How to get your business mentioned on ChatGPT in the UK

Some customers now ask ChatGPT before they search Google: “can you recommend an accountant in Norwich for self assessment?”, “emergency plumber in Leeds who can come tonight”. The reply names two or three firms, and people tend to ring one of them. Getting your business mentioned on ChatGPT mostly comes down to things you already look after: your website, your Business Profile and what other sites say about you.

Below: what ChatGPT reads before it names a business, the steps you can take yourself, what to leave alone, and how to see whether it mentions you.

How ChatGPT chooses which firms to name

ChatGPT answers from what it learned in training, which you can't change, and from what it looks up on the web when asked, which you can influence. When a question needs current or local information (“open on Saturday”, “near me”, “how much”), it searches and shows the sources it used. Those sources are where you come in.

It searches with its own crawler, OAI-SearchBot, and OpenAI says sites that block it won't appear in ChatGPT search answers (its crawler documentation). Perplexity works the same way with PerplexityBot (its documentation), and Microsoft's Copilot draws on Bing.

Seven steps a UK business can take itself

1. Ask the questions your customers ask

Open ChatGPT and put five or six questions to it as a new customer would: your service and your town, the “best” in your trade locally, what it costs. Note who comes up, which pages are linked and what's said about you. That's your starting point; ask the same questions again each month.

2. Let the search crawlers in

Ask whoever looks after your website to check the robots.txt file. OpenAI separates GPTBot, which reads to train its models, from OAI-SearchBot, which reads to answer searches. You can block the first if you'd rather your content wasn't used for training; block the second and you can't appear in ChatGPT's search answers.

3. Get listed on Bing Places, Apple Maps and Yell

Most firms only think about Google. Copilot draws on Bing, so add your site to Bing Webmaster Tools and your business to Bing Places, and keep Apple Maps and Yell up to date. Since February 2026 Bing shows how often Copilot cites your site, in its AI Performance report.

4. A page for each service that answers first

If your site says “we deliver tailored solutions”, an AI has nothing to quote. Each service needs its own page, opening with the answer: what it is, who it's for, which towns you cover, the price or what it depends on (before or after VAT), and how long it takes. Then the questions clients always ask, in your words.

5. The same details everywhere

Name, address, postcode, phone, hours and services should match on your site, your Business Profile, Bing, Yell and the directories in your trade. When every source says something different, the AI can't tell which is right and sometimes picks the old one. Your Business Profile matters most for local questions; how to rank higher on Google Maps covers it.

6. Get other sites talking about you

Recent reviews with replies, your trade body, the local paper, the business association on your high street, “best of” lists and comparison sites. That's what these tools read before they trust a name. No shortcuts: Google's spam policies go after bought links and mass-produced content.

7. Measure what you can

Repeat the step 1 questions monthly, check your analytics for visits from chatgpt.com or perplexity.ai, and look at the Bing report. Google counts visits from AI Overviews and AI Mode within the Search Console Performance report, alongside the rest of your search traffic.

What you'll be sold that doesn't help

• “Guaranteed ChatGPT rankings.” No one controls who it names, and the answer changes from day to day.
• An llms.txt file as the cure. Google says no AI text files or special mark-up are needed for its AI features.
• Hundreds of AI-written pages: the scaled content Google treats as spam.
• Bought reviews or mentions. They break Google's rules, and UK law on fake reviews has tightened (CMA guidance).

And in Google's AI Overviews in the UK

AI Overviews have appeared in UK results since August 2024 and draw on the same index as ordinary Google search. Google says in AI features and your website that there are no extra requirements: a page that's indexed and can show with a snippet is eligible. The same seven steps apply.

Want to see what AI tools say about your firm today? The free audit includes the screenshots and what we'd fix first.