Late last year, a friend in the hardware export business sent me a screenshot.
He had searched “Chinese furniture hardware suppliers” on ChatGPT. The AI listed six company names, each with a brief recommendation. He scrolled through the entire response and told me: “Two of them are my competitors. I’m not on there.”
This isn’t a future scenario. This is happening right now.
I’ve been tracking the impact of AI search on B2B foreign trade, and earlier this year I conducted a dedicated research study. Two data points stood out — I kept going back to them over and over:
51% of B2B procurement managers say their first step in the sourcing process is no longer opening Google — it’s opening an AI tool. They ask ChatGPT, DeepSeek, Grok — “Who are the best Chinese suppliers in this category?” “Which factory has the most reliable delivery?” The AI gathers information from across the web, organizes it into an answer, and directly provides a recommendation list.
The second data point is even more critical: over 80% of the companies and brands cited in AI responses are not in the top 10 Google search results.
Put these two numbers together and the message is clear: you may have spent enormous effort climbing Google rankings — landing on page 3, page 5 — and nobody sees you. But in the AI era, AI doesn’t look at rankings. It looks at content quality, information structure clarity, and how a brand “exists” on the internet. A website that never made it into Google’s top 10 could still get recommended by AI.
Flip that around, and it becomes even more practical for you and me:
If you don’t have an independent website at all, AI doesn’t even have an entry point to know you exist.
AI Doesn’t Invent Answers from Thin Air — It Needs an “Anchor”
Many people have a misconception about AI: they think it works like a search engine, crawling the entire web whenever you ask a question.
That’s not how it works. The way AI conversational tools build knowledge is more like assembling a jigsaw puzzle — it pulls fragments of information from the web, uses a set of rules to judge which information is credible and relevant, then pieces them together into a complete answer. In this process, structured data determines whether AI can “understand” what kind of company you are.
What is structured data? Simply put, it’s using specific markup language in your website code to tell AI: “This text is the company name,” “This is the main business,” “This is a customer review.” This markup is called Schema, and it doesn’t affect your website’s appearance — your customers won’t see it — but AI can read it.
Schema markup, llms.txt index files, FAQPage structured Q&A — these are the key configurations that let AI “understand” you.
Alibaba.com doesn’t open its Schema interface, so your information is just unstructured text in AI’s eyes. Some all-in-one website building platforms (like Wix, Webflow) started supporting Schema and llms.txt in 2026, but with limited control granularity — you can only toggle them on or off globally, not fix them item by item. What truly enables deep control is a self-hosted independent website: you have full code access, and Schema markup can be precise down to every page, every field.
I installed an SEO plugin called SureRank on my own website. One of its core features is automatically detecting and fixing Schema errors. When I first installed it, the site had over 20 incomplete Schema markings — some pages were missing company type markers, some product information was missing price ranges. After fixing them, Google Search Console started showing “rich result” display data, and AI tools occasionally surfaced my website in their results.
This experience confirmed one thing for me: the value of an independent website in the AI era isn’t “an additional lead channel” — it’s “a structured profile that AI can read and understand.”
With this profile, AI knows you’re a company — not a blog post, a product listing, or a temporary page pushed up by an algorithm. That’s the fundamental difference.
“I Have an Alibaba.com Store — Isn’t That Enough?”
Many factory owners ask this question. I completely understand — the Alibaba.com annual fee isn’t cheap, you do get inquiries, you do get customers, so why spend a few thousand extra on an independent website?
Let me approach this from a different angle.
The essence of Alibaba.com is a “closed marketplace.” Your product information, company information, and transaction records all live within the walls of this marketplace. In the traditional search era, Google crawlers could crawl in — your Alibaba store pages might appear in Google search results. But in the AI search era, things have changed.
When AI conversational tools build knowledge graphs, they prioritize “information from authoritative open websites” far above “information from within closed platforms.” This is because AI needs verifiable, traceable, structurally marked data sources — exactly what platform product pages can’t provide.
