How Do I Get My Business Recommended by ChatGPT and AI Search?
More people are now opening ChatGPT, or asking their phone out loud, instead of scrolling through a page of search results. They ask something like “who does emergency plumbing near me” and the assistant comes back with two or three names. You are either on that shortlist or you may as well not exist.
The gap here is worth paying attention to. Roughly 45% of people say they have used an AI assistant to help find a local business, but only a tiny slice of business locations actually get named in those answers. Compare that to the Google map pack, where competition is fierce. For now, there is space.
Here is what actually helps, and none of it requires a big budget.
Write one plain sentence about what you do and where
AI tools match a question to a description. If your Instagram bio says “creating moments since 2019” and your homepage leads with “bespoke solutions”, there is nothing concrete for anything to grab hold of. Say the boring version instead: “Family-run dog grooming in Guildford, open Saturdays, nervous dogs welcome.”
Then use that same sentence in three places: your website homepage, your Google Business Profile description, and every social bio. Repetition is the point. You want the same plain facts showing up wherever anything looks.
Make your contact details identical everywhere
Set aside an hour, search your own business name, and write down every place it appears. Google Business Profile, Bing Places, Yell, Facebook, Instagram, your Companies House listing, any trade directory you joined years ago and forgot about.
Now check the name, address, phone number and opening hours on each one. An old address on a directory you stopped using is enough to make a business look uncertain, and uncertain businesses do not get recommended. Fix the mismatches and close down the listings you no longer want.
Reviews are doing most of the heavy lifting
Review sites are one of the few places where real customers describe your business in their own words, which is exactly what an AI assistant wants to summarise. Pick the two platforms that matter in your trade and keep those profiles current rather than spreading yourself across eight.
Aim for a steady trickle rather than thirty reviews in one week, which looks odd to everyone. Ask at the moment the customer is happiest, usually the minute the job is finished, and make it a link rather than instructions. Reply to every review, including the unhappy ones. Your reply is text too, and a calm, specific response sitting under a one-star review often does more good than the review does damage.
Answer the questions people actually ask
Think about what you get asked on the phone every week. Do you cover Woking? How much does a small bathroom refit usually cost? Do I need to be in for the delivery? Those are the questions people put to an assistant too.
Write the question as a heading on your site and answer it properly in the first two sentences underneath. Ranges are fine where you cannot give an exact figure. Do the same on social: one post, one question, a straight answer in the caption. It gives the assistants something to quote and saves you a phone call.
Get mentioned somewhere that is not your own website
Anything can say it is the best in town on its own homepage, so that claim carries very little weight. What counts is other people saying it. A write-up in the local paper, a supplier listing you as an approved installer, a mention in a village Facebook group, a trade association member page, a guest slot on someone’s podcast.
One or two genuine third-party mentions a quarter is a realistic target for a small business. Sponsoring the under-11s football kit and getting named on the club website counts. So does answering a question properly in a local group instead of dropping a link and leaving.
Check what the assistants say about you today
Most business owners have never actually looked. Open ChatGPT and Google and ask three things: “best [your trade] in [your town]”, “is [your business name] any good”, and “who should I call for [the job you want more of] near [your town]”.
Write down what comes back. You will usually find one of three things: you are not mentioned at all, you are mentioned with out-of-date details, or a competitor is being described in a way you could easily match. All three are fixable, and all three tell you where to spend your next hour. Repeat it once a month so you can see whether anything is shifting.
None of this needs a big budget. It needs the same true, specific information about your business to be easy to find in a handful of places, and it needs someone to keep it that way. If you would rather not spend your evenings auditing old directory listings, that is the sort of thing we do every day. Get in touch through our Contact page and we will take a look at how your business currently shows up.