How to tell if ChatGPT recommends your business (and what to do if not)

To find out whether ChatGPT recommends your business, ask it the way a client would, several times and with web search turned on, and look at which sources it cites. A single question is not enough, because the answer changes every time. Below you will find a 15-minute test with a template, and what to do if the AI recommends your competitors and not you.

First, to be honest: nobody can guarantee that an AI will recommend you. What you can control is whether it finds clear, reliable information about you in the places where it looks.

ChatGPT does not know you: it searches for you

When someone asks about a service in a city, ChatGPT can search the web before answering. According to OpenAI’s help page on ChatGPT search, it sometimes relies on third-party search providers. It rewrites your question into one or more searches and writes the answer with links to the sources.

The example OpenAI gives is revealing. If you are in San Francisco and ask about good restaurants near you, ChatGPT may turn it into the search “top restaurants San Francisco”. Service plus city: that is what your website and your listings have to answer.

OpenAI does not publish a closed list of providers, but on that same page it links to Microsoft’s privacy policy. And Microsoft states on its webmaster blog that Bing powers AI tools such as ChatGPT. Practical conclusion: if Bing does not know your website, you start at a disadvantage.

On how it chooses, OpenAI says little, and says it clearly. It ranks results using several factors to show relevant and reliable information, and position is not guaranteed. The only technical requirement it asks for is letting in its search crawler, OAI-SearchBot.

And local queries matter to it. In its release notes of 24 June 2026, OpenAI announced improvements to show nearby options and business information.

The other tools work in a similar way:

• Perplexity searches the internet in real time, and each answer comes with numbered citations to the original sources.
• Gemini uses public information from Google Maps to search for businesses: address, website, ratings and opening hours. It also relies on Google’s index to ground its answers, according to the Google-Extended documentation.
• Google has no additional requirements for its AI Overviews and its AI Mode: the page must be indexed and eligible to be shown with a snippet. Both features have been available in Spain since 2025 (AI Overviews in March and AI Mode in October).

In short: AI recommends whoever it finds well described in sources it considers reliable. If your competitors appear and you do not, the most common reason is that there is more and better information about them on those sites. We explain it in depth in what GEO is.

Why it tells you something different every time

Language models do not always answer the same way. OpenAI’s developer documentation says so plainly: its models are not deterministic by default. The answer can change from one request to the next.

Other factors add to this. ChatGPT estimates your approximate location from your IP address and, if you have memory turned on, it can use what it knows about you when it rewrites the search. Google warns that AI Mode and AI Overviews use different models, so their answers and links will vary.

That is why a one-off test proves nothing. What matters is how many answers you appear in out of the total, and whether that figure goes up or down over time.

The 15-minute test

You need 3 questions, 4 tools and a table. You will run 15 queries: each question twice in ChatGPT and once each in Perplexity, Gemini and Google. If each query takes a minute, including waiting and noting it down, that is 15 minutes.

Step 1. Write 3 questions the way your client would

Copy these templates and replace what is in curly brackets. Always include the city: OpenAI itself recommends including it so that local results are for the right area.

1. I need a trustworthy {specialist} in {city}. Who would you recommend?
2. Which {specialist} would you recommend in {city}? Compare 3 or 4 options by name.
3. {Your problem, described the way a client would describe it}. I live in {city}. Who can help me?

The third is the most important. Your clients do not always know what the thing they need is called: they describe their problem. This is how the template would look for 4 made-up businesses:

If you have a minute to spare, add a brand question that does not count towards the total: What do you know about {your business} in {city}?. It will tell you what information the AI has about you and whether it is correct.

Step 2. Set up each tool so that it does not recognise you

• ChatGPT (chatgpt.com): open a temporary chat and choose the option without personalisation. That way it does not use your memory or your instructions. Another option is to use it without logging in, because search works without an account. Check that web search is turned on: if the answer does not include links to sources, it has not searched. For the second round, open another chat.
• Perplexity (perplexity.ai): a new conversation for each question.
• Gemini (gemini.google.com): a new conversation for each question.
• Google: search for the question exactly as written. If the AI Overview does not appear, click AI Mode. It is normal for it not to appear: Google acknowledges that it often does not trigger.

Turn off your VPN if you use one, because it changes the location ChatGPT infers from your connection.

Step 3. Record each answer in this table

Copy this template into a spreadsheet. Write the date at the top and fill in one row per answer, 15 in total.

Repeat the block for questions 2 and 3. Under “Do you appear?” write Recommended, Mentioned or No. Under “Sources cited”, the domain or the type of site is enough.

Let’s say you are an inheritance law firm in Castellón. Question 1 could look like this:

When you have finished, count how many of the 15 answers you appear in and do the same with the competitor that appears most often. If you appear in 3 and Firm A in 13, you have your starting point.

Step 4. Read the sources: that is where the reason lies

The sources cited tell you where the AI gets what it says. Each tool shows them in its own way:

• ChatGPT: links within the text and a sources button below the answer. If there are no links, check that search was turned on.
• Perplexity: numbered citations within the answer, each linked to its source.
• Gemini: a sources button below or within the answer. If it does not appear, that answer has no links.
• Google: links next to the text of the AI Overview or of AI Mode.

