They Ask, You Answer, Marcus Sheridan's 2017 book about answering buyers' questions honestly instead of selling at them, still works in AI search. Its Big 5 topics (cost, problems, comparisons, reviews and "best of" lists) are what people now ask ChatGPT and Google before they call anyone. Publish one honest page per topic and the AI answer has something on your site worth quoting.
| The book | They Ask, You Answer, Marcus Sheridan. First published January 2017; 2nd edition, revised and updated, Wiley, August 2019 |
| The idea | Answer buyers' questions on your website, honestly and in full, including the ones your industry avoids |
| The Big 5 | Cost & Price, Problems, Versus & Comparisons, Reviews, Best in Class |
| The sequel | Endless Customers, Wiley, April 2025, Sheridan's updated system with the Big 5 at its core |
| Why it matters now | AI answers need pages that state prices, trade-offs and named options. In our experience, many small business sites don't |
What is They Ask, You Answer?
They Ask, You Answer is a 2017 business book by Marcus Sheridan arguing that businesses should stop selling to buyers and start answering their questions, on their own websites, as honestly and thoroughly as possible. Sheridan's author page says plainly: "In January of 2017, TAYA was published." Wiley's listing covers the current edition: the 2nd Edition, Revised and Updated, 352 pages, hardcover in August 2019 (ISBN 978-1-119-61014-4). Wiley says the update adds chapters on technology, conversational marketing, essential website elements and the rise of video.
The origin story is Sheridan's pool company. Wiley's description says the approach took his struggling business to "one of the largest pool installers in the United States." The book's thesis, in Wiley's words: "To be successful, businesses must obsess over the questions, concerns, and problems their buyers have."
Most Toronto service sites we look at have a services page, an about page and a contact form. Few say what anything costs, what goes wrong, or who they are not a good fit for. Those gaps are what the book is about.
What are the Big 5 in They Ask, You Answer?
The Big 5 are the five content topics buyers search for most before they contact a business. In Sheridan's own Big 5 article on IMPACT (last updated March 16, 2026), they are:
- Cost & Price. What does it cost, and why?
- Problems. What goes wrong, with your product, your industry, or the buyer's situation?
- Versus & Comparisons. This option or that one? You or the other company?
- Reviews. What do people who have used it actually think?
- Best in Class. Who or what is the best for my situation?
On price, Sheridan is blunt: "If you're not talking about price, someone else is, and your silence breaks trust." He also gives the practical version: "Write about the factors that influence costs and at least give a range of possible rates."
The other four rules are just as short. Comparisons should be "honest, unbiased, and presents both sides fairly." Review content "should include who the product or service is not a good fit for." And problems pages should be candid about your drawbacks and your industry's, which builds credibility with the buyers who are a real fit.
Does They Ask, You Answer still work with AI search?
Yes. AI search rewards the same pages the Big 5 produce, because an AI answer needs specific, quotable facts and most sites don't publish them. Sheridan says so himself in his Big 5 article: "But AI is changing the game." About best-of lists, he writes: "These lists are now what feed AI recommendations, so if you're not in the conversation, you risk being invisible."
The way people ask has moved closer to the Big 5, too. When Google began rolling out AI Mode in Canada on August 21, 2025, it pitched the tool for "exploratory questions" and tasks like "comparing products, planning a trip or understanding complex how-tos." That is the Versus & Comparisons topic, described by Google.
ChatGPT use points the same way. An NBER working paper on how people use ChatGPT (September 2025) found that "Practical Guidance," "Seeking Information" and "Writing" together account for nearly 80% of all conversations, and concluded that ChatGPT "provides economic value through decision support." A buyer asking "is a heat pump worth it in Toronto" is asking for decision support.
What changed is where the answer gets read. In 2017 the buyer clicked your blog post. Now the buyer often reads a summary built from several pages (how ChatGPT picks businesses), and AI engines can only repeat facts that exist somewhere. If the only honest price range for your service lives on a competitor's site, the competitor gets named. That is Sheridan's "someone else is talking about price" rule, with a machine doing the talking.
