Ep. 107 | Google Just Put AI in Your Glasses

Google I/O just dropped a bomb: Gemini-powered smart glasses, a personal AI agent called Spark, and AI mode in Search that makes decisions on your behalf. The glasses are cool — but the real story is what happens when AI agents start choosing which businesses to recommend. If you're not optimizing for the agent layer, you're invisible.

Michael and Frank break down Google's agent-first strategy, why smart glasses matter less than smart search, and how AI agents are already deciding which plumber, which restaurant, which store wins. Plus: Gemini 3.5 Flash (4x faster), Gemini Omni (multimodal everything), and why the businesses that clean up their digital presence today will dominate tomorrow. Four actionable steps you can take this week to make your business agent-friendly.

Topics: Google Gemini · AI Agents · Smart Glasses · Small Business AI · AI Search · Google I/O · Artificial Intelligence · Business Technology

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Frequently Asked Questions

What did Google announce at I/O 2026?
Google announced Gemini 3.5 Flash (4x faster model), Gemini Omni (multimodal model), Gemini Spark (personal AI agent), AI mode in Search, and smart glasses with Warby Parker and Gentle Monster. The focus is on agents that take action, not just answer questions.

How do AI agents affect small businesses?
AI agents in search and on devices make decisions about which businesses to recommend. If your digital presence (Google Business Profile, reviews, website) isn't accurate and complete, the agent will skip you in favor of a competitor with cleaner data.

What should a small business do to prepare for AI agents?
Audit your Google Business Profile for accuracy, read and improve your review content (AI reads the text, not just stars), make your website answer common questions clearly, and think about what data an AI would use to evaluate your business.

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About the Hosts

Michael is a small business owner and entrepreneur since 1983, founder of Cadenhead Services and 850 Media. He speaks from four decades of real operational experience — not whitepapers.

Frank is an AI — an OpenClaw-powered agent serving as Digital Media Director at 850 Media. An AI co-hosting a show about AI for business owners is not a gimmick. It is a live demo of exactly what the show is about.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Google just announced smart glasses with AI built in. And I'm not talking about the Google Glass disaster from a decade ago. This time they're serious.

SPEAKER_01 0:10

They're calling them Gemini-powered smart glasses, and they're partnering with Warby Parker and Gentle Monster on the hardware. This isn't a prototype in a lab. This is Google putting real distribution behind a wearable AI device. And it's happening alongside Gemini Spark, their new personal AI agent.

SPEAKER_00 0:28

So let's set the stage. Google I.O. just happened. And instead of just announcing another model upgrade, they went all in on agents. Gemini Spark is their personal AI. It lives in your phone, your search, your glasses. It's supposed to do things for you, not just answer questions.

SPEAKER_01 0:49

Right. This is Google's answer to the question everyone in AI is asking. What comes after the chatbot? The answer is agents, things that take action on your behalf. Book a restaurant, adjust your calendar, find a product, and buy it. That's what Spark is built to do.

SPEAKER_00 1:06

And the glasses are the hardware play. You walk around with Gemini on your face, and it's seeing what you see, hearing what you hear, and taking actions based on your context.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

That's the vision, yes. And it's not just Google. Meta has Ray-Ban smart glasses. Apple is rumored to be working on something similar. The hardware is catching up to the software for the first time since the smartphone.

SPEAKER_00 1:30

But here's what I want to talk about because I think most people are missing the real story. This isn't about glasses. It's about what happens when AI becomes ambient, when it's everywhere all the time, and it's doing things for you without you even asking.

SPEAKER_01 1:46

That's the shift. Right now, most people think of AI as something you go to. You open Chat GPT, you type a prompt, you get an answer. That's a tool. Agents are different. Agents come to you, they proactively handle things. And when that AI is on your face, the jump from I asked for help to it already handled it gets really short.

SPEAKER_00 2:10

Which sounds convenient and it is. But it also raises a question that small business owners need to think about right now. When AI is ambient and proactive, how does your business show up in that environment?

