Guide · updated November 10, 2026
How to get your business recommended by ChatGPT
More customers now ask an AI app who to hire. Here's how those apps decide who to name, what you can change, what's a waste of time, and how to tell whether any of it worked.
The short answer
You can't apply to be recommended and nobody can promise it. AI apps build their answers from what they can read about you on the web, so the work is to make sure what they read is correct and easy to find: fix wrong details at their source, get listed on the sites they read for your questions, let their crawlers into your website, say what you do in plain text and keep earning reviews. Then measure how often you're named over several weeks, because a single answer tells you almost nothing.
Why this matters now
BrightLocal's 2026 survey of 1,002 US adults found that use of ChatGPT and other AI tools for local recommendations went from 6% to 45% in a year, and that 42% trust AI platforms as much as traditional reviews for local recommendations.
An AI answer is also a different shape from a search result. Google shows ten results, a map and ads, and the customer compares. An AI app usually gives a short list of names, and the customer picks from that. Being fourth on Google still gets clicks. Being left out of an AI answer means you were never considered, and nothing tells you it happened.
How AI apps decide who to name
None of these companies publishes a formula, but the apps work the same broad way: when a question needs current information, they search the web, read some pages and write an answer from what they read. So what matters is what's on the pages they reach.
Each app reads different places. In our own test of 428 answers across three local businesses, Google's AI leaned heavily on Google Maps, Claude on Yelp, ChatGPT on directories like Birdeye and Angi, and Gemini on businesses' own websites. Any two apps agreed on only 12% to 26% of the names they gave. That's why being strong on one says little about the others.
For Google's own AI, the rules are the ones you already know. Google says a page only has to be indexed and eligible to show with a snippet, and it recommends keeping your Business Profile up to date. Google's local results are based on relevance, distance and prominence, and prominence includes how many reviews you have.
Six things that change what AI says about you
- 1
Find out what it says today
Ask the things your customers ask, with your town in the question, on more than one app, several times each. The list changes every time, so count how often you appear instead of trusting one answer.
- 2
Fix wrong details at the source
AI repeats what it reads. In our test, apps gave out wrong phone numbers and hours for real businesses, and some of those matched what a directory or the business's own website still said. Correct your Google Business Profile first, then whichever site the wrong answer came from.
- 3
Get listed where AI reads for your questions
Look at which sites the answers are based on and be listed on those, with the same name, address and phone everywhere. A directory nobody cites isn't worth your afternoon.
- 4
Let the crawlers into your website
Check your robots.txt. OpenAI says sites that block OAI-SearchBot won't be shown in ChatGPT's search answers. Anthropic says blocking Claude-SearchBot may reduce your visibility, and Perplexity recommends allowing PerplexityBot. Some website firewalls block these by default, so check yours too.
- 5
Say what you do in plain text
Google recommends keeping important content in text. Many AI crawlers don't run scripts, so a site built entirely in JavaScript can look nearly empty to them. Put your services, the towns you serve and your price ranges in the page itself, in the words a customer would use.
- 6
Keep earning reviews
Google counts them towards local prominence, and AI answers often describe a business by what its reviews say. Ask every happy customer, steadily. Never buy them.
What you can skip
- An llms.txt file for Google. Google says you don't need new machine-readable files, AI text files or special structured data to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode.
- Anyone selling a "number one in ChatGPT" ranking. SparkToro found less than a 1 in 100 chance of ChatGPT or Google's AI giving the same list twice, so a rank from one run is close to meaningless.
- Fake pages for towns you don't serve, keyword stuffing and bought reviews. They risk your Google profile and don't address what AI reads.
How to measure it properly
Doing it by hand works for a day. Ask each question four or more times on each app, write down who was named, and repeat every week. Ask from a phone and a computer too: in our test Google AI Mode's answers changed with both the device and the location. Make one or two changes at a time and leave them a few weeks, or you won't know what helped.
Count how often you're named, as a share of all answers, and always keep the count beside it. Nine out of thirty is a real number. A jump from 20% to 25% in one week usually isn't: with about two dozen answers, one app's weekly number moves about 15 points by chance, and a four-week number about 8.
Zuops
Zuops does this for you, every week
AI Visibility asks ChatGPT, Gemini, Google AI Mode and AI Overviews, Perplexity and Claude what your customers ask, reads every answer, and shows how often you're named, who's named instead, what's wrong and which sites they read. Each check ends with a plan, and each step opens the tool that does it.
- First check free, about five minutes
- Wrong phone numbers, addresses and hours caught
- Checks whether AI crawlers can read your website
- Every answer there to read
FAQ
Questions
Can I pay to be recommended by ChatGPT?
Nobody can sell you a guaranteed place in its answers, so be wary of anyone offering one. What you can do is improve what it reads about you.
How long does it take for ChatGPT to start recommending me?
There's no fixed time. OpenAI says a robots.txt change can take about 24 hours to reach its systems, but what the app says depends on what it finds across the web, and new listings and reviews take weeks to build up. Expect to measure in months.
Does SEO still matter if people use AI?
Yes. Google's AI features draw on pages that are indexed and eligible for Google Search, and other apps search the web too. Good local SEO is most of the foundation. The difference is that you also need to check what the answers say, because you can rank well and still be left out or described wrongly.
What's the difference between SEO, AEO and GEO?
SEO is about ranking in search results. AEO (answer engine optimization) and GEO (generative engine optimization) are two names for being named in AI answers. In practice, for a local business, they overlap almost completely.
Why does ChatGPT give a different answer every time?
It writes each answer fresh and may read different pages each time. In our test, asked again, ChatGPT, Gemini and Google AI Mode kept only 42% to 59% of the names from one answer to the next, so count across many answers rather than judging by one.
Sources (checked November 10, 2026)
- BrightLocal, Local Consumer Review Survey 2026
- SparkToro, AIs are highly inconsistent when recommending brands (January 2026)
- OpenAI, Overview of crawlers
- Google Search Central, AI features and your website
- Google, Tips to improve your local ranking
- Anthropic, how Claude's crawlers work
- Perplexity, Perplexity crawlers
Product names are trademarks of their owners; Zuops isn't affiliated with them. Prices change, so check each company's site before you decide.
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