Classify each source into one of these 4 groups:

1. The recommended business’s website.
2. Map listings: Google Maps or the Google Business Profile.
3. Sector directories and portals: professional associations, medical appointment portals, business directories.
4. Third parties that talk about the business: local press, rankings, associations, forums.

If the same site comes up in several answers, the AI uses it for your sector and your city. If your competitors are there and you are not, you have your first task.

A warning: OpenAI acknowledges that citations may be incomplete, out of date or incorrect. Open the sources and check that they say what the AI claims.

Step 5. Interpret the result

What to do if ChatGPT recommends your competitors

If you are wondering how to appear in ChatGPT, these are the actions with the most impact for a local business, from fastest to slowest. None of them guarantees the result, but they all tackle what the AI needs: to find you, understand you and trust you.

1. Make sure you are not blocking AI

Open yourdomain.com/robots.txt in your browser. It is a text file that tells each crawler what it can read. This is what each one does, according to the guides from OpenAI, Perplexity and Google:

This is what you do not want to find:

User-agent: OAI-SearchBot
Disallow: /

Nor do you want to see User-agent: * followed by Disallow: /, which shuts the door on all of them. OpenAI and Perplexity say that changes can take up to about 24 hours to take effect.

Check the server too. OpenAI asks you to confirm that your hosting or your CDN lets through traffic from its crawlers. If you use Cloudflare or another firewall, ask whoever manages it to review the bot settings. Our free SEO and AI audit checks your robots.txt for each of these crawlers.

Google has one more switch. Search Console has a generative AI control to include or exclude your website from AI Overviews and AI Mode. It is set to “Include” by default: check in Settings that nobody has changed it.

2. Look after your Google Business Profile and sign up for Bing

Your Google Business Profile feeds Google and Gemini at the same time. Gemini reads Google Maps, and Google includes keeping your Business Profile up to date among its recommendations for AI features.

Google explains that local results depend on relevance, distance and prominence. Check these points:

• The real name of the business, with no added keywords, as its guidelines for profiles require.
• The most specific primary category possible.
• Address or service area, opening hours, phone number and website.
• Services described in your clients’ words.

Then do the same on Bing. Microsoft recommends signing up for Bing Places so that your address, opening hours and contact details stay up to date and can be included in AI-generated answers. Register your website with Bing Webmaster Tools too.

If your business does not appear on the map, start with the diagnosis in how to appear on Google Maps. And if you want to see how a profile is worked on in depth, we explain it on the page about local SEO for businesses in Castellón and Valencia.

3. Appear where the AI is already looking

The list of sources from step 4 is your task list. For each site that cites your competitors and not you:

• Sector directory or portal: sign up with the same details as your Google Business Profile. You will find the ones for each sector, verified, in where to list your business.
• Professional association or trade body: complete your member profile and link to your website if they allow it.
• Local press or rankings: they cannot be bought. You earn them by having something to say: a case, your own data, a useful guide.

Google counts the number of websites that point to your business towards prominence. And in your table you have already seen which sites the AI reads for your sector. Always use the same name, address and phone number on all of them.

4. Have one page per service, with specialism and city

Remember OpenAI’s example: the search ChatGPT runs looks like “service plus city”. If your website only says “Lawyers. Legal solutions”, there is nothing that matches that search.

Each important service needs its own page with:

• Title and first paragraph with specialism and city: “Inheritance lawyer in Castellón”.
• Who it is for and what problems you solve, in the client’s words.
• How you work, approximate timescales and what documents you need.
• Who does it: name, membership number or qualification.
• The area you cover, address and contact details.
• Real frequently asked questions.

Google asks for important content to be in text form and linked from your own website. Microsoft, for its part, recommends a clear structure with headings, tables and FAQs, data that backs up what you say and up-to-date content.

5. Get reviews consistently

Google puts it this way: the more reviews and positive ratings, the better your local ranking will be. And Gemini shows Google Maps ratings when it searches for businesses.

Ask for the review with the link or QR code that Google gives you and reply at least to the negative and neutral ones. Never offer discounts or gifts in return: Google considers it fake engagement and prohibits it. You will find model messages and replies in how to get Google reviews.

6. Add structured data that matches what is shown

Structured data is invisible code that describes your business for machines: name, address, opening hours, services. Google uses it to understand your pages and gather information about businesses, and it has a specific type for local businesses.

Be realistic: Google says no special markup is needed to appear in its AI features. Its value is consistency: your website, your code and your profile all saying the same thing.

Two rules. The data must match the visible text. And do not mark up your own testimonials as reviews: if you control them, Google does not show stars on local business pages.

What does not work

Paying does not help: OpenAI states that ads do not influence the answers and Google does not let you pay for a better local ranking. Telling ChatGPT about your business does not work either: memory personalises your answers, not your clients’.

What to do on Monday

1. Do the 15-minute test and save the table with the date.
2. Open your robots.txt and check that OAI-SearchBot and PerplexityBot are not blocked.
3. Check the category, services and opening hours of your Google Business Profile. Sign up for Bing Places.
4. Note down the 3 sites that come up most often in the sources and check whether you are on them.
5. Ask for a review from the clients you served in the last 30 days, all of them, not just the ones you know are happy.
6. Repeat the test in a month, with the same questions.

If after the test you are not sure where to start, at NOR studio we can review your case: request your audit. And if you want to work on it on an ongoing basis, this is our service for visibility in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google.