How Ikram Rana turned a visibility problem into AI Search Ready
Ikram Rana is the founder of AI Search Ready, which helps local service businesses understand how they appear in AI answers and address gaps in their websites and public information. The conversation traces the service from a visibility problem at Barrana.ai to a practical testing process, and explains why progress needs to be measured across customer questions rather than one successful recommendation.
AI visibility work should be treated as a test-and-improve process: track a fixed set of customer questions, distinguish mentions from links and accuracy, and retest after making changes. A single recommendation is not reliable evidence of broader progress.
What’s the short story of how your business started, and what makes it genuinely different from the other options your customers have?
AI Search Ready started with our own business, Barrana.ai. We weren’t seeing it appear in AI recommendations for the services we offered, so we started looking into why.
We audited the website, improved the SEO and worked through our online presence step by step. As we made those changes, we began seeing Barrana.ai appear in relevant recommendations. That experience became the starting point for AI Search Ready.
Our service connects testing with practical work. We ask AI platforms the questions a potential customer would ask, record which businesses and sources appear, and identify gaps we can address. Then we improve the website content, business information and relevant profiles before repeating the questions to see what changed.
We focus on local service businesses, and I stay involved in every project. Customers get clear priorities, help implementing them and a record of the results.
How did you win your first customers, and where does most of your new business come from today?
Our first customers already worked with us on automation projects through Barrana.ai. They knew our work and began asking for help with SEO and AI search visibility. Those relationships brought us our first projects.
We’ve since had two or three new enquiries from people who told us ChatGPT recommended us while they were looking for an agency. Those conversations are still ongoing.
In our own signed-out ChatGPT test on 16 October 2026, AI Search Ready was named and our website was linked for questions including “local SEO and AI search agency Vaughan” and “best GEO agency Vaughan.”
Existing customer relationships have brought us most of our initial work, and we are beginning to receive enquiries through AI recommendations too.
What’s one decision that changed the direction of your business, and one mistake that taught you the most?
The decision that changed our direction was turning the work we had done for Barrana.ai into a dedicated service. We had worked through our own visibility problems and could see an opportunity to help other businesses with the same issue.
An early mistake was putting too much weight on a positive AI recommendation. Our testing showed that the same business could appear for one question and be missing from another, even when both covered similar services in the same city.
That taught us to measure progress across a fixed set of customer questions. We now record mentions, website links and accuracy separately, then repeat the questions over time. It gives us a clearer picture of what is improving and what still needs work.
What has changed in your industry or in what your customers expect over the last couple of years, and how have you adapted?
We’re seeing AI recommendations become part of how people choose a service provider. Prospective customers have told us they found us through ChatGPT, so this has become a practical business issue for us.
We’ve adapted by looking beyond a website’s Google performance. We also check how AI platforms describe a business, whether they mention it for relevant customer questions and which sources they reference.
Alongside website and SEO improvements, we work on accurate business information, useful service content and relevant profiles across the web.
We also keep recommendations, website visits and enquiries separate. Being mentioned is useful, but we need to understand whether it brings the business relevant opportunities.
If you were advising someone starting out in your industry today, what would you tell them to do first, and what would you tell them to ignore?
Start by doing this work for a real business, ideally your own. Audit the website, check that its business information is accurate and ask the questions a customer would ask before hiring it. Save the answers so you have something to compare against later.
Get the basics right first. The business name, locations, services and credentials should be clear and consistent across the website and relevant profiles. Publish useful answers to real customer questions, then test again after making changes.
I would ignore promises of guaranteed AI recommendations and conclusions drawn from one successful search. Learn how to investigate a problem, make the changes and explain the evidence honestly. That is the foundation I would build the service on.
Thank you to Ikram Rana and the team at AI Search Ready for sharing what actually worked with Leaders Perception readers.
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