How to get your business recommended by ChatGPT in Texas

How ChatGPT finds local businesses

When ChatGPT searches the web to answer, it uses a crawler called OAI-SearchBot, and OpenAI recommends allowing it in your robots.txt file if you want to appear in its search results. According to its help center, ChatGPT can also use the approximate location of the person asking, based on their IP address, to give local results.

The other assistants work in similar ways. Perplexity uses PerplexityBot to surface and link websites in its results; Anthropic uses Claude-SearchBot for Claude's search; and Gemini can use public information from Google Maps, which is where your Business Profile shows up. In short: your website, your Google profile and your reviews are the raw material for what assistants say about you.

Step 1: Let assistants read your website

Check your robots.txt file (it's at yoursite.com/robots.txt) or ask your web provider to check it. If it blocks OAI-SearchBot, PerplexityBot or Claude-SearchBot, those assistants can't use your site to answer searches.

Blocking training crawlers is a separate decision, and it's yours: GPTBot and ClaudeBot collect content for model training, and Google-Extended controls whether your content is used to train Gemini. Google says Google-Extended doesn't affect your inclusion in Google Search and isn't used as a ranking signal.

You don't need special files. Google says you don't have to create new machine-readable files, AI text files or special markup to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode. Our free AI readiness checker reviews your robots.txt and other website basics in a minute.

Step 2: Complete your Google Business Profile

Your Business Profile controls how you appear on Google Maps and Search, and Google's local ranking tips start with making your information as complete as possible. The minimum:

• The most specific primary category that describes what your business is: a used-car lot shouldn't have a repair shop as its primary category.
• Correct hours, with special hours set for holidays.
• A description of up to 750 characters, with no links or promotions, that says what you offer, where, and in which languages you serve customers.
• Real photos of the entrance, the location and the team.
• A link to your website and the same phone number your website shows.

If you run a car lot, Google Business Profile fields AI assistants read walks through each field with Google's rules for dealerships.

Step 3: Say clearly what you do, where and for whom

Customers rarely ask “what's the best business?”. They ask specific things: “who fixes transmissions in north Houston?”, “which lot in San Antonio has in-house financing?”, “which taquería in El Paso opens early?”. An assistant can only recommend you for something like that if, somewhere, plain words say you do it.

• One page for each main service, with the service name in the title.
• Your city and the areas or neighborhoods you serve, written the way customers search for them.
• Hours, payment options and, if you can publish them, reference prices on your website.
• If you run a car lot: a financing page that explains what you really offer.

Step 4: If you serve customers in Spanish, publish in Spanish

A question in Spanish is a different question: the assistant may answer with other businesses and other sources than it would in English. If you serve customers in Spanish, say so where it can be read:

• In your Business Profile description, for example: “We serve customers in English and Spanish.”
• On your website, with at least one Spanish page written or reviewed by a person, not just run through machine translation.
• In your review replies: answer in the language the customer wrote in.
• In your structured data: the knowsLanguage property can say you serve customers in English and Spanish.

And when you check what AI says about your business, ask in Spanish too, because the results can differ.

Step 5: Get reviews and answer them

In BrightLocal's 2026 survey, 89% of consumers said they expect owners to respond to reviews, and 82% read AI-generated review summaries. Google, for its part, says more reviews and positive ratings can help your local ranking, and that replying shows you value your customers' feedback.

Ask every customer for a review, steadily, not just the ones you think were happy: Google's content policy prohibits asking only satisfied customers and offering discounts or gifts in exchange. Answer recent reviews with short, specific replies; Google's tips say to leave deals and promotions out of them.

Step 6: Make your details match everywhere

Your name, address, phone number and hours should be identical on your website, your Google profile, Facebook, Yelp and any directories you're listed in, such as your local chamber of commerce. When two sources disagree, the assistant has to guess which is right, or it may confuse you with a business that has a similar name. If you operate under an assumed name (a DBA), use that same name on your sign, your site and your profile.

On your website, add structured data with the same information. For car lots, AutoDealer schema: what it is and how to add it includes a copy-ready example. It's not a trick to get recommended — Google says no special markup is needed for its AI features — but it removes doubt about who you are.

Step 7: Check every month, the way a customer would

Ask the question a customer would ask, without your business name, in ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and Perplexity, and write down the date, the exact question and whether you appear. Repeat each question a few times: in SparkToro's January 2026 study, the same list of recommendations came back less than 1 time in 100. What matters is how often you're named, not where you appear in the list.

Does ChatGPT recommend my dealership? explains the five-minute method, and it works for any kind of business. Or get your free report: we ask an AI assistant a customer's question for your city and show you the exact answer, whether you appear, and what to fix first.

What doesn't work

• Stuffing keywords into your business name. Google's guidelines don't permit unnecessary information in the name, such as taglines or locations.
• Paying for an llms.txt file “for AI”. Google says no special files are needed for its AI features. You can have one if you like, but it isn't a requirement.
• Adding FAQ markup for Google. Google stopped showing those rich results on May 7, 2026. An FAQ section is still useful for your customers.
• Believing in “guaranteed first place in ChatGPT”. No one controls an assistant's answers, and they change from one try to the next.
• Fake or purchased reviews. They break Google's policy and can be removed when detected.