How to get mentioned in ChatGPT: a step-by-step plan for businesses

ChatGPT mentions your business when the model can find you, understands what you do and sees enough reliable sources to back that up. You get there with a website AI can read, clear information, reviews and mentions on other sites. Below is the step-by-step plan we usually recommend to businesses.

How ChatGPT builds its answer

ChatGPT draws on two kinds of knowledge. The first is what the model learned during training. That knowledge is not current and you have little direct influence over it. The second is live search: for many questions, ChatGPT currently searches the web and reads a number of pages before it answers.

That second part is where you can make a difference. When ChatGPT searches for "roofer in Apeldoorn", you want your website and good sources about you to be in those results. Our article how does ChatGPT choose which businesses to recommend goes into more detail.

Step 1: let OpenAI's crawlers in

OpenAI uses different bots. OAI-SearchBot is used for search in ChatGPT, GPTBot for training. Check your robots.txt to make sure these bots are not blocked. Also ask your web developer or hosting provider whether a firewall or security plugin is keeping bots out. It happens more often than you might think.

Step 2: say literally what you do and where

A model should not have to guess. Put what you do and where in the first sentence of your homepage. So not "We make your dream come true", but "We are a roofing company in Apeldoorn and the surrounding area, specialising in flat roofs and roof insulation".

On top of that, create:

• a separate page for each service
• a clear contact page with address, phone number and opening hours
• an about page explaining who you are and how long you have been in business
• an FAQ with short, direct answers to questions customers actually ask

Step 3: add structured data

With schema.org markup you tell machines who you are in a fixed format. For local businesses, LocalBusiness is the most important type. You fill in your name, address, phone, opening hours and service area. You will find an example in our article on structured data.

Step 4: collect genuine reviews

When someone asks for "a good" or "a reliable" provider, ChatGPT looks for evidence. Reviews are a big part of that. Ask every happy customer for a review on your Google Business Profile and on a review site that is widely used in your industry. Include a direct link to make it easy.

Step 5: get mentioned on other sites

ChatGPT does not rely on your own website alone. It also reads comparison sites, industry directories, local news sites and lists like "the best bakeries in Haarlem". Ask yourself: which sites show up in answers about my trade, and am I on them too?

A practical example: a cleaning company in Breda finds that ChatGPT keeps citing two local business directories and one review site for their questions. They are only listed on one of them. By getting properly listed on the other two, with the same details, they improve their chances of appearing in the answer.

Step 6: keep your details consistent

Use the same business name, address and phone number everywhere. An old location in a directory or a different spelling on social media can make a model hesitate. Go through your listings carefully once and correct everything.

Step 7: measure and repeat

ChatGPT does not give the same answer every time. Asking a question once yourself tells you very little. Put together a fixed set of questions your customers really ask, say ten to twenty, and ask them again regularly. Look at:

1. which questions you are mentioned for
2. where in the answer you appear
3. which competitors do show up
4. which sources ChatGPT uses

That way you see which step pays off most and where work remains.

How quickly will you see results?

It varies by business and by question. Changes that come in through live search can sometimes show within a few weeks. What sits in the training data only changes with a new model. So think in months, not days.

Know where you stand today

Curious whether ChatGPT already mentions your business? The free AI visibility check asks the major AI assistants five questions and shows you where you stand. Want to follow it every week, with a PDF report in your inbox? Take a look at our pricing.