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The short version
We tracked 1,104 ChatGPT answers for seven businesses: a Vancouver electrician, a Massachusetts roofer, a Florida dental training institute, an online mobility store, an online sod farm and two others. For every site ChatGPT cited, we checked whether that answer went on to recommend the business.
- The site ChatGPT trusts most is your own, once it reads it. When ChatGPT cited a business's own website, it named that business in 50% to 93% of those answers. (The data)
- The sod farm's website barely appeared in ChatGPT's sources (fewer than 3 answers). It was named in 1 of 204.
- List sites and directories work when they already name you. For the electrician, answers citing ThreeBestRated named him 63% of the time, against 14% overall. A different list site: 3%. (Lists and directories)
- Rivals' websites can help or hurt, depending on whether you're part of the local "known set". (Rivals' sites)
- Angi, HomeAdvisor and BBB showed up across several businesses. Yelp and Google Maps barely showed up at all. (Across businesses)
The short answer
ChatGPT trusts three kinds of site when it recommends a local business: the business's own website, list sites and directories that already name it, and, in some markets, competitors' pages that list several firms. It barely touched Google Maps or Yelp.
This builds on our ChatGPT citations study, which counted every site ChatGPT cited for one electrician. Counting citations shows what ChatGPT reads. It doesn't show what it trusts. So this time we asked a sharper question across seven businesses: when ChatGPT cites a site, does that same answer recommend the business?
Want to see which questions your customers ask ChatGPT? The free question finder writes them from your website.
How we measured "trust"
The short answer: for each site ChatGPT cited, we compared how often the business was named in answers citing that site against how often it was named overall.
Our tool, LLM Visibility Lens, asks each business's buying questions in ChatGPT every morning, logged out, and stores every answer and every source link. This study covers 9 September to 8 October 2026:
- 1,104 ChatGPT answers, 1,047 of them with sources
- seven tracked businesses
- 218 sites cited in three or more answers
ChatGPT named at least one business in 768 answers (70%). The rest gave general advice.
Only one business is named here: Kato Electrical, the Vancouver electrician whose account is our public demo. The others are described by trade and region.
What "trust" means here, and what it doesn't. If a business is named in 14% of all answers but in 63% of answers that cite a particular site, that site travels with its recommendations. That's association, not proof of cause: an answer cites several sites at once. One business is tracked in two accounts, so counts of "accounts" below may include it twice. The method is on the how it works page.
I sell this tracker, so weigh my view accordingly.
Your own website is the most trusted source
The short answer: when ChatGPT read a business's own site, it usually recommended that business. The hard part is getting it to read the site at all.
| Business | Named in all answers | Named when its own site was cited |
|---|---|---|
| Vancouver electrician | 14% (54 of 386) | 78% (7 of 9) |
| Florida dental training institute | 58% (89 of 153) | 88% (56 of 64) |
| Massachusetts roofer | 73% (112 of 153) | 93% (13 of 14) |
| Online mobility store | 5% (10 of 183) | 50% (10 of 20) |
| Online sod farm | 0.5% (1 of 204) | its site was cited in fewer than 3 answers |
Every business that ChatGPT read was named far more often when it did. The online sod farm shows the flip side. Its website was cited in fewer than three ChatGPT answers in 30 days, and ChatGPT named it once in 204 answers. It recommended national retailers and other sod sellers instead.
But ChatGPT read Kato's site in only 9 of 386 answers. So the first job isn't writing more. It's making sure ChatGPT can find and read your pages:
- Let OpenAI's crawler in. OpenAI's crawler documentation says sites that block OAI-SearchBot won't appear in ChatGPT search answers. Check your robots.txt and your firewall.
- Be in Bing. Submit your sitemap in Bing Webmaster Tools. ChatGPT's search draws on outside search providers as well as its own crawler.
- Answer the question on the page. Say what you do, where and for whom, in the first lines. The full playbook is in how to rank in ChatGPT.
Lists and directories: only help if you're on them
The short answer: list sites and directories can multiply your chances, but only the ones that already list you.
