How to Get Your Business Found in ChatGPT and AI Search
Something has changed in the last two years and most small businesses have not noticed yet.
People have stopped searching and started asking. Instead of typing "wedding cakes east London" into Google and working through the results, they ask ChatGPT to recommend a good cake maker near Walthamstow. They get three names back. If you are not one of them, you were never in the running.
There is no page two to be on. Either the AI says your name or it does not.
Why this matters sooner than you think
The people asking AI for recommendations tend to be the ones ready to buy. They are not browsing, they are shortlisting. One name from an AI carries more weight than ten blue links, because it arrives sounding like advice rather than advertising.
I track this every couple of days across the businesses I work with. I ask the four big engines the questions their customers would actually ask, and record whether the brand gets named. Watching that number move is one of the most useful things I do, and almost nobody is measuring it.
How AI decides who to name
It is not magic and it is not paid placement. Broadly, an AI names businesses it has seen described clearly and consistently, in enough places, in a way that matches the question.
That gives you four things to work on.
1. Say plainly who you are and what you do
Vague copy is invisible to AI. "Bespoke solutions for discerning clients" tells it nothing. "We make custom celebration cakes and deliver across north east London" tells it everything.
Write like you would explain it to a neighbour. The clearer you are, the easier you are to recommend.
2. Answer the actual questions people ask
If someone asks AI "how far ahead do I need to order a wedding cake", the businesses with a genuine answer to that on their site are the ones in the running. Every real question your customers ask is a page or a section waiting to be written.
This is where an honest blog earns its keep. Not keyword stuffing, just proper answers to real questions.
3. Be findable in the same terms twice
Your name, what you do, and where you do it should appear the same way everywhere. Your site, your Google Business Profile, directories, anywhere you are listed. Inconsistency makes AI unsure it is talking about one business, and an unsure AI stays quiet.
4. Get mentioned somewhere other than your own site
This is the hard one and the one that moves the needle most. AI trusts what other people say about you more than what you say about yourself. Real directories, local press, a supplier's site, a genuine partnership.
What you must not do is buy your way into fake link networks. It is the fastest way to get a domain punished, and I would not do it to a business I cared about.
What it looks like when it works
One of the bakeries I work with went from being named in one AI answer out of twelve, to five, to eleven over a couple of months. Nothing clever happened. The site got clearer, the real questions got answered properly, and the details lined up everywhere she was listed.
That is not a trick. It is the same principle as being the business people actually believe in, applied to a machine that reads.
Start here
Open ChatGPT and ask it the question your best customer would ask. "Recommend a [what you do] in [where you are]." See what comes back.
If your name is not there, that is your starting position, and it is worth knowing rather than assuming. Ask it again in a month once you have tidied up the four things above.
If you would rather someone did the tidying and tracked the numbers for you, that is a large part of what I build.
Want to know where your business currently stands in AI search? Get in touch and I will take a look.