This isn’t theoretical speculation. I encountered this comparison firsthand while building my own independent website:
I simultaneously maintain my independent website and several articles on Zhihu (a Chinese Q&A platform). Several times when I searched “foreign trade website building” related questions in AI tools, my independent website homepage appeared in AI recommendation lists. But my Zhihu answers — which had far more views — were never cited by AI even once. Some might say “Zhihu blocks crawlers,” but the more fundamental reason is: my independent website has complete Schema markup; Zhihu doesn’t. AI determines the former’s information is more structured and more credible.
I’m not saying Alibaba.com is useless. It has its own value, especially for immediate inquiries and existing customer relationships. But from the perspective of “getting AI to recommend you in its answers,” an independent website is the entry point you fully control — third-party platforms can supplement your information sources, but only an independent website gives you complete data ownership.
An Independent Website Isn’t the Goal — It’s Your “ID Card” in the AI World
At this point, I want to be clear — this article isn’t advocating “hurry up and build an independent website.”
What I want to say is: In 2026, an independent website is no longer an optional “should I or shouldn’t I” — it’s your “ID card” in the AI world. Without this card, AI doesn’t know you exist; with it, AI at least knows who you are, what you do, and why you’re worth recommending.
But having the card doesn’t automatically mean you’ll get AI recommendations. This is where many people get confused.
My own strategy has three layers — let me share what I actually do:
Layer 1: The independent website as an “authoritative profile repository.” Schema markup, llms.txt index, FAQ pages, About pages — all the structured information that helps AI “recognize” your company is centrally deployed on your independent website. The core goal of this layer is letting AI know “who you are” — not lead generation, not conversion.
Layer 2: Third-party platforms as a “source network.” Zhihu, LinkedIn, industry forums, G2 — on these platforms, there are discussions about you, your answers, your case studies. When AI sees the same company’s information across multiple platforms and cross-validates it, its recommendation confidence increases significantly. The core goal of this layer is letting AI confirm “you are indeed what you say you are.”
Layer 3: Conventional SEO and content updates. Google rankings, keyword coverage, blog updates — these ensure more people see your information when searching for your product category. SEO doesn’t become obsolete because of AI search, but its role has genuinely changed: from “the only customer acquisition channel” to “one node in the information distribution network.”
These three layers are interconnected. Only build an independent website, and AI knows who you are but lacks cross-validation. Only spread across third-party platforms, and AI sees discussions about you but has no authoritative anchor. Only do SEO without touching AI GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), and you’re only walking the traditional search path — while 51% of procurement decision-makers have already taken a detour.
For how these three layers specifically come together — especially how the independent website layer is built from scratch and what level of AI GEO capability different budgets correspond to — I’ve broken it down by outcome into three tiers on my website building packages page. Feel free to take a look — you don’t have to hire me, but that table at least gives you a clear picture of “what an AI-readable website looks like.”
The Real Question in 2026 Isn’t “Should I Build an Independent Website”
Let’s go back to that opening scenario.
A German procurement manager opens ChatGPT and types “best Chinese furniture hardware suppliers.” In seconds, AI scans thousands of pieces of information online, selects from those with structured markup and multi-platform cross-validation, and picks six recommendations.
Your factory isn’t on the list. This has nothing to do with how much you spent on advertising, or how many years you’ve had an Alibaba.com store. It comes down to one thing — can AI “understand” you?
In 2026, the independent website isn’t a “should I or shouldn’t I” question — most of your competitors already have one. The real question is: are you preparing to let AI recognize you, or are you preparing to continue being absent from AI answers?
51% of procurement decisions already start with AI, and this number is still climbing. Every day you wait is another day you’re not in the answer.
This isn’t fear-mongering. It’s like twenty years ago when people asked “should a foreign trade company have a website,” or fifteen years ago when they asked “should I open an Alibaba.com store.” In hindsight, the answers were obvious. The difference is, this time the window might be shorter.
In the next article, I’ll tackle another question many people struggle with: AI website building tools can now generate a site in 30 seconds — fast and cheap. How does that really compare to hiring someone to build with WordPress? I’ve tested this myself, and the conclusion might surprise you.
