How to check if ChatGPT recommends your business
A free 10-minute audit you can run right on this page. Build the questions your buyers actually ask, run them in ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini, and get your score.
- Don't ask AI about your brand. Ask it what your buyers ask, without naming you.
- Run each question in a clean chat in ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini.
- Score every answer below. Your score is how often AI sends buyers to you.
The mistake almost everyone makes
Most people check by typing their company name into ChatGPT. If it describes them correctly, they assume they're fine. That test only tells you AI knows you exist. It says nothing about whether AI recommends you.
Buyers don't ask about you by name. They ask what to buy.
What is Acme CRM?
What's the best CRM for a small agency?
If you show up in the second answer, AI is sending you traffic. If a competitor shows up instead, that's traffic going to them.
Step 1: Build your buyer questions
Good test questions cover the different ways people shop: "best of" lists, alternatives to a competitor, a problem they want solved, budget, and location. Fill in the fields and the builder writes them for you.
"Ask ChatGPT" and "Ask Perplexity" open the question in a new tab. For Gemini, copy the question and paste it at gemini.google.com.
Step 2: Ask each assistant, the right way
AI answers change with context. A few rules keep your test honest:
- Use a clean session. In ChatGPT, turn on Temporary Chat or log out. Otherwise your past chats about your own business can push you into the answer.
- Ask each question twice. Answers vary from run to run. If you appear once out of two, count it as a mention, not a win.
- Don't follow up. Score the first answer only. Buyers rarely ask a second time.
- Test all three engines. ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini pull from different sources and often recommend different companies.
Step 3: Score every answer
Click each cell to record what happened. The score updates as you go.
| Question | ChatGPT | Perplexity | Gemini |
|---|
Score a few answers to see where you stand.
How the score works: recommended first counts as 100%, mentioned as 50%, not mentioned or competitor-only as 0%. Your score is the average across every answer you've checked.
What your score means
- 70 and up: AI already sends buyers your way. Protect it by checking monthly, since answers shift as engines update.
- 30 to 69: You're in the conversation but rarely the pick. Focus on the questions where a competitor wins.
- Under 30: AI is sending your buyers elsewhere. This is common for newer businesses, and fixable.
How to get recommended more often
AI assistants mostly repeat what trusted pages say about your category. Studies of how these engines pick their sources point to a few places that matter most:
For "best X" and "alternatives to X" questions, listicles make up around half of what AI cites, and about 70% for alternatives questions. Being listed on the articles that already rank is the biggest lever.
Pages like "You vs Competitor" and "Competitor alternatives" answer exactly what buyers ask. Keep them factual, dated and easy to scan.
Review platforms like G2 show up often in AI answers for software. For local businesses, Google and Yelp reviews play the same role.
Short explainer videos and genuinely helpful answers in forums and LinkedIn posts give AI more places to find you.
Why doing this by hand gets hard
Eight questions on three engines, asked twice, is 48 answers. Do it monthly and add a competitor or two, and it becomes a few hours of copy-paste. Answers also drift between runs, which makes one-off checks unreliable.
GapCite's free scan automates the Perplexity and Gemini part of this audit. Weekly tracking across ChatGPT, Claude and up to 8 engines is on the paid plans.
FAQ
Can I just ask ChatGPT "What is my company?"
That only tests whether ChatGPT knows you exist. Whether you appear in unbranded buyer questions is what brings traffic.
Why do I get different answers each time?
AI answers vary between runs, sessions and engines. Run each question at least twice in a clean session and record the most common result.
How often should I check?
Monthly is a good minimum. Answers shift as engines update and as new content about your category gets published.
Does this work for local businesses?
Yes. Fill in the city field in the builder and it adds location-based questions like "best dentist in [city]".