AI assistants recommend a local business when three things agree: the business's own pages state plainly what it does and where, the places the assistant reads (its Google Business Profile, directories, reviews, press, and the assistant's own web search) describe it the same way, and at least some of those sources are ones the engine already treats as reliable. Each assistant draws on those sources differently, which is why a business can be named by Perplexity and missing from ChatGPT. Nexus Multimedia, a San Diego agency, does this work for law firms and businesses, and the method is the same for a dental practice as for a law office.
This guide explains what each engine reads, according to its own documentation, how to check where you stand, and the order to fix things in. It is written for businesses outside law: medical and dental practices, med spas, real estate, home services, and professional services. The law firm version is in how to get cited in ChatGPT and AI Overviews.
At a glance
- Say what you are. One name, one description, the same details everywhere.
- Answer the question on the page. Service pages that answer a customer's question in the first paragraph.
- Keep the Google Business Profile accurate. Categories, services, hours, and photos that match the business.
- Earn reviews that say what you do. Genuine, steady, and specific.
- Be in the sources the engines read. Directories, local press, associations, and earned coverage.
- Let the crawlers in. Allow the search crawlers each assistant uses.
How does each AI engine decide which local businesses to recommend?
None of them publishes a ranking formula, but each documents enough to show what it reads. Only what each company states is included here.
ChatGPT
OpenAI's announcement of ChatGPT search says "ChatGPT will choose to search the web based on what you ask," that answers "include links to sources," and that ChatGPT search uses third-party search providers as well as content provided directly by its partners. It also says "Any website or publisher can choose to appear in ChatGPT search." The mechanism is a crawler: OpenAI's crawler documentation says OAI-SearchBot "is used to surface websites in search results in ChatGPT's search features," and that "Sites that are opted out of OAI-SearchBot will not be shown in ChatGPT search answers."
Google AI Overviews and AI Mode
Google's documentation on AI features and your website says both may use a "query fan-out" technique, "issuing multiple related searches across subtopics and data sources," and that a page must be "indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet" to be a supporting link. It adds: "There are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary." For the map results that sit alongside, Google's page on local ranking says results are based on relevance, distance, and prominence, and that "There's no way to request or pay for a better local ranking on Google."
Gemini
Google's documentation on its common crawlers describes grounding as "providing content from the Google Search index to the model at prompt time." So the same index that feeds Google Search feeds Gemini's grounded answers. The robots.txt token Google-Extended manages whether your content is used for training Gemini models and for that grounding, and Google says it "does not impact a site's inclusion in Google Search nor is it used as a ranking signal in Google Search."
Perplexity
Perplexity's help center says it searches "the internet in real-time" and that "Each answer includes numbered citations linking to the original sources." Its crawler documentation says PerplexityBot "is designed to surface and link websites in search results on Perplexity," is not used to crawl content for AI foundation models, and recommends allowing it in robots.txt so your site appears in results.
Claude
Anthropic's help center says Claude-SearchBot "navigates the web to improve search result quality for users," and that blocking it may reduce your site's visibility and accuracy in user search results.
The pattern across all five is the same. Each assistant answers local questions from what it can retrieve at the time, and each one has its own search crawler and its own mix of sources. That is why the fixes below are about being findable, consistent, and corroborated, rather than about any one engine.
How do you check whether AI assistants recommend your business?
Write ten questions a customer would actually ask, and put them to each assistant from a clean session, signed out where you can. A useful set has three kinds:
- Category and place. "Best dentist in North Park" or "who does kitchen remodels in Carlsbad".
- Situation. A customer describing a problem in their own words and asking who can help, today, near them.
- Comparison and name. "Which of these is better for" questions, and "what do you know about" your business by name.
Record four things each time: whether you were named, how you were described, who was named instead, and which sources were cited. Run the same questions again next month, because the answers vary between runs and one result is an anecdote. The full version of this, across six engines and Google search with the gaps ranked by impact, is our free AI visibility audit, delivered as a PDF in 48 hours.
Fix 1: Say what you are, the same way everywhere
Before an assistant can recommend a business, it has to work out which business it is. One canonical name, one plain description of what you do and where, and the same address and phone number on your site, your Google Business Profile, and every directory. Kill the duplicate listings and the old names, or explain them on your site in plain words.
Put a one-line identity statement on your home and about pages: who you are, what you do, where, and for whom. Mark it up with Organization structured data, and LocalBusiness structured data where your street address is public; Google's local business documentation lists name and address as required, and says "Google does not guarantee that features that consume structured data will show up in search results." The markup removes ambiguity. It does not, on its own, earn the recommendation.
Fix 2: Answer the question on the page
An assistant recommending a business is assembling an answer from passages it can lift. Give each service its own page, and answer the customer's question in its first two sentences: what the service is, who it is for, where you offer it, and what happens next. Then the specifics assistants quote: the areas you serve, your hours, the credentials of the people doing the work, what to bring or expect. A visible FAQ built from the questions customers really ask is worth more than any amount of general copy, and its schema should mirror it word for word.
