AI SEO for solar contractors. A 90-day playbook.

Residential solar in the PNW is in a strange spot. Federal solar tax credits got extended through 2032, Oregon and Washington both have additional state-level incentives, and homeowners are asking ChatGPT, "is solar worth it in Portland" before they ever call a contractor. Most solar installers are still running websites that read like 2018 brochures. The contractors who win the next 24 months will be the ones whose service pages get cited by name when AI engines answer "best solar company near me" queries. This is the 90-day playbook to get there.

Day 1. The AI Overview is the new "above the fold."

Open Google in a private browser. Search "residential solar Portland." Look at the top of the page. Three businesses are named in the AI Overview box. Those three are getting the leads. Everything below is Google's blue links, which still matter, but the box decides the click. If you are not one of those three, you are not in the consideration set for buyers who use AI to research before they decide.

AI Overviews are not random. They pull from sites that have three things: FAQ schema markup, structured answers to specific questions, and a Google Business Profile that has been active in the last 30 days. Most solar contractors fail on all three.

The 5 patterns that decide whether AI cites your solar business.

We audited 40 PNW solar contractor websites between Portland, Seattle, Bend, Eugene, Boise, and Spokane. Same five patterns showed up on the ones that don't get cited.

Pattern 01. No FAQ schema on your top service pages.

Google's AI Overview lifts answers directly from FAQPage JSON-LD. If your "residential solar installation" page does not have it, you are invisible to queries like "how much does residential solar cost in Portland" or "what tax credit do I get for solar in Oregon," even if your body copy has those exact answers. Body copy is not enough. Schema is what makes it parseable.

Pattern 02. Tax credit content is buried.

The federal solar Investment Tax Credit is 30 percent through 2032. Oregon Department of Energy offers additional rebates. Washington has state and utility-level incentives, and Boise homeowners get IRS credit access too. Every homeowner asks AI, "what tax credit do I get for solar" before they ask for a quote. If your site does not have a dedicated, FAQ-marked-up page on incentives by state, you lose the question. The contractor who owns that page owns the lead.

Pattern 03. Battery storage gets no dedicated page.

Battery storage (Tesla Powerwall, Enphase IQ Battery, Franklin WH) is the fastest-growing attach to solar installs. Homeowners who already have solar are searching for "add battery to existing solar Portland." Most solar contractor sites bury battery on a generic services page. Build a dedicated battery storage page with FAQ schema and you own a query nobody else is competing for.

Pattern 04. City-specific content is templated.

You serve Portland, Salem, Eugene, Bend. You have four city pages with the same content and the city name swapped. AI engines see this pattern as duplicate and pick one, usually not yours, because a national franchise has more topical authority. The fix is unique content per city, different incentive eligibility, different climate notes (Portland is overcast, Bend is high-desert), different local utility programs.

Pattern 05. No quote calculator or interactive estimate tool.

Interactive elements like a "what would my monthly bill be" calculator do two things. They get linked from third-party guides, which builds backlinks. And they signal to AI engines that the page is a useful answer to the most common pre-purchase question, which lifts your citation probability. The contractor with the simplest, clearest solar cost calculator on the PNW gets disproportionate organic traffic.

The 90-day execution plan.

Days 1-15. Schema everything that already exists.

Pick your top five service pages, residential solar, battery storage, commercial solar, solar maintenance, and solar tax credits. Add FAQPage JSON-LD to each. Write 5-7 questions a homeowner would actually ask before calling. Answer each in 2-4 short sentences. Wrap the whole thing in FAQPage schema. Do the same for the homepage.

Validate every schema block in Google's Rich Results Test. If it does not pass validation, AI engines cannot parse it. This step alone moves most solar contractors from invisible to visible in AI Overviews within 30-60 days of re-crawl.

Days 16-30. Build the tax credit and incentive pages.

Build one page per state you serve. "Oregon solar tax credits 2026" and "Washington solar incentives 2026" minimum. Each page covers federal ITC, state incentive, utility-level rebates, eligibility rules, and a worked example. FAQ schema on every page. Internal-link each page from your homepage and main solar page.

The contractor who owns these pages owns the most-searched pre-purchase question in residential solar. ChatGPT and Perplexity cite these pages back to homeowners directly.

Days 31-45. Build the battery storage cluster.

Battery is where the growth is. Build a pillar page on residential battery storage, plus three supporting articles. "Tesla Powerwall vs Enphase IQ Battery PNW," "battery payback period in Oregon," and "adding battery to existing solar." Each gets FAQ schema. The pillar links to the supporting articles, and they all link back to the pillar.

This is hub-and-spoke topical authority. Google sees you as an authority on battery storage. AI engines cite your pillar page when homeowners ask about batteries.

Days 46-60. Rewrite city pages with unique content.

Pick your top three cities. Rewrite each page with unique local content, specific local incentive program names, specific utility names (PGE, Pacific Power, Idaho Power, Eugene Water and Electric Board, Seattle City Light, PSE), specific climate notes that affect solar (Portland's overcast winters versus Bend's high-altitude sun exposure), and local case study mentions where you have them.

Templated city pages are duplicate content. AI engines will pick one and discard the rest, usually a competitor's. Unique city pages get cited individually for "[city] solar installer" queries.

Days 61-75. Build the cost calculator.

Build a simple solar cost calculator on your site. Inputs: home square footage, average monthly electric bill, state. Outputs: rough system size, federal credit, state incentive, estimated payback period. Does not need to be perfect. Needs to be the simplest one in the PNW.

Calculators get linked from third-party guides forever. They build backlinks. They also signal to AI engines that the page is a useful answer to the most common pre-purchase question, which lifts citation probability for the entire site.

Days 76-90. Cadence and measure.

Set up a weekly Google Business Profile post cadence. Job photos with location tags, customer review excerpts, tax credit reminder posts. Four posts per month minimum. AI engines pull from GBP for freshness, contractors with active GBP outrank contractors with more reviews but inactive profiles.

Open Google AI Overviews and Perplexity weekly. Search "best solar company in [your city]" and "residential solar [your city]" and similar buyer queries. Track which businesses get cited each week. The list will shift. Track yours over 90 days. If you do the work above, your name shows up in the list within 60 days of re-crawl, and locks in for 12 plus months.

What this 90-day playbook will not do.

It will not fix bad reviews. It will not save a bad install reputation. It will not make a $40,000 residential solar quote feel cheap. It will get you in the consideration set, the three names AI shows when a PNW homeowner asks for a solar contractor. The actual sale is still yours to close.

What it will do, when executed: triple your AI search citation rate within 90 days, double inbound from organic search within 6 months, and put you in the homeowner's top-three-options list for the queries that actually drive solar revenue in 2026.