Kato was named in 14% of all ChatGPT answers. When ChatGPT cited:
- publicleads.com: 11 of 11 answers (100%)
- threebestrated.ca: 19 of 30 (63%)
- homestars.com: 12 of 30 (40%)
- verifiednode.com: 9 of 37 (24%)
- trustanalytica.org: 10 of 47 (21%)
- industryoversight.ca: 1 of 30 (3%)
Same kind of site, wildly different results. The simplest explanation is that some of these lists include Kato for the city in question and others don't. ChatGPT repeats the list it reads. We saw the city-by-city version of this in Google Business Profile and AI answers: the same list sites named him for Burnaby and didn't for Vancouver.
For the other businesses, BBB stood out. Across the two accounts where ChatGPT cited BBB, the tracked business was named in 18 of 37 of those answers.
Before you pay any list site, look at how it chooses businesses. Some are editorial, some take nominations, some sell placement.
Rivals' websites: it depends on the market
The short answer: in a market where ChatGPT sees you as one of the established names, even competitors' pages bring your name along. In a market where it doesn't, they replace you.
- The electrician in Coquitlam. ChatGPT cited a rival electrician's site (intelpower.ca) in 64 answers. Kato was named in none of them. Three other rival sites: 0 of 58, 0 of 38 and 0 of 31.
- The Massachusetts roofer. ChatGPT cited three rival roofers' websites in 52, 37 and 33 answers. The roofer was named in 85%, 84% and 82% of them.
- The online mobility store. When ChatGPT cited the bigger rival stores and scooter brands, the store was named in 15% to 25% of those answers. That's well above its 5% baseline, though still low.
Our reading: ChatGPT often answers a local question with a short list built from several businesses' pages. If you're in that list in your area, a rival's page doesn't hurt you. If you're not, every rival page is a recommendation for someone else. That's what happened to Kato in Coquitlam, which we covered in We asked AI who to hire 80 times.
Background reading vs recommendation sources
Some sites ChatGPT reads only for facts, and they rarely come with a recommendation.
- Consumer Reports: cited in 17 answers about mobility equipment, only 3 of which named any business at all.
- Utility and regulator sites (BC Hydro, Technical Safety BC, a state dental board, the FAA): read for rules, rebates and requirements. BC Hydro was cited in 63 of Kato's answers, and he was named in 5.
- University extension sites (Florida, Maryland, North Carolina and Virginia extension services for the sod farm): read for grass and lawn-care facts. The sod farm was named in none of those answers.
- Manufacturers: it depends on the trade. A mobility maker's site appeared in 21 answers and the store was named in none. But a roofing brand's pages came with the roofer's name (6 of 6), and an implant maker's site came with the dental institute's name in 19 of 20 answers.
You can't get "listed" on most of these. But you can write the plain-English version of the official facts, put your name next to it, and link to the source. Then the answer that starts with the rules can end with you.
Which sites show up across businesses
A few directories appeared across several of our accounts. Yelp and Google Maps barely appeared at all.
- Angi appeared for four tracked accounts, the most of any site. HomeAdvisor and Home Depot for three. BBB, bestprosintown.com, Birdeye and Yellow Pages for two.
- HomeStars appeared only for the Canadian electrician. That fits: it's a Canadian directory.
- Yelp and Google Maps were each cited in fewer than three answers for every account in 30 days, including the US businesses.
That last point goes against what you may have read. BrightLocal's large study found Yelp was ChatGPT's single most-cited local source across the US, UK and Australia. Our seven businesses, in their trades and questions, didn't see that. Your mileage will vary by trade and city, which is exactly why it's worth checking your own sources rather than following a generic directory list. And as SparkToro's research shows, AI answers shift a lot from run to run, so look at weeks of data, not one check.
On Google Maps: for ChatGPT, your Business Profile doesn't seem to be the lever. For Google's own AI it very much is. See Google AI Mode for local businesses.