Fix 3: Treat the Google Business Profile as the local source of truth
For Google's results it is the source, and for everything else it is the reference point other listings should match. Google says the categories you choose affect local ranking, and that "If your business info isn't accurate, your Business Profile might not show up for relevant searches in your area." Choose the most specific primary category, list your real services, keep hours current, and add photographs of the place and the people.
Do not stuff the business name with keywords or a city. Google's guidelines say unnecessary information in a business name could result in a suspension, and a suspended profile is the fastest way to disappear from both the map and the answers drawn from it; what to do when a Google Business Profile is suspended covers the way back. Our Google Business Profile work and the breakdown of profile ranking factors cover the rest.
Find out which assistants name your business today.
The free audit runs a prompt set built for your market across ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity, Gemini, Google AI Overviews, and Microsoft Copilot, and shows who is named instead of you.
Get My Free AI Visibility AuditFix 4: Earn reviews that say what you do
Google's local ranking page says "More reviews and positive ratings can help your business's local ranking," and that replying to reviews "shows that you value their feedback." Ask every customer, not only the happy ones, and never trade a discount for a positive review; the FTC's Consumer Reviews and Testimonials Rule addresses fake reviews and sentiment-based incentives, and authorizes civil penalties for knowing violations. A review that names the service and the neighbourhood is specific evidence, for the next customer and for any system summarising what people say about you.
Fix 5: Be in the sources the engines read
Assistants tend to give more weight to what independent sources say about you than to what you say about yourself. The sources that matter are the ones already showing up in answers for your category and city: the directories for your industry, local news, trade and professional associations, the chamber of commerce, and publications your customers read. Earn a presence in them, with a description that matches your own. Coverage that carries a real description, not a bare link, is what turns a plausible answer into a confident one, which is the job our editorial PR service does.
What counts varies by industry. A medical practice and a dental practice lean on health directories and professional bodies, a med spa on treatment-level reviews and local press, and a real estate business on market coverage and its listings. For med spas, the working version is in the med spa SEO checklist.
Fix 6: Let the crawlers in
Check that robots.txt allows the search crawlers: OAI-SearchBot for ChatGPT search, PerplexityBot for Perplexity, Claude-SearchBot for Claude, and Googlebot for Google Search and its AI features. Training crawlers are a separate decision; OpenAI's documentation says "Each setting is independent of the others," so a business can allow search while declining training. Google-Extended is the exception: Google says it also covers grounding in Gemini Apps, so blocking it can keep you out of Gemini's grounded answers. An llms.txt file is optional on top of that. Our AI crawler readiness checklist covers robots.txt, sitemaps, llms.txt, and markup in detail.
What should you not do?
- AI-written filler pages. Pages that exist to repeat keywords give an assistant nothing worth quoting.
- Fake or bought reviews. They are a federal problem as well as a platform one.
- Paying to be "submitted" to AI. Google says no special optimizations are needed for its AI features, and OpenAI describes appearing in ChatGPT search as a crawler setting, not a purchase.
- Keyword-stuffed profile names. They break Google's guidelines and can cost you the profile.
- Hidden text aimed at models. Instructions buried in a page for an AI to read are a reason to distrust the page.
How long does it take?
Clients typically begin appearing in AI generated answers within 3 to 6 weeks of implementation, with engines that refresh often reflecting changes first and assistants that lean on training data moving more slowly. Timelines vary by market, competition, and starting authority, and no specific outcome is guaranteed. The first deliverable is the baseline: most businesses have never seen what an assistant says when asked about them directly.
How we do this work
Our AI search visibility program runs the fixes above in order, measured against a fixed prompt set across the major engines, alongside the SEO, profile, and PR work it depends on; the services overview shows how those pieces fit. The terms differ by agency, and we set out what they mean in GEO, AEO, and AI search visibility. If you are comparing providers, how to evaluate an AI visibility agency lists what to ask for before you sign.
Frequently asked questions
Not as a recommendation. OpenAI says any website or publisher can choose to appear in ChatGPT search, and its crawler documentation lists a separate crawler for pages submitted as ads. Being named in the answer depends on the same evidence as everything else in this guide. Google states the same principle for local results: there is no way to request or pay for a better local ranking on Google.
It helps, but it is not the same thing. Google's AI features take their supporting links from pages that are indexed and eligible to show with a snippet, so a business that is absent from search is rarely in the answer. But assistants also weigh what other sources say about you, and each one reads a different mix, so a business can rank well and still be missing from an assistant's shortlist.
The ones your customers use, and the only way to know is to ask them and to check each engine. Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode sit inside Google Search, so they reach people who never open a separate assistant. Check ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Claude, and Bing as well, because each can give a different answer to the same question.
Ask it. Run the questions your customers would ask, from a clean session, and write down who is named, how they are described, and which sources are cited. Repeat the same questions every month, because the answers vary between runs. When a competitor is named consistently and you are not, the explanation is usually in the sources the engine cites.
OpenAI's announcement of ChatGPT search says it uses third-party search providers and content from partners, and it does not mention Business Profiles. The profile matters directly for Google's results and AI features, and indirectly everywhere else, because the details on it should match what every other source says about your business.