PELORA Research · AI search
How to get your business found on ChatGPT and AI search
We read 20 of the leading studies and platform guides on AI search, from Pew Research Center and the GEO paper to Google, OpenAI and Microsoft's own documentation. They agree on more than the hype suggests. The businesses that show up tend to be easy to read, and named and described the same way across the web.
There is no separate trick.
- Be easy to read
- Be described the same way everywhere
- Be mentioned across the web
The short version
Eight things the research agrees on
The numbers
Twelve figures worth knowing, with their limits
Each figure is quoted from its source. Most come from companies that sell search or AI visibility tools, and the line under each says so.
8% vs 15%
Result clicks: with vs without AI summary
Pew Research Center, 22 Jul 2025
Real browsing of 900 US adults, March 2025, Google only.
6 in 10
US adults who read AI summaries
Pew Research Center, 17 Jun 2026
Survey of 5,119 US adults, Feb. 17 to 23, 2026. Self-reported.
58%
Fewer clicks to the top result
Ahrefs (Ryan Law), 4 Feb 2026
300,000 keywords, desktop, Dec 2023 vs Dec 2025. Correlation. Vendor.
68.01%
Google searches ending with no click
SparkToro (Rand Fishkin), Similarweb data, 8 Jun 2026
US, Jan to Apr 2026, excludes the Google app.
0.664 vs 0.218
Brand mentions outrank backlinks as predictor
Ahrefs (Louise Linehan), 26 May 2025
Spearman correlation, 75,000 brands. Not causation. Vendor.
<1 in 100
Chance AI repeats its brand list
SparkToro (Rand Fishkin) with Gumshoe.ai, 27 Jan 2026
2,961 runs of 12 prompts, Nov to Dec 2025. Not peer reviewed.
42%
Local AI citations from business websites
BrightLocal (Mike Hawkes), 16 Sep 2026
200,085 local searches on ChatGPT, AI Mode, AI Overviews. Vendor.
28.5%
Local AI citations from Business Profiles
BrightLocal (Mike Hawkes), 16 Sep 2026
Across ChatGPT, AI Mode and AI Overviews combined. Vendor.
86%
AI citations from brand-managed sources
Yext, 9 Oct 2025
6.8M citations: websites 44% plus listings 42%. Vendor that sells listings.
56% and 74%
Cited sources replaced weekly: Google, ChatGPT
SISTRIX (Johannes Beus), 1 May 2026
82,619 prompts over 17 weeks, six countries. Vendor.
35%
More organic clicks when cited
Seer Interactive, 4 Nov 2025
Informational queries, 42 client organizations. Seer says causation is not proven.
What we measured ourselves
Our own data, kept apart from the 20
Two PELORA studies, each published on this site with its method and sample. They are not among the 20 sources above.
79% and 83%
Declare a machine-readable identity on the homepage, and ship structured data that parses cleanly
PELORA Local AI Findability Score, 17 Aug 2026
121 businesses across five industries, measured on the homepage. PELORA's own study.
14%
Carry FAQ or Q&A markup on the homepage
PELORA Local AI Findability Score, 17 Aug 2026
Same 121 homepages. 17% carry rating or review markup.
85%
Carry no FAQ markup on the homepage
PELORA Orange County clinic audit, 29 Jul 2026
55 of 65 Orange County clinic and med spa homepages. PELORA's own study.
What these show and do not show: they measure what sites carry, not whether that markup earns a citation. The studies above disagree on how much markup helps (see "Does markup help?"). Our advice is the same either way: put the plain answers on the page in text first.
What they agree on
Each point is backed by at least three of the 20
1. Basics first
AI search runs on ordinary search.
Google says there are no extra requirements: a page has to be indexed and eligible for a snippet. OpenAI says a site that blocks its search crawler will not be shown in ChatGPT search answers. Microsoft says crawlability, metadata, internal links and backlinks remain essential.
2. Fewer clicks
Being named matters more than raw traffic.
Pew measured 8% of visits clicking a result when an AI summary appeared, against 15% without one. Ahrefs and Seer measured large drops in clicks, and SparkToro found 68.01% of Google searches end without a click. Judge the work by calls, leads and being named, not only by visits.
3. Across the web
Being named and described the same way across the web matters.
Ahrefs found mentions across the web track AI Overview visibility far more closely than backlinks do. Pew and Profound found Wikipedia, YouTube and Reddit among the most cited sources, and BrightLocal found all three AI platforms it tested lean on Yelp. Your own listings and Business Profile count too, and those you control. These are correlations, not experiments.
4. Your site
Your own website is still the anchor.
BrightLocal found business websites were 42% of local AI citations. SISTRIX found that for 43% of brand searches, the brand's own site stayed cited for all 17 weeks it tracked. The site is where the facts get checked.
5. Answers move
AI answers change from one ask to the next.
SparkToro found less than a 1 in 100 chance of getting the same brand list twice. SISTRIX found most cited sources replaced within a week. One screenshot proves nothing, and nobody can promise an AI "ranking".
6. Real facts
Specific, factual writing beats tricks.
In the GEO paper, citing sources, adding quotations and adding statistics helped, and keyword stuffing did not. Microsoft tells writers to anchor claims in measurable facts. Every fact has to be real.