How to turn the Big 5 into an AEO content plan
AEO, answer engine optimization, means getting your business named inside ChatGPT and Google AI answers (our guide covers the basics). The plan: take each Big 5 topic, write down the exact prompt a buyer would type into ChatGPT, and publish one page that answers that prompt better than anything else on the web. Then make that page easy to quote: a direct answer up top, real numbers, named options and a date.
Here is the plan for an invented example (not a real business or client): a small bathroom renovation company in east Toronto.
| Big 5 topic | Buyer's AI prompt | Page to publish | What makes it citable |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cost & Price | "How much does a bathroom renovation cost in Toronto?" | A cost guide with low, typical and high ranges by bathroom size | A range in the first paragraph, what pushes the price up, the year it was checked |
| Problems | "What goes wrong with bathroom renovations in old Toronto houses?" | "Problems we find behind the tile" page: old plumbing, subfloor rot, permit surprises | Named problems, rough cost to fix each, how to spot them before signing |
| Versus & Comparisons | "Tub-to-shower conversion vs keeping the tub, which is better?" | A comparison page with a table of cost, time, resale and accessibility | A side-by-side table and a clear "pick this if..." line for each option |
| Reviews | "Are curbless showers worth it? Reviews" | An honest review of a product or approach you install, including who should skip it | Pros, cons and "not a good fit for" stated outright |
| Best in Class | "Best bathroom renovation companies in east Toronto" | A best-of list that names other firms fairly, with what each is best at | Named businesses, the criteria used, and a date of last update |
A few rules carry across all five.
Lead with the answer. The first two sentences of the page should answer the prompt on their own. AI engines lift short passages, and a page that warms up for 300 words before saying a number gives them nothing to lift.
Use ranges, not "it depends." Sheridan's rule still holds: give a range and explain what moves it. "It depends" can't be quoted.
Put comparisons in tables. A table of options against the same attributes is one of the easiest formats for an engine to read and for a person to scan.
Name names. A best-of list that only recommends you is an ad, and buyers can tell. Sheridan's comparison rule ("presents both sides fairly") is what makes the page trusted enough to repeat.
Date it. Put a "last checked" date on price pages and update them when prices move.
We follow the cost rule ourselves. Our pricing page lists our website builds at Story CA$5,000, Engine CA$9,000 and Studio CA$15,000+, with monthly plans from CA$300/mo, all in Canadian dollars plus HST. For wider market ranges, our Toronto website cost guide compares eight Canadian price pages.
Once the five pages exist, link them from the homepage (our SB7 homepage wireframe shows where) and keep them easy to scan (Don't Make Me Think summary).
They Ask, You Answer summary: what to skip and what to keep
Keep the philosophy and the Big 5. Skip the parts that measure success only by blog traffic, and read the newer book for anything about AI. The 2019 edition came out more than three years before ChatGPT launched in November 2022 (per the NBER paper), so it cannot tell you how answer engines pick sources.
| Keep | Skip or update |
|---|---|
| Answer the questions your sales team hears every week | Treating the plan as "post more blogs." One strong page per buyer question beats volume |
| Publish price ranges and what moves them | Judging success by clicks alone. An AI answer can name you without a click |
| Talk about problems and who you are not for | Technology and conversational marketing chapters written in 2019 |
| Fair comparisons, including competitors | Reading it as the latest Sheridan. Endless Customers (Wiley, April 2025) is his updated system |
| Get sales and leadership involved, not just marketing | Assuming Google is the only place buyers ask |
Sheridan's author page says the book was one of the first content marketing books written for sales and leadership teams, not only marketers. That part ages well: the owner or sales lead knows the real questions.
If you want the newer thinking, Wiley's page for Endless Customers calls it "an evolution of Marcus Sheridan's first book, They Ask, You Answer," and says it accounts for "the monumental impact AI is having on business and the buyer's journey." The IMPACT article now says "The Big 5™ is at the core of the Endless Customers System™."
Where the Big 5 fall short
The Big 5 approach is slow. Five good pages take real time from someone who knows the business, and AI engines may take weeks to pick them up. It also won't save a page that is vague. A cost guide that refuses to give numbers is worse than none, because it tells the engine your site has nothing to quote. And publishing a fair best-of list means naming rivals, which some owners won't do. If you can't stomach that, start with cost and problems, where the only business you discuss is your own.
If you want to see which Big 5 pages your site is missing, our free site check looks at that.