For firms hiring for marketing, SEO or content

Hiring a content marketer? Give them this brief first

Evangelos Pantidos · WhoAINames · 14 October 2026 · 8 min read

The short answer

Before a new content or SEO hire starts, check who AI assistants name for each of your services today. One page shows where you're missing, which firms are named instead and which sources the answers draw on. It turns their first 90 days from guessing into a plan you can measure, and the first version can be free.

Key takeaways

Buyers now ask AI assistants which firm to hire. Your new hire needs to know what those assistants say about you before they write anything.
The brief is one page: your services and offices, the questions buyers ask, how often you're named, who's named instead, and the sources behind the answers.
Measure the first 90 days on what the hire controls, and re-check the same questions at day 45 and day 90.
The same brief works whether the hire does the work, approves an outside team's work, or you hand the job to a managed programme.

What should a new marketing hire do first?

Find out where the firm stands before they publish anything. Most good 30/60/90-day plans for content hires start the same way: listen, review what exists, then plan. What's changed is where buyers look. Before they call a firm, many now ask an AI assistant who to hire, and the assistant answers with a short list of names.

BrightLocal's 2026 consumer survey found the share of US consumers using AI to find local business recommendations went from 6% to 45% in a year. Professional firms aren't plumbers, but the habit is the same: ask, get a shortlist, check the names. If your new hire doesn't know whether you're on that shortlist, for which services, they're planning blind.

What goes in the brief?

One page, six parts, built from real answers rather than opinions.

Services and offices. Every practice area or service line you want to grow, and every city you have an office in.
The buyer questions. For each service, the questions a client types, in their words.
How often you're named. Each question asked on several AI assistants, counted, not screenshotted.
Who's named instead. The firms the assistants recommend when they don't recommend you.
The sources behind the answers. The directories, ranking sites, review sites and competitor pages the assistants cite.
Three fixes first, and how you'll measure them. Chosen from the gaps above, with the same questions re-checked later.

The point isn't the document. It's that the hire's first decisions come from what buyers are actually told about you.

Which questions should they check?

At least one per service per office city, phrased the way a client would ask it. "Who's the best employment lawyer in Manchester for a tech company?" beats "employment law services". Then add the questions buyers ask before they shortlist anyone: how to choose a firm for this, and what it costs.

Test the wording too. A UK study by QualitySolicitors (over 700 manual tests across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews and Claude) reported that different phrasings of the same need returned different firms. And check more than one assistant: a July 2026 US study of 3,200 legal prompts found only 2.9% of the firms named were named by all three assistants it tested (CLM Sequoia). One question on one assistant tells your hire almost nothing. A small grid of questions across services and assistants tells them where to start.

What a filled-in brief looks like

Here's the brief filled in from a real check on a national UK law firm best known for personal injury, anonymised. We asked 20 buyer questions across five practice areas, each once on ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Mode: 80 answers.

Day-one brief · a national UK law firm (anonymised)

Checked 13 October 2026 · 4 AI assistants · each question asked once · UK-wide questions, no city

Services: Personal injury · medical negligence · commercial law · conveyancing · immigration
Buyer questions: 20, e.g. "Who are the best solicitors for a personal injury claim?", "How do I choose the best personal injury solicitors?", "How much do solicitors take for no win no fee?"
Named: 13 of 80 answers (16%). Personal injury 11 of 56 · medical negligence 1 of 8 · commercial 1 of 8 · conveyancing 0 of 4 · immigration 0 of 4
Where it's strong: "Best / top-rated / which personal injury solicitors": 10 of 16
Where it's missing: The same question asked about a "lawyer": 0 of 8 · how to find or choose: 0 of 8 · fees and costs: 1 of 24
Named instead: Rival firms. The report flags one as the top competitor.
Sources cited: A legal directory (Chambers), a lawyer-ranking site (Best Lawyers) and a competing firm's own website. The firm's own site wasn't among them.
Three fixes first: 1. Be listed and described for each practice area on the directory and ranking site the answers drew on. 2. Give each service a page that answers its buyer questions in the first lines. 3. Answer the how-to-choose and fee questions on the firm's own site.
Re-check: The same 20 questions, same assistants, at day 45 and day 90

A new hire reading this knows their first month's work on day one: the questions buyers ask before they shortlist anyone, and the practice areas the firm is almost never named for. They don't need to be told to "do some SEO".

