Ask ChatGPT for a good accountant in Manchester or a reliable roofer in Leeds, and you immediately get three or four names. Not a list of ten blue links, but a short answer with a recommendation. For the businesses on that shortlist, that is worth its weight in gold. For those who aren’t, it’s a customer who never lands on their website.
In this article you’ll read how AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity decide which businesses to mention, why your competitor sometimes shows up and you don’t, and what you can do in practice to improve your chances.
Where does ChatGPT get its answer from?
An AI assistant draws its answer from two sources. The first is what the model learned during training: a huge amount of text from the internet, up to a certain date. The second is a search carried out in the moment. For questions about local businesses, prices or current affairs, ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and the AI answers in Google increasingly search live.
During such a live search, roughly this happens: the assistant turns your question into one or more search queries, reads a handful of pages that come out on top, and summarises them into a single answer. Businesses that are mentioned clearly and credibly in those sources have the best chance of ending up in the answer.
That also means an AI assistant doesn’t make up its recommendations out of thin air. It repeats what the internet says about you. If that is little, vague or contradictory, it picks someone else.
Which signals carry the most weight?
No AI provider publishes a complete list of criteria. But anyone who analyses a lot of AI answers sees the same patterns coming back again and again.
- Clear answers on your own website. Pages that answer a concrete question clearly are picked up more easily than generic marketing copy. What do you do, for whom, in which area, and roughly what does it cost?
- Mentions on other sites. Comparison sites, local news media, industry directories and lists such as “the best ... in ...” are often used as sources. The more often you appear there, the stronger the signal.
- Reviews and reputation. Ratings on Google and other platforms give an AI assistant something to hold on to when recommending a business as trustworthy.
- Consistent business details. Name, address, services and area should be the same everywhere: on your site, in your Google Business Profile and in directories. Contradictory information makes the model uncertain.
- Technical accessibility. If your website blocks the crawlers of AI services, or is slow and messily built, they simply can’t read your content.
- Freshness. Recent, well-maintained content often beats a page that hasn’t been updated in years.
What is the difference between SEO and GEO?
GEO stands for generative engine optimisation: improving your visibility in the answers of generative AI. It isn’t a replacement for SEO, but an extension of it. Much of the foundation is the same: a technically healthy website, good content and authority through mentions on other sites.
The difference lies in the emphasis. Classic SEO is about a place in the search results, so that someone clicks through. GEO is about making your content so clear and reliable that an AI assistant adopts it, and that your business comes back as a name in the answer, even if nobody clicks through. Content that answers a question in the first few sentences, with concrete facts and a clear source, scores on both fronts.
Why does your competitor get mentioned?
If you ask ChatGPT a question about your field and only see competitors appear, it’s usually down to one of these causes:
- They are mentioned more often on other websites, for example in local lists or comparisons.
- Their website answers customers’ questions more explicitly, with separate pages per service and area.
- They have more, and more recent, reviews.
- Your website is hard for crawlers to read, or your services are only described vaguely.
The good news: these are all things you can influence. With a competitor analysis you quickly see where others are ahead.
How to increase the chance that AI mentions your business
Answer the questions customers actually ask. Create pages that clearly answer one concrete question: what does it cost, how long does it take, what is the difference between option A and B. Put the answer at the top and elaborate afterwards.
Be explicit about who you are. Clearly state your services, your area, your experience and your contact details. An AI assistant can only recommend you for “Manchester” if it says somewhere that you work in Manchester.
Make sure you’re mentioned beyond your own site. A complete Google Business Profile, listings in relevant directories, local press and partnerships all build the authority that AI assistants look for.
Collect reviews, and keep doing it. Systematically ask satisfied customers for a review. A steady stream of recent reviews is stronger than a peak from years ago.
Let crawlers in. Check that your website doesn’t block the crawlers of AI services, loads quickly and has a logical structure. A visibility audit maps this out quickly.
How do you know whether AI mentions your business?
The simplest test is to ask ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity the questions your customers would ask. Keep two things in mind. AI answers vary: the same question can produce a different list today than tomorrow. And the wording matters: “best”, “affordable” or “near me” often gives different names.
A one-off test therefore says little. What does say something is how often you are mentioned across dozens of questions and several weeks, and whether that is rising. That’s why it pays to track your visibility in AI answers structurally, alongside your rankings in Google.
A realistic view of your own visibility
The question is no longer just whether you’re on page one of Google, but also whether you get mentioned when someone asks an AI assistant for advice. Want to know where your business stands today and which steps will deliver the most? Book a free demo and we’ll look at it together.