7. Better visits
The few who click from AI look more engaged.
Google, Semrush, Conductor and Similarweb all report that visitors from AI are more engaged or arrive more decided. None of them publishes the full method behind its figure, so treat this as a direction, not a number.
Where they disagree
Four open questions
Does markup help?
Microsoft says question and answer pairs can be lifted word for word into AI answers, and that long walls of text make it harder for AI to separate content into usable chunks. Google says no special schema or AI files are needed. Ahrefs measured schema and could not tell whether it did a tiny bit of good or nothing at all.
Who controls the sources?
Yext found 86% of citations come from sources a brand manages. Profound and Pew put Reddit, Wikipedia and YouTube near the top. They measured different questions: local and branded searches lean on listings and the business site.
Does ranking on Google decide it?
BrightEdge found 54.5% of AI Overview citations rank organically, but only 16.7% come from the top 10. BrightLocal found ranking in Google Maps does not carry over directly. Ranking gets you into the pool. It does not decide who gets named.
What to do
Ten things a local or specialist business can do
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4Ask every real customer for a review. Honest reviews only: no incentives, no filtering. That is Google's and the FTC's rule, not a finding of the 20.
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
What owners actually type
People say "get my business on ChatGPT", not GEO
Search box suggestions on Google and Bing, read 3 October 2026. They show what people type, not how many people type it. We could not get reliable volumes, so we do not quote any.
- how to get your business recommended on chatgpt
- how to get your business found on chatgpt
- how to get your business listed on chatgpt
- how to get chatgpt to recommend your business
- how does chatgpt find a business
- how to make your business show up in chatgpt
- how to get cited in ai overviews
- how to rank in google ai search
- how do i get my business listed on ai
The 20 sources
Who we read
Platform: the company's own guidance. Academic and Independent: no product to sell. Vendor and Industry: a company that sells search, data or marketing services, so its numbers carry that interest.
- 1
- 2
- 3Microsoft Advertising Platform
Optimizing Your Content for Inclusion in AI Search Answers, 8 Oct 2025. Microsoft, for Bing and Copilot. - 4Aggarwal, Murahari, Rajpurohit, Kalyan, Narasimhan, Deshpande Academic
GEO: Generative Engine Optimization (KDD 2024), v3, 28 Jun 2024. Princeton University, IIT Delhi and co-authors. - 5Pew Research Center Independent
Google users are less likely to click on links when an AI summary appears, 22 Jul 2025. Nonprofit, sells nothing. - 6Rand Fishkin, SparkToro Vendor
AIs are highly inconsistent when recommending brands or products, 27 Jan 2026. Sells audience research software. - 7
- 8Bain & Company with Dynata Industry
Goodbye Clicks, Hello AI: Zero-Click Search Redefines Marketing, 19 Feb 2025. Management consultancy. - 9Ryan Law, Ahrefs Vendor
Update: AI Overviews Reduce Clicks by 58%, 4 Feb 2026. Sells SEO and AI visibility tools. - 10Seer Interactive Industry
AIO Impact on Google CTR: September 2025 Update, 4 Nov 2025. Digital agency. - 11
- 12Louise Linehan, Ahrefs Vendor
An Analysis of AI Overview Brand Visibility Factors (75K Brands), 26 May 2025. Sells SEO and AI visibility tools. - 13BrightEdge Vendor
AI Overview Citations Now 54% from Organic Rankings, 18 Sep 2025. Sells enterprise SEO software. - 14
- 15
- 16Yext Vendor
AI Doesn't Rank, It Cites. And 86% of Its Sources Are Brand-Managed, 9 Oct 2025. Sells listings and brand data software. - 17Mike Hawkes, BrightLocal Vendor
What 200k local AI searches tell us about what businesses get recommended, 16 Sep 2026. Sells local SEO software. - 18Johannes Beus, SISTRIX Vendor
AI Citation drift: How stable are sources in AI search results?, 1 May 2026. Sells SEO and AI visibility software. - 19Tow Center for Digital Journalism Academic
AI Search Has a Citation Problem, 6 Mar 2025. Columbia Journalism Review, non-commercial. - 20Mike King, iPullRank Industry
How to Optimize for AI Mode Using Query Fan-Outs (webinar recap), 3 Jul 2025. SEO agency.
Method and limits
How we did this
We opened each source and quoted it word for word, then a second reviewer checked the quotes and figures against the pages. The Tow Center study could not be opened in the first review; a second review on 4 October opened it and found both quotes word for word. Nothing on this page rests on it alone. A point counts as agreed only when at least three of the 20 support it. Most studies here measure correlation, not cause. No platform publishes how it chooses which business to name, so every list of AI ranking factors, ours included, is read from the outside. We could not open Gartner's 2024 forecast, an Authoritas study, Aleyda Solis's checklist or Kevin Indig's paywalled usability study, so none of them is used.
For 30 studies graded one by one on their method and commercial interest, see our evidence review: What gets a business named by AI: we graded 30 studies.
If you want to know where you stand
See whether AI names your business
On a call we ask the AI tools the questions your customers ask, and show you who gets named. You keep the findings either way.