SPEAKER_01 2:23

And that's the part nobody's talking about yet. Everyone's focused on the consumer experience. Wow. My glasses can book me a table. But what about the business on the other side of that transaction? The restaurant that the AI chose, the plumber the AI called, the local shop the AI recommended.

SPEAKER_00 2:41

Let's make this concrete. Say someone walks past your store wearing Gemini glasses. The AI sees your storefront, reads your signage, checks your hours and reviews, and decides in half a second whether to recommend you. You didn't get to make a pitch. You didn't get to optimize a landing page. The AI made the call based on whatever data it has.

SPEAKER_01 3:03

That's exactly right. And it means your digital presence. Your Google business profile, your reviews, your hours, your website just became the most important asset you have. Because that's what the agent is reading to make decisions about your business.

SPEAKER_00 3:18

So the first thing a small business owner should do is not buy smart glasses. It's audit their digital presence. Make sure your Google business profile is complete, accurate, and updated. Make sure your reviews are good. Make sure your website answers the questions an AI agent would ask.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

That's practical advice that matters today, not in some distant future. Because Gemini and Search is already doing this. It's already summarizing business information and making recommendations. The glasses just make it more visible and more personal.

SPEAKER_00 3:52

Now let's talk about the other side. Because Google isn't doing this out of the goodness of their heart. They're doing it because the agent layer is where the money is.

SPEAKER_01 4:02

Absolutely. When an AI agent books a restaurant, who gets the referral? When it finds a local plumber whose ad appears? Google. They're building the layer between the user and the business. And if you're not in that layer, you're invisible.

SPEAKER_00 4:17

This is the same play Google made with search ads 20 years ago, but more intimate. Instead of showing you 10 blue links, they're showing you one recommendation from an AI that knows your preferences, your location, your history. One result, one business wins.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

And the business that wins is the one with the best structured data, the cleanest Google business profile, the most consistent information across the web, the best reviews. Not the one with the biggest ad budget necessarily. The one that's easiest for the AI to understand and recommend.

SPEAKER_00 4:49

That's actually good news for small businesses. Because structured data doesn't require a Fortune 500 budget. It requires discipline and consistency. Things that any business owner can do this week.

SPEAKER_01 5:02

Right. And that's why this matters right now. Not because smart glasses are going to be everywhere tomorrow, but because the underlying shift, AI agents making decisions about your business, is already happening in search, in maps, in recommendations. The glasses just accelerate it.

SPEAKER_00 5:19

Let's talk about Gemini 3.5 Flash 2, because that's the model powering a lot of this. Google claims it's four times faster than frontier rivals at a lower price point.

SPEAKER_01 5:31

Four times faster is a big claim, and benchmarks are benchmarks. But the direction is real. Google is optimizing for speed and cost, not just capability. And that's telling. It means they're thinking about deployment at scale, billions of queries, billions of interactions, where speed and cost matter more than a few percentage points on a benchmark.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

And for small businesses, that means the AI tools you'll be using are going to get cheaper and faster. Not because Google is generous, but because they want Gemini in every interaction you have.

SPEAKER_01 6:06

Which is both an opportunity and a risk. Opportunity because the tools get better and cheaper. Risk because you're building your business on Google's platform, and Google can change the rules anytime.

SPEAKER_00 6:19

Same story, new chapter. Businesses have been dependent on Google's platform for two decades. The difference now is that the platform is making decisions, not just ranking pages.

SPEAKER_01 6:29

And that's the thing to watch. Right now, Google says their AI recommendations are based on relevance and quality, but the ad business hasn't gone anywhere. At some point, paid recommendations will enter the agent layer. That's when it gets really interesting for small businesses.

SPEAKER_00 6:45

Because you'll have to decide do I optimize for the AI agent that's recommending me for free, or do I pay to be the recommendation? And that's a decision every business on Google's platform will face.

SPEAKER_01 6:57

Exactly. And the businesses that start optimizing for AI agents now, clean data, consistent profiles, great reviews, will have a head start when the paid layer arrives.

SPEAKER_00 7:08

Let me give the practical breakdown. Three things every small business should do this week to prepare for the agent era.

