Guide
Why doesn't ChatGPT recommend my business?
When someone asks ChatGPT for a local business, it searches the web, reads a handful of pages and names the few businesses those pages make it confident about. If yours isn't named, it's usually for one of six reasons, and most of them can be fixed.
How ChatGPT decides who to name
For a question like "who's a good electrician near Joondalup?", ChatGPT runs web searches, opens a set of pages and writes an answer from what it found. It doesn't have a list of approved businesses. It names the ones the pages it read describe clearly and well.
In our Perth study, ChatGPT cited at least one business's own website in 81% of its answers. A US study by BrightLocal found business websites made up 58% of the sources ChatGPT used for local searches. Beyond websites, it leans on directories, review sites and "best of" lists.
Six common reasons you're left out
1. Your website doesn't say what you do and where
If your site says "quality work at great prices" but never lists your services and the suburbs you cover, there's nothing for ChatGPT to match to "electrician near Joondalup". Plain text that names each service and each area is what gets read.
2. You're missing from the sites it quotes for your industry
Each industry has a few sites the assistants keep citing. In our Perth testing, trades were matched to platforms like hipages and government licence pages, car repairers to review sites like Birdeye and Word of Mouth, and cafés to local guides like The Urban List and Time Out. If you're not on them, or your listing is thin, you miss a source the assistant trusts.
3. Your details don't match everywhere
An old phone number on one directory, a different business name on another and wrong hours on a third make it harder for an assistant to be confident about you. Sometimes it repeats the wrong detail, which sends customers to a dead line.
4. Your reviews are below the bar
AI assistants often quote review counts and star ratings as their reason for recommending someone. A US study by SOCi found the businesses ChatGPT recommended averaged 4.3 stars. A low rating or only a handful of reviews works against you.
5. A few competitors are simply better described
In our Perth study, the 10 most-named businesses in each industry appeared in 69–82% of answers. They usually have more complete information across more sites. That's a gap you can close, but it takes steady work.
6. You checked once
ChatGPT's answers change a lot between asks. An Australian study by Dossis Digital found it gave the same recommendations only 8% of the time on a repeat. Being left out of one answer doesn't mean you're never named, and being named once doesn't mean you usually are. Ask many questions, several times each, before drawing conclusions.
What to do about it
- Ask ChatGPT the questions your customers ask, several times each, and note who it names and which sites it cites.
- Make your website state your services, suburbs, contact details, licences and hours in plain text.
- Correct your name, address, phone and hours everywhere they appear.
- Get listed properly on the sites cited for your industry.
- Ask every customer for a review, and reply to them.
- Re-check monthly, the same way each time.
Our guide to getting recommended by ChatGPT in Australia covers each step in more detail.
Prefer a list to tick off? Get the free 23-point checklist.