Want this brief for your firm?Free AI Answer Report, by email within 2 business days. No call needed.

Get my free report →

What should their first 90 days deliver?

Things the hire controls, measured against the brief, not a promised ranking. A sensible shape:

Days 1–30: the brief done and agreed with the partners. Directory and ranking-site profiles checked for every practice area. The two or three services to start with chosen.
Days 31–60: one page per priority service that answers the buyer's question first, in the client's words, with something only your firm can say (outcomes, timelines, fee ranges, credentials). Profiles fixed where the answers draw their sources.
Days 61–90: the same questions re-checked, and partners quoted or reviewed for the priority services. Next quarter's list comes from what moved and what didn't.

How often AI names you is the number to watch, but it moves on its own timescale and differs by assistant. Judge the hire on the work the brief asked for, and use the re-check to decide what comes next.

Do they need an outside team?

Sometimes, and the brief is the same either way. Some firms give the new hire the brief and an outside team to handle the volume of pages, profiles and mentions, with the hire approving the work and owning the plan. Others decide the role they were hiring for is better filled by a managed programme from the start. Many do some of both.

Whichever you choose, start with the same page: who AI names for each of your services today.

Questions partners ask

Should a new content marketer start by writing articles?

No. Start with a baseline: which buyer questions AI answers for each of your services today, and who it names. Writing before that means guessing which pages matter.

How many questions should the brief cover?

At least one per service per office city, in the words clients use, plus the questions buyers ask before they shortlist anyone: how to choose a firm, and what it costs.

Which AI assistants should we check?

More than one. Assistants often name different firms for the same question, so check at least ChatGPT and Perplexity, and ideally Gemini and Google's AI answers too.

What should a new hire be measured on in the first 90 days?

On things they control: the baseline done, the pages and profiles fixed, and the same questions re-checked at day 45 and day 90. How often AI names you is the trend to watch, not a target to promise.

Do we need an outside team as well as the hire?

Not always. Some firms give the hire the brief and an outside team to do the volume work, with the hire approving. Others hand the whole job to a managed programme. Both start from the same brief.

Sources

BrightLocal, Local Consumer Review Survey 2026: share of US consumers using AI for local business recommendations, 6% to 45%. brightlocal.com (US consumers).
QualitySolicitors AI recommendation study, reported in Today's Family Lawyer, 28 April 2026: over 700 manual tests, 14 prompts, ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews and Claude, seven UK locations. todaysfamilylawyer.co.uk (full methodology not published).
CLM Sequoia (Custom Legal Marketing), "ChatGPT, Claude and Google AI Mode rarely recommend the same law firms", data collected 28–29 July 2026, 3,200 prompts across 100 US metros and 32 practice areas. custom.legal (US data; the study's authors sell legal marketing).
The filled-in example: a check run on one national UK law firm, 13 October 2026, 20 questions × 4 AI assistants, each asked once. Firm and rival names withheld.

Download the blank day-one brief (printable)

Evangelos Pantidos, WhoAINames. Independent AI search advisor and AEO Engine Partner for professional service firms past €1M in revenue. I check what AI assistants say about firms before I say anything about them.

LinkedIn · contact@whoainames.com

Get the brief for your firm, done for you

The free AI Answer Report runs your firm's main buyer questions across four AI engines and shows, question by question, which engines name you, and which rival firm is named most. Within 2 business days.

Get your free AI Answer Report