Step 1: write down your customers' questions
Prepare 10 to 20 questions in the words your customers use (on calls, in emails, or in the searches you see in Search Console). Mix four kinds:
| Kind | Example | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Category | "Which renovation companies would you recommend in Leeds?" | Whether you are considered an option |
| Problem | "How do I get rid of damp on an inside wall?" | Whether your content is used to answer |
| Comparison | "Heat pump or gas boiler for a 90 m² flat?" | How you are placed against alternatives and competitors |
| Brand | "What is [your brand]? Is it reliable?" | What it knows about you, and whether it confuses you with something else |
Do not name your brand in the category and problem questions: the point is whether it shows up on its own.
Step 2: ask without bias
- Use an unpersonalised temporary chat. In ChatGPT, a temporary chat can still use your memories and custom instructions if you leave it personalised; choose the unpersonalised option before your first message. Otherwise the answer will know who you are and what you do.
- Ask the way a customer would, with their vocabulary and their location if your business is local.
- Repeat each question at least three times, ideally on different days. A language model's answers vary; what matters is how often you appear, not one answer.
- Check whether the answer searched the web. When it does, it shows its sources. An answer without sources comes from what the model learned in training, and that changes far more slowly.
Step 3: record what matters
A spreadsheet with these columns is enough:
| Question | Do you appear? | Position | Does it link to you? | Sources cited | Whom it recommends |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Which renovation companies would you recommend in Leeds? | No | — | — | A directory, a local news article, a forum | Competitor A, competitor B |
At the end you have a percentage: how many answers you appear in. That is your baseline.
Step 4: repeat in the other assistants
Each assistant searches in a different place, so the results do not match:
- ChatGPT combines its own crawler (OAI-SearchBot) with third-party search providers, according to OpenAI's publisher documentation.
- Copilot relies on Bing's index.
- Gemini, Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode use Google's index.
- Perplexity has its own crawler, PerplexityBot, and always shows its sources.
Appearing in one and not in another is a clue: it tells you which index your site is missing from.
Step 5: read the sources they cite
The pages assistants cite when they answer category questions are your to-do list: industry directories, "best companies for…" articles, review sites, forums, comparisons. If your competitors appear and you do not, it is nearly always because they are on those pages and you are not.
Why you are missing: the five usual causes
- Crawlers cannot read your site. A robots.txt that blocks OAI-SearchBot or PerplexityBot, a firewall or CDN that turns AI bots away, or content that only appears after JavaScript runs. We cover it in AI crawlers in robots.txt.
- You are not in the index they search. A new site can be on Google and not on Bing, or the other way round. Search for it with
site:yourdomain.comon both, and add it to Bing Webmaster Tools. If Google is not indexing you, start with why Google isn't indexing your site. - Your brand is ambiguous. If your name matches another company, a product or a place, the model can mix you up. Mark up your company with Organization structured data and
sameAslinks to your official profiles, and describe yourself the same way everywhere: name, what you do and where. - Your site does not answer those questions. Many service pages list virtues and never say what it costs, who it is for or how it differs. Assistants cite pages that answer directly, with specific facts.
- Nobody talks about you anywhere else. To recommend someone, assistants lean on what others say: reviews, directories, press, forums, lists. Without that, they have nothing to justify your name with.
What to do, in order
- Today: open access to the AI search crawlers and check that Google and Bing have your site indexed.
- This week: Organization markup with
sameAs, complete profiles on LinkedIn and in the directories of your sector, and the same description on all of them. - This month: pages that answer the questions on your list, with real prices, timelines, cases and comparisons.
- Always: a presence beyond your site. Customer reviews, directories, local or trade press, partnerships.
- Every month: ask the same questions again and compare the percentage.
How to measure it over time
- The same question list, every month. It is the most direct measure, because it does not depend on anyone clicking.
- Referral traffic from assistants in your analytics: chatgpt.com, perplexity.ai, gemini.google.com, copilot.microsoft.com. OpenAI adds
utm_source=chatgpt.comto links that leave ChatGPT, so Google Analytics shows it as a source of its own. - The search engines' own reports. Since 31 August 2026, Search Console has had a generative AI performance report with your impressions in AI Overviews and AI Mode. Since February 2026, Bing Webmaster Tools has had an AI Performance report showing how often Copilot cites your pages.
- Our free GEO audit, which checks AI crawler access and your entity markup, and asks a web-searching AI model one live question about your market to see whether it mentions you. The full report asks five.
Sources
- OpenAI: Publishers and Developers FAQ
- OpenAI: Temporary chat in ChatGPT
- OpenAI: Overview of OpenAI crawlers
- Google Search Central: AI features and your website
- Search Console Help: Generative AI performance report
- Bing Webmaster Tools: AI Performance
- Perplexity: Perplexity crawlers
Can AI assistants read your site?
The free GEO audit checks, live, whether AI crawlers can reach you, whether your brand is a clear entity and whether your pages are ready to be cited.