What to do, by type of business
Start with the same three steps everywhere: let ChatGPT read your site, find the lists that already name you, and get onto the ones that don't. Then adjust by business type.
Local trades (electricians, roofers, plumbers)
- Make each service and area page say clearly who you are, what you do and where.
- In Canada, complete HomeStars and BBB. In the US, Angi, HomeAdvisor, BBB and Yellow Pages showed up in our data.
- Check the "best [trade] in [city]" list sites ChatGPT cites for your city, and whether you're on them.
Online stores
- Give ChatGPT a reason to read your site: clear category pages with buying guidance, not just product grids.
- Expect to compete with national retailers and the biggest specialist stores. Find the questions where they're not named and write for those.
Training, clinics and professional services
- Your own course or service pages did the heavy lifting for the dental institute: 56 of 64 answers citing them named it.
- Be clear about accreditation and the official requirements (licence renewal, CE credits), linking to the official body. ChatGPT reads those sources too.
For more on why one check isn't enough, see what one free check can and can't do and why the same question gets different answers.
How to see your own
Ask ChatGPT your customers' questions logged out, a few times a week, and click every source. Note which sites appear, and whether the answers citing them name you. A few weeks of that will show your own "trusted" sites.
LLM Visibility Lens does it every morning and keeps every source, so you can see which sites travel with your name and which travel with your rivals'. The monthly action plan lists the ones to get onto. Plans start free, and agencies can send the reports under their own name. See the agency plan.
You can open any day's ChatGPT answers and sources in the live demo. There's also a plain comparison with Semrush's AI visibility tool, the changelog, the FAQ page and the security page. More reading: no rank #1 in ChatGPT, Perplexity vs ChatGPT, how to rank in AI Overviews, AI Overview tracking for near me searches, spoken questions and 5 AI systems, 35 questions. If you'd like me to look at which sites ChatGPT trusts for your business, get in touch.
Questions people ask
Which websites does ChatGPT trust for local recommendations?
In our data, the business's own website came first: when ChatGPT cited it, it named that business in 50% to 93% of those answers. Next came list sites and directories that already included the business, such as ThreeBestRated and HomeStars for a Canadian electrician, and Angi, HomeAdvisor and BBB for US businesses.
Does ChatGPT use Yelp or Google Maps for local businesses?
Rarely, in our data. Across seven businesses over 30 days, Yelp and Google Maps were each cited in fewer than three ChatGPT answers for every business, including US ones. Other studies have found Yelp more often, so check which sources appear in your own trade and city.
Why does ChatGPT recommend my competitor and not me?
Usually because it read pages that list your competitor and not you: their website, or a "best of" list or directory they're on. In our data, when ChatGPT cited a rival electrician's site, our business was named in none of 64 answers. Find those pages, then get onto the lists and make your own pages easier for ChatGPT to read.
How do I get ChatGPT to read my website?
Allow OpenAI's search crawler, OAI-SearchBot, in robots.txt and your firewall. Submit your sitemap to Bing Webmaster Tools, and make each page answer a customer's question clearly, saying what you do, where and for whom. When ChatGPT did read a tracked business's own site, it usually named that business.
Are "best of" list sites worth paying for?
Only if ChatGPT actually reads them for your trade and city. In our data, one list site came with our electrician's name in 63% of answers, while another came with it in 3%. Check which lists appear in your own ChatGPT sources, and how each list selects businesses, before paying for anything.
How can I find which sites ChatGPT cites for my business?
Ask ChatGPT your customers' questions logged out over several weeks and note every source link, plus whether that answer named you. An AI visibility tracker can do this automatically and show which sites appear with your name and which with your competitors'.
Harjeet Singh Bedi Founder, LLM Visibility Lens · SEO consultant, Bedi SEO
Harjeet has worked in SEO since 2010, first in agencies and now running Bedi SEO for local businesses, online stores and agencies. He built LLM Visibility Lens after clients kept asking whether they showed up in ChatGPT and other AI tools and nobody could give them an honest, measured answer. Every figure in this article comes from answers his tool collected.