of actually winning that job is the fact that we had a lot of um things going in in our favor. So, we had a lot of testimonials. We had a lot of reviews. Our decision was like literally close to none. So, even if we were the most expensive, James, correct me if I'm wrong. I reckon that the person that was actually in charge of getting this quote, even if we were the most expensive, we still probably would have won that job.

James Dooley: Yeah, for sure. So, there was four people um in on it. Uh, four people had priced the work. We was the second most expensive. The one that was the, the most expensive, to be fair, was I think it would... Do you know what? I'm going to now, not now while I'm on, but I'm going to do that search and check to see what ChatGPT would come back with, because the one that was the most expensive and we was I believe about £15,000 cheaper than the most expensive one. They do have a lot of like legislation, regulations, accreditations. They've got some good case studies. They've got a good online presence. So, it would have been very, if it would have been the same price, it would have been very close. I probably would say a flip of a coin with would we have won the job or not won the job. But the ones that was cheaper than us, what was interesting is one of them didn't follow the specification and what they ended up doing is they didn't put what's called a tarmac subbase um onto the project, and that's what the actual school wanted. Now what the funny part was is that the school business manager didn't pick up on this. So what they was wanting to do is go with one of the two cheapest prices. Yet one of the cheapest prices didn't even meet the specification of what they was asking for. So that straight away with ChatGPT they realized that and said, "Well, you can't compare those, are out the window." So now there's only one of three companies that you can go with. Now we was cheaper than the one that was the most expensive, obviously. So because of everything else lined up and because we had all of our ducks in a row, we've got all the insurances. We've got all the accreditations. Why would they have gone with the most expensive? They just wouldn't, because we're cheaper and we do at least the same type of work of what they do, if not better. So then we're in a two-horse race. There's us and one that's cheaper than us. And at that point when it started to come back, it then started to look at comparison articles. It started to look at case studies of what we've done and like you said, the insurances. I have never seen... I've, I've always been a little bit obsessed by discovery and I think the whole SEO industry is obsessed by discovery and trying to increase AI citations and we've always done like the listicle and the comparison articles and try and do case studies and testimonials. But what I hadn't realized, which I didn't purposely do this to, for AEO or GEO, we had all over our website all of our badges like CHAS, Constructionline. Um, we had a certificate which is for our insurances and it was pulling all these accreditations down and it basically said it we've been trading for over two decades. And this other company hadn't been trading, even though they was given a 10-year guarantee, they'd only been trading for four years. So what it actually came back with in one of the answers was, "How can they be giving and warranting a 10-year guarantee when they've not even been trading for that long? How do you know that things are not going to go wrong?" And that was one part. And it just give a few question marks about it. And then as it came back and it says, "If you had to choose one company out of that, we believe that Soft Surfaces Limited is the best option." And this was a £572,000 project. It was a huge project for us. It was a full construction, 3G surfacing, flood lighting, fencing, everything. It was a big job. And we won it. And I asked the head teacher, "What would you have done if it would have picked another contractor?" And she literally turned around and I said, "Would you have used that other contractor?" And she went, "Absolutely. Yes, I would." I'm like, "So you was allowing ChatGPT to make that decision for you." "No, I fed it all the information. I give everything of what I thought was correct, but then yes, I allow ChatGPT to come back and say, 'Who do you think is the best value?'" Now for that, that is very different from discovery. That is that zero moment of truth. That is ChatGPT making the decision on part of the client that won us a £572,000 project. That is why now I am obsessed by bottom of the funnel Decision Engine Optimization.

Kasra Dash: Yeah, that's, I mean it's, it's, it's re, it's really important to have all of that in place because I mean if, if, if, if you've got three different quotes, you will probably end up just firing all three into ChatGPT. I mean, even, even I've done it. Um, like I'm I'm getting a new roof um on my new house and that's the first thing that I done. Literally put in all of the different quotes and I got ChatGPT to make the decision cuz the price was pretty much there or thereabouts against all three of them. Um, so just as a quick recap. Yeah, just as a quick recap while James answers his phone. Um, what, what, so one thing that you want to obviously make certain that you are doing is getting your reputation out there. Um, so many companies already have everything in place, like for example the awards, the accreditations, but they just don't actually say anything about it. Um, one other thing as well which was really important um, and I'd like to get your thoughts on it because this is a big issue in the UK. There are a lot of cowboy builders if, if you want to call them that. Let's say for example, James, I have a construction company and I've only been trading for five years, but part of my guarantee is for 10 years. Do you think that that could potentially harm what ChatGPT says about my quotes and about the decision making process?

