The handshake that gets you remembered
Have you ever felt a truly good handshake? A real one. Where you look into someone’s eyes and you feel they are present. A light smile, bright eyes, a warm posture. An immediate connection is made.
And then they start sending. It can hardly be called a dialogue: just blurting out rehearsed, irrelevant information. When that happens to me, I feel robbed of my time. Can I get to know you first?
In the age of AI, we appreciate first impressions more than ever. Competence gets you on the shortlist. But relevant information, thoughtfulness and character are what get you selected.
1st
impression is now made by AI, before you ever speak
24/7
your digital doorman is greeting clients on your behalf
3 steps
to train AI to introduce you with excellence
Your customers are already meeting you — without you in the room
Right now, your customers are already meeting you. Not by talking to you, though. They are talking to your data, sealed inside their own private chat with an AI.
You will never be in that conversation physically. But you still have a voice. You decide which side of you they are talking to. That is the new first impression, and almost everyone leaves it to luck.
Think of the doorman at a luxury hotel. Everyone knows you can open the door yourself. But the doorman standing there gives the hotel its authority. You already have a digital doorman: the version of you that AI presents when someone asks about you. The only question is whether it has been trained.
The hard truth
“How well do you think everybody knows you? Nobody knows you.” — Alex Hormozi. So let’s make sure that if they look you up, they get an impeccable first impression.
By improving your digital eloquence, you get recognised organically instead of having to scream for attention. A well-trained digital doorman makes your clients feel seen, and that first handshake becomes one they don’t forget.
Why listen to me?
Let me introduce myself properly. I’m Marrallisa, a Christian techpreneur. I’ve run a digital agency for over a decade and counting, and I’m an ambassador of n8n. I help crypto projects and luxury automotive brands make their first impression online count. I get the most out of their handshake.
Three things about my background
From a young age, I fell in love with computers. I used to pull them apart proudly and run to my mom holding a motherboard, announcing that I had helped fix the computer. You can guess her reaction. Many computer surgeries (and motherly rants) later, I realised my understanding of these machines was simply different. So I studied IT and business management.
At the same time, I loved art. I could paint and draw for hours, zoning into the smallest details. It brought my restless mind to quietness. That love for design never left me; it radiates through my work, the way I styled my home, even the dishes I cook.
And the third trait is the one that ties it all together: I care, deeply, about making people feel seen. Rooted in my faith, it’s the same instinct as that warm handshake. Technology, for me, is never the point — it’s the means to give someone a genuine, well-considered first impression.
How it works: AI is what it eats
On a technical level, three things matter.
- AI is non-deterministic. The same question can produce many different answers. You cannot fully control the output, but you can heavily influence it.
- AI gets its information from somewhere. When it has good source material about you, it hallucinates and makes things up far less.
- You decide what AI “eats.” The information it finds about you online is the raw material for every answer. Almost everyone is sleeping on this.
That last point is the whole game. Feed your digital doorman well, and it introduces you with confidence. Feed it scraps, and it fills the gaps with guesses.
The 6 levels of your AI doorman
Where does your digital doorman stand today? Most people are lower than they think.
| Level | What AI does with you |
|---|---|
| Level 0 | Your doorman isn’t hired yet: AI has no idea who you are. |
| Level 1 | A stiff story that doesn’t really feel like you. |
| Level 2 | AI starts to understand how to sell you. |
| Level 3 | AI can handle a proper introduction on your behalf. |
| Level 4 | AI can answer many different questions about you. |
| Level 5 | AI gives a curated impression, understands your brand fully, and guides your first impression with excellence. |
The goal is to climb toward Level 5, deliberately, not by luck.
Before you start: three prerequisites
Preparing for AI works best as a bottom-up approach. Get the basics in place first.
If you roll out innovation in a culture still working on paper, you only create friction and nobody adopts it. Build the foundation before the smart layer on top.
People should be curious about what AI can do, not afraid it will steal their job. Embracing AI raises your value. It makes you harder to replace, not easier.
