Free guide · SEO & GEO
More customers now ask an AI "who's a good dentist near me?" or "best plumber in Burbank?" instead of scrolling Google. The AI names two or three businesses, and most people call one of them. Here's how ChatGPT, Gemini and Google's AI answers decide who to name, and a checklist you can work through this week. Most of it is free.
How AI picks
When it searches the web, it uses search partners, including Bing, plus OpenAI's own crawler. For local questions it also reads listings and reviews.
They use Google's own search index and your Google Business Profile: category, hours, area, reviews.
Runs its own crawler and shows its sources, so you can see exactly which pages it trusted.
None of them sell spots in their answers. They name the businesses they can find, read clearly and see others vouch for. So the work is the same for all of them: be findable, be clear, be talked about.
The checklist
Open yoursite.com/robots.txt. If it blocks OAI-SearchBot (ChatGPT search), PerplexityBot, Bingbot or Googlebot, those tools can't read you. Some website builders and security plugins block them by default.
Free at google.com/business. Google's AI answers lean on it for hours, area, category and reviews. Pick the most specific main category you can.
Free at bingplaces.com, and you can import straight from Google. ChatGPT's search uses Bing among its sources, so this listing matters more than most owners think.
Same business name, phone, city and hours on Google, Bing, Apple Business Connect, Yelp and your site. AI tools cross-check them, and mismatches make you look less certain.
"Brake repair in Glendale" beats one long "Services" page. Say what you do, who it's for, where you work and how to book, in plain words a customer would use.
Add a short Q&A to each page: cost range, how long it takes, insurance, parking, weekends. Keep each answer to two or three sentences. That's the size AI tools like to quote.
LocalBusiness (or Organization) markup with your name, phone, area served, hours and links to your listings. Most site builders have a setting or plugin for it.
Your shop, your team and your work, on Google and Bing. It shows you're a real, open business, and listings with photos get more clicks.
Reviews are one of the strongest signals for local answers. Ask right after a good job, make the link easy, and reply to every review, good or bad. Never buy or fake them.
Your industry association, local business groups, the chamber of commerce, local news, "best of" lists and the directories in your field. AI tools trust businesses other sites talk about.
Text inside images or behind clicks is hard for crawlers to read. Put your services, city and phone number in real text, and keep the page fast on a phone.
Add your site to Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools (both free) and submit your sitemap. Bing even has a report on when Microsoft's AI cites your pages.
Check where you stand
Open ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity in a private browser window. Ask each one the question your customers would ask, like "Who's a good chiropractor in Glendale?" or "Best barbershop near Burbank?" Write down who gets named and which pages they cite.
Run the same questions once a month. If the businesses being named have listings, reviews or pages you don't, that's your to-do list.
Skip these
We do this on our own site
This week we ran this checklist on our own website: structured data on every page, a page for each service, an llms.txt summary, and we set up our listings on Google, Bing, Yelp and Clutch with the same details everywhere.
We'll keep checking what ChatGPT and Google say about us, the same way we do for clients.
No storefront? Here's how to set up a Google Business Profile with your address hidden.
Questions
No. ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity don't sell spots in their answers. Anyone who guarantees you'll be named is guessing. What you can do is make your business easy for them to find, read and trust.
When ChatGPT searches the web it uses search partners, including Bing, plus OpenAI's own crawler. For local businesses it also leans on listings and reviews. That's why a correct Bing Places listing and an open website matter as much as Google.
They overlap. SEO is ranking in Google's list of links. GEO, generative engine optimization, is getting named in AI answers. Both reward the same basics: clear pages, correct business details, structured data, reviews and mentions on sites people trust.
Listings and site fixes are usually picked up within days to a few weeks. Showing up for competitive searches in a big city usually takes months, not days.
It helps a little and costs nothing. It's a short plain-text summary of your business for AI tools. It's new and not every AI tool reads it yet, so do the listings and pages first.
Want it done for you?
Tell us your business and city. A person reads it, usually the same day. Or see our SEO & GEO service, and the AI receptionist that answers the extra calls.