Guide
How to get recommended by ChatGPT, Perplexity, Grok and Google AI Overviews
More buyers now ask an AI assistant instead of scrolling search results. If the answer names your competitors and not you, you lose the customer before they ever see your site. Here’s how to check where you stand and fix it.
AI visibility vs SEO
SEO gets you ranked in a list of ten links. AI visibility gets you named in a single answer. They overlap — crawlable pages and authority still matter — but AI engines lean harder on:
- Mentions over links: how often trusted third parties talk about you.
- Clear entity facts: what you are, where, for whom.
- Quotable answers: content that directly answers the buyer’s question.
- Volatility: answers shift week to week and differ by engine, so one check isn’t enough.
The 5-prompt test
Ask each of these in ChatGPT, Perplexity, Grok and Google (AI Overview), and note who gets mentioned:
What's the best [your category] in [your city]?Recommend a [your category] for [specific use case].[Competitor] alternatives?Is [your brand] any good?Compare [your brand] vs [competitor].
If you’re missing from most answers — or competitors show up first — you have an AI visibility gap. Citeboard’s free audit runs this test for you in under a minute.
7 fixes that move the needle
1. Say exactly what you do, in plain words
Put your category, location and who you serve in the first lines of your homepage and title tags. AI models match entities to categories — make yours unambiguous.
2. Get listed where AI looks
Google Business Profile, Yelp, G2/Capterra, industry directories and "best of" roundups are heavily cited. Consistent name, address and description everywhere.
3. Earn third-party mentions
Reviews, Reddit threads, local news and comparison articles carry more weight than your own site. One honest mention on a cited page beats ten blog posts.
4. Publish answer-shaped pages
FAQ, pricing, "X vs Y" and "best X for Y" pages with direct, quotable answers are what Perplexity and AI Overviews cite.
5. Add structured data
Organization, LocalBusiness, Product and FAQ schema help engines confirm facts about you.
6. Keep facts fresh and crawlable
Don't block AI crawlers in robots.txt, keep pricing and hours current, and avoid hiding key info in images or JS-only widgets.
7. Measure weekly
AI answers change constantly. Track the same prompts every week across engines so you know whether fixes are working.
See who AI recommends in your category
Free audit across ChatGPT, Perplexity, Grok and Google AI Overviews. No signup needed.