James Dooley: Yeah, absolutely. I think that um AI is picking everything up. I think it from accreditations to how long you've been trading to what insurances you have, what warranties you have, what guarantees you have. Other what I found surprising was how much weight they put to case studies. So what other projects have you done similar to this size and similar to what they wanted and we've done several in and around the local area as well to Manchester where this job was and I think that that was a huge part as well as the accreditations and everything else. So holistically they're looking at everything and it's mad because you want to be trying to tick the box like what we talk about from discovery. We talk about it about query fan-out and ticking every single box and it's important for query fan-out. But now I was obsessed with it with discovery and not as being bottom of the funnel with, I think the best thing that someone could do is go and get one of your biggest competitors and go and get two quotes that you might be pricing up and say like two similar prices. So £50,000 and £50,000. I've got two quotes for £50,000. If you could only choose one in Doole's SEO and Kasra's SEO, which one would you choose and why? Do not sit on the fence and explain the reason why you've chose that company. Start to have a look at that and reverse engineer that part. So, not just the query fan-out, the answer over what they're saying, because a head teacher had no idea what query fan-out meant. I wasn't going to explain to her what it meant, but like she just asked the questions and then it came back with Soft Surfaces is the best. You know me when I was like segmenting and seeing what she'd said and I'm like, "Oh, like this one article here has massively helped influence that answer and this here, oh my God, this has been incredible." And there were certain bits that wasn't part of query fan-out that started to get me thinking, "Wow, I now have just created a whole new set of terms that I need to make certain from Decision Engine Optimization I'm optimizing for to get that zero moment of truth and get that conversion, which I think is key." What's your thoughts then, Kasra? I want to flip one back on to you on the marketing industry being obsessed with discovery as opposed to bottom of the funnel Decision Engine Optimization.

Kasra Dash: I mean, I, I understand it from a marketer's point of view because so many marketing people, they don't have that data set. They've only got, "Okay, I've been able to create 15 new listicles, get 65 new citations, build all these articles." Those are th, those are numbers that they can obviously break down and show their client and it looks glossy on the actual end report. But as a business owner, all of that doesn't mean anything if at the last minute you've got 50 one-star reviews and nobody's actually picking up your calls and stuff like that, right? So I think, I think, I think it's a very hard one for agencies to, to track potentially. Um, so it's, it's one of them. I, I think at the end of the day probably comes down to good communication, right? Like if I, if I'm doing AEO for you or for your company, James, I would want to be able to speak to you and say like, "Oh, we've done this part of reputation management online. Have you seen an increase in the actual sales?" Also equally I think it comes down to how good your sales team is as well and trying to do fact-finding of how that person came about your brand.

James Dooley: Yeah, for sure. I mean for me it's so difficult like you said there to put a price in it. Um, because this is branding, this is reputation management. This is way more than just AI visibility. And for me, the majority of people that just talk about the discovery, they're underselling their AEO services because they're not realizing that not only is it increasing AI visibility, it will further down the line increase their sales. And what they're doing at that zero moment of truth could be the difference between like us, the head teacher literally said they would not have gone with us if ChatGPT didn't say we was the best value. And that is just one project that I know about. There's so many others where we ask them and they went, "Oh yeah, we just decided to go with you. We've seen some stuff online. Some of those might be online, could have been asking AI, but they might not have wanted to say it." It just so happens to be that this head teacher said, "Yeah, I got ChatGPT to answer it." And as I got a good relationship with her, I said, "Would you?" And it was like, "I wouldn't have gone with you." I'm like, "That's a £572,000 project." So I wanted to make certain that we did this AEO case study. I wanted to make certain that we've named the business, which is Soft Surfaces Limited, that builds free 3G football pitches so people can literally see that. Stop being obsessed by AI citations and clicks and impressions and start actually looking at case studies with regards to AEO, GEO, AI SEO or what I'm now calling Decision Engine Optimization and think about all those zero moments of truth at the 11th hour when they're comparing two companies or in this case four companies side by side that AI could be the one that's recommending you. It is your 24/7 sales machine and that is why people need to be embracing AI, increase of AI visibility, doing DEO, AEO or GEO, whatever you want to call the acronym. If you don't want to call it just SEO, that's absolutely fine, but we hope you like this case study on Decision Engine Optimization. Kasra, it's been an absolute pleasure. Cheers, you guys.