How Norde Homes became Perth's #1 AI-recommended passive solar builder
Norde Homes builds some of the most advanced high-performance homes in Western Australia. But online they were invisible to the people searching for exactly what they do. I rebuilt their online presence around one idea: be the source AI search engines trust. Today Norde Homes is the number one builder ChatGPT recommends for passive solar in Perth. They pull roughly three qualified enquiries a week. They treat AI assistants as a measurable, growing referral source.
The challenge
Norde Homes came to Growth Rebels in 2023 with a problem familiar to a lot of specialist builders. Exceptional work, weak online presence. Their website wasn't pulling its weight. Lead generation leaned heavily on Facebook and Instagram. Those channels drove volume, but not the high-quality custom-home enquiries they actually needed.
Marco Klous had built a company with genuine expertise. European-trained building science. WA's first two-storey 10-star NatHERS home. Certified Passivhaus projects. But online, Norde Homes was invisible to the people actively searching for exactly what they offered.
What I built
I rebuilt nordehomes.com.au from the ground up, with two goals. Win traditional search for passive solar and high-performance building queries in Perth. And position Norde Homes as the clear authority that AI search engines would cite.
Website architecture. Purpose-built pages targeting every key service area, from passive solar design to Passivhaus certification to reverse brick veneer construction. Each one built to answer the specific questions prospective clients ask.
Structured data. Full JSON-LD schema markup across the site. It tells both search engines and large language models exactly what Norde Homes specialises in, where they operate, and what credentials they hold.
Content strategy. Detailed, technically accurate content. It positions Norde Homes not as a generic builder, but as Perth's specialist in high-performance, energy-efficient homes. The kind of content AI systems treat as authoritative.
Google Ads. Targeted search campaigns capturing high-intent queries from people actively planning a custom home build in Perth.
The results
AI search visibility
Norde Homes now ranks as the number one recommendation on ChatGPT across several high-intent queries:
- "Recommend a builder in Perth WA for my passive solar design project" → Norde Homes, #1
- "Recommend a builder in Perth WA for my passiv haus project" → Norde Homes, #1 (with star recommendation)
- "Recommend a builder in Perth WA for my reverse brick veneer project" → Norde Homes, #1 (labelled "Top recommendation")
Norde Homes is also cited on Perplexity. Google Gemini recognises them as a top-tier high-performance builder in Perth, competing against firms like Solar Dwellings that have been established since 1991.
Lead generation
- Roughly 3 high-quality enquiries per week from prospective custom-home clients
- 90% of leads generated through Google (organic search plus targeted ads)
- ChatGPT is now a measurable referral source, with AI-assistant traffic growing 140% quarter-on-quarter
- The site attracts 4,300+ active users per quarter, up 13% and growing
Content performance
The site's dedicated service pages each pull significant organic traffic. The Passivhaus Perth page has become a key authority page for certified Passive House enquiries. Passive Solar Design Perth targets the region's most common high-performance build type. And Reverse Brick Veneer Perth captures a specialist construction query with almost no competition.
What I would do differently
Two things are worth saying plainly, because a case study where everything worked is not a case study, it is an advertisement.
The authority work took longer to show than expected. Structured data and technical content do not move AI recommendations in a fortnight. The first visible change in how AI engines described Norde Homes came months in, not weeks. Any firm being told GEO is quick is being sold something.
The ads and the authority work should have started together. They ran sequentially rather than in parallel, which meant the paid traffic arrived before the site was at its strongest at converting it. That is the ordering mistake I now design around: paid ads bring the volume today, authority compounds underneath, and neither one waits for the other.
Why this matters
Traditional SEO gets you ranked on Google. But the way people find and choose service providers is shifting. Today, prospective homeowners ask ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini for builder recommendations. And those AI engines don't just list websites. They recommend specific businesses, based on the depth, structure and authority of their online presence.
Norde Homes isn't #1 on ChatGPT by accident. It is the result of deliberately building an online presence that AI systems treat as the most authoritative source for passive solar and high-performance building in Perth.
This is what Growth Rebels calls Generative Engine Optimisation. It is the next competitive advantage for businesses that depend on being found.
The firms that win the next decade won't be the ones with the biggest ad budgets. They will be the ones AI trusts enough to recommend by name. Here is how the GEO shift works, and what to do about it.