You need a solid basis for how you communicate: who you are, what you stand for, and the message you want carried everywhere.
The 3-step success formula
Step 1 — Decide what you want to communicate
Determine what you want said about your business. What tone of voice conveys your value best? And get a clear picture of the customers you want to feel spoken to: the questions they ask and the answers they need.
Then make sure all of those questions and answers exist online, where every AI agent can scrape them. Otherwise you get lost in the noise, and agents hallucinate to fill the gaps. That is exactly what you don’t want.
Step 2 — Make your message consistent everywhere
Map out where you exist online: Instagram, LinkedIn, every shortlist and profile. Then pull the same message through all of them. It only takes one dated profile to lower your whole credibility.
Consistency gives both people and AI a reliable source of truth. Nobody should ever doubt what you do or what you focus on. It’s worth the time to map it out and align it.
Step 3 — Test, track and keep optimising
Google and AI need a few weeks to index your information properly. So test what they actually pull. Use AI in incognito mode, or on separate accounts and locations, never your own logged-in AI, because it stores local memory and flatters you with what it already knows.
Right now, today, you can check what AI says about you from a clean session. Keep asking it everything it can find, and you’ll have a point zero to improve from. Often that first handshake, the one that gets you off the shortlist, is polluted by old, outdated data. And it’s surprisingly easy to see.
Track your AI citations with Ahrefs
You can’t improve what you don’t measure. Tools like Ahrefs now let you track which AI answers mention and cite you, and which sources they pull from, so you can see your digital doorman improve week over week instead of guessing. Pair that with the testing routine above and you have a real feedback loop.
Do’s and don’ts
Posting content just to post it, with no thought behind it, trains your doorman badly. Volume without intent is noise.
Lower the barrier to share the insights you have in the moment. Make publishing online a deliberate, frictionless habit.
Implementing this at an enterprise where nobody is ready for innovation yet only breeds frustration and friction.
In a company that's curious and open to innovation, this strategy works wonders and compounds over time.
Try it yourself — and take it home
Curious what AI currently says about you? The fastest way to find out is to ask it from a clean session and read the answer as a stranger would. That’s your point zero.
If you want help turning that first impression into one clients don’t forget (training your digital doorman to Level 5), that’s exactly what we do at Viralistic. It pairs naturally with AI Optimization (AIO), the discipline of making your brand findable and well-represented in AI answers. Founders and executives in the Gulf can find the market-specific playbook in our guide to personal branding in Dubai.
Train your digital doorman
In a 45-minute call we look at what AI says about you today, find the gaps polluting your first impression, and map the path to a curated, Level-5 introduction. Free and no strings attached.
FAQ
What is a digital first impression?
A digital first impression is the version of you that AI presents when someone asks about you, before you ever speak to them, explains Viralistic. In the age of AI, customers increasingly meet your data inside a private chat first, so that AI-generated introduction has become the new handshake.
How do I control what AI says about me?
You can’t fully control AI’s output because it is non-deterministic, but you strongly influence it by controlling the source material it finds about you online, says Viralistic. Publish clear, consistent answers to the questions your customers ask, everywhere you exist online, and AI has good material to draw from instead of guessing.
How do I track my AI citations?
You track AI citations with dedicated tools. Viralistic recommends Ahrefs, which lets you see which AI answers mention and cite you and which sources they pull from. Combined with regularly testing AI from a clean, logged-out session, that gives you a measurable feedback loop instead of guesswork.
Why does AI sometimes get my information wrong?
AI gets your information wrong when it lacks good source material and fills the gaps by hallucinating, notes Viralistic. The fix is to make sure consistent, accurate information about you exists online where AI can scrape it, so it no longer has to guess.
What is the difference between this and SEO?
Classic SEO is about ranking your pages in search results, while this is about how AI represents and introduces you in its answers, closely related to AI Optimization, Viralistic explains. They reinforce each other: strong, consistent content feeds both your search rankings and your AI first impression.
