Field Guide — AI Search
How to get my business recommended by ChatGPT
More customers now ask an AI assistant "who's the best ___ near me?" instead of scrolling search results. The assistant names a few businesses and moves on. Here's what it looks at before it decides — and what you can change.
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See which businesses ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity name instead of you
Why AI skips good businesses
Assistants don't know who does the best work. They recommend businesses whose details are clear, consistent and confirmed by several sources. A great practice with a vague website and mismatched listings often loses to an average one that's easy to understand.
Step 01
Make your website say plainly what you do and where
AI assistants read your site the way a careful stranger would. If your homepage opens with a slogan instead of "family dentist in Columbus, Ohio", the assistant has to guess — and it usually picks a competitor whose site doesn't make it guess. Put your service, your town or service area, and who you help in the first lines of the page, in ordinary words customers actually use.
Step 02
Answer the questions customers ask, on your own pages
People ask assistants full questions: "who does same-day crown repair near me?" or "is there a chiropractor that takes walk-ins?" Pages that answer those questions directly — a real FAQ, a page per service, honest pricing ranges — give the assistant something to quote. Write the answer first, then the detail.
Step 03
Add structured business details behind the scenes
Structured data (LocalBusiness schema) is a short block of code that states your name, address, phone, hours and services in a format machines read without interpretation. It doesn't change how your page looks, but it removes ambiguity about the basic facts.
Free Visibility Check
Find out if AI recommends you — or a competitor
The free check asks ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity the questions your customers ask, and shows who gets named instead of you.
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Make every listing agree, exactly
Assistants cross-check you against Google, Yelp, Apple Maps, Bing, Facebook and industry directories. When one says you close at 5 and another says 6, or an old address lingers, confidence in you drops. Fixing contradictions is tedious, careful work — but it's some of the highest-leverage work there is.
Step 05
Earn mentions from places AI already trusts
Assistants lean on sources beyond your own site: reviews, local news, associations, and real community discussions. Steady, recent reviews that mention specific services help. So do honest, helpful answers in local forums — posted by you, clearly saying who you are.
Step 06
Check the answers regularly, not once
AI answers change as models update and competitors improve. Ask the same set of customer questions every week or month and note whether you're named, where, and who's named instead. That's the only way to know whether your work is landing.
What not to do
Don't buy reviews, stuff keywords into your business name, or post promotional replies without saying who you are. These shortcuts get profiles suspended and accounts banned, and they make the inconsistency problem worse.
Free Visibility Check
See exactly where you stand
One free check shows your score, the real AI answers, and what's missing — no sign-up needed to see it.
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