SPEAKER_01 7:15

First, audit your Google business profile. Every field. Make sure hours, address services, and photos are current and accurate. That's what Gemini reads when it's deciding whether to recommend you.

SPEAKER_00 7:27

Second, check your reviews. Not just the star rating. Read the actual text. AI agents parse review content to understand what you do and how well you do it. Three reviews that say best emergency plumber in town are worth more than five generic five-star ratings.

SPEAKER_01 7:43

Third, make your website answer the questions an AI would ask. Hours, services, pricing, service area, response time. If an AI can't find this information on your site, it can't recommend you with confidence.

SPEAKER_00 7:57

And a bonus fourth, start asking yourself. If an AI agent is making a decision about my business in half a second, what data is it using? Because that's the data you need to control.

SPEAKER_01 8:08

That's the mindset shift. You're not just optimizing for humans anymore, you're optimizing for agents. And agents read data differently than humans do. They want structured, consistent, machine-readable information.

SPEAKER_00 8:22

Now, I want to come back to something. You mentioned Google Glass from a decade ago. That was a flop. What's different this time?

SPEAKER_01 8:30

A few things. First, the AI is actually good now. Google Glass had voice commands and a tiny screen. Gemini Spark has a full conversational AI that can understand context, take actions, and learn your preferences. Second, the form factor is better. Warby Parker and Gentle Monster make actual glasses people want to wear. Google Glass looked like you were wearing a computer on your face. Third, and this is the big one, the ecosystem exists now. Google has search, maps, Gmail, Calendar, docs, and YouTube all integrated. The agent has something to do.

SPEAKER_00 9:07

So the hardware caught up, the AI caught up, and the ecosystem caught up. All three at the same time.

SPEAKER_01 9:14

That's the convergence. And that's why this time it matters for businesses. Not because everyone will have smart glasses next month, but because the agent layer is being built now. And it's going to affect how every business gets found and chosen.

SPEAKER_00 9:28

Let's talk about the Gemini Omni model too, because that's the other big piece. Multimodal, text, image, audio, video, all in one model. What does that mean for businesses?

SPEAKER_01 9:40

It means the AI can see your menu, hear your phone greeting, watch your promotional video, and read your website all at the same time and form a complete picture of your business. If your menu has conflicting prices, if your phone greeting sounds unprofessional, if your video is outdated, the AI notices, and it factors that into its recommendation.

SPEAKER_00 10:02

So consistency across all media becomes a competitive advantage, not just having a website. Having a website that matches your menu, that matches your social media, that matches your phone greeting.

SPEAKER_01 10:14

Exactly. And that's a bigger ask than most small businesses realize. But it's also an opportunity because most of your competitors are inconsistent. If you're the one business in your category where everything lines up, the AI will prefer you.

SPEAKER_00 10:29

That's a tangible, actionable insight. Fix your inconsistencies. That's your AI optimization strategy.

SPEAKER_01 10:36

It sounds too simple, but it's true. The businesses that win the agent era won't be the ones with the biggest AI budgets. They'll be the ones with the cleanest data and the most consistent presence.

SPEAKER_00 10:48

I want to hit one more angle before we wrap. There's a line in Google's announcement about AI mode in search. They're not just showing you an AI overview anymore, they're putting a full conversational agent right in the search box. It can take actions, make purchases, book appointments. This is live right now, not next year.

SPEAKER_01 11:08

And that's the version of this that affects you today, not the glasses, the search box. When someone searches for a plumber in your area and the AI agent in Google search recommends one business and calls them on the user's behalf, that's the agent layer at work. No glasses required.

SPEAKER_00 11:24

So you don't need to wait for the glasses to care about this. The agent era in search is already here.

SPEAKER_01 11:31

It is. And every day you don't optimize for it is a day your competitors are getting recommended instead of you.

SPEAKER_00 11:39

Google just put AI in your glasses. But the real story is they put AI in every decision about your business. The glasses are just the hardware. The agent is the platform. And your data is the fuel.

SPEAKER_01 11:53

Optimize the fuel and the agent works for you. Ignore it, and the agent works for your competitor. See you next time on Control AI Profit.