ChatGPT uses a combination of its training data, live web browsing, and structured signals from your website to answer questions about local businesses.
When someone asks "who is the best electrician in Sheffield" or "find me a solicitor who handles employment law," ChatGPT looks for businesses it can verify — businesses with:
Most businesses have none of these. Not because they're doing anything wrong — because nobody has told them this is how AI search works.
Schema markup is structured code embedded in your website that tells AI engines exactly who you are, what you do, where you are, and how to contact you.
Without schema, ChatGPT has to infer your business type from page text. It will not confidently recommend a business it cannot verify.
llms.txt is a plain-text file at the root of your website — yoursite.co.uk/llms.txt. When GPTBot visits your site, this is often the first thing it reads.
It contains a structured summary of your business: what you do, who you serve, where you operate, and how to contact you.
ChatGPT cross-references your business name, address, and phone number across directories, review platforms, and Google Business Profile. If these don't match — even small differences like "Ltd" versus "Limited" — AI confidence in your identity drops.
Lower confidence means lower likelihood of recommendation.
The fix is technical, not creative. You don't need more content. You don't need ads. You need the right files in the right places.
Once the technical signals are in place, AI engines can pick them up within days to weeks. Perplexity crawls in near-real time. ChatGPT updates its web knowledge on a rolling basis.
Businesses with no signals will never appear. Businesses with correct signals have a clear chance.
No. In most cases the files are generated and pasted or uploaded by you or your web person. It usually takes under five minutes.
Your site design, content and hosting stay exactly as they are.
No. Traditional SEO is about ranking on Google's results page. This is about appearing in AI-generated answers — a fundamentally different system with different signals.
You can be on page one of Google and completely invisible to ChatGPT.