If your business doesn't show up in ChatGPT, Gemini or Perplexity, the cause is usually one of nine things: AI crawlers are blocked, your pages aren't indexed, your content sits behind JavaScript, your site doesn't say plainly what you do, no page answers your customer's question, other sites don't mention you, your details differ from place to place, your customer asks in another language, or competitors answer that question better than you do. Below is how to check each one and what to do about it.
First, make sure you're testing correctly
Before you conclude "we don't show up", check the test itself. Common mistakes:
- You're asking from your own account. ChatGPT's memory may know you and tailor the answer. Open a temporary chat or log out.
- You're asking with your brand name. Your customer doesn't know your name; they ask for the "best", the "most reliable", "which one". Test with those questions.
- You're asking in the wrong language. If your customer is in Germany, ask in German; the answer to an English question differs from the answer to a German one.
- You're asking once. Answers change a little every time. Ask the same question at least three times.
1. You're blocking AI crawlers
How to tell: In yoursite.com/robots.txt, look for a Disallow: / line for OAI-SearchBot, GPTBot, PerplexityBot, ClaudeBot or Claude-SearchBot. If you use Cloudflare, check whether your bot settings block AI crawlers.
What to do: At minimum, allow the search bots (OAI-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, Claude-SearchBot). These are the bots that read your site to answer a question; block them and those tools can't cite you. Whether to allow the bots that crawl for model training (such as GPTBot and ClaudeBot) is a separate decision.
2. Your pages aren't indexed in Google and Bing
How to tell: Search site:yoursite.com on Google and on Bing. If your important pages aren't in the list, the search side of AI can't find them either. Search Console's Pages report tells you why.
What to do: Submit your sitemap to Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools, and fix whatever keeps pages out of the index: a noindex tag, a wrong canonical, thin or duplicate content. Notify Bing and Yandex of new pages with IndexNow.
3. Your content loads with JavaScript
How to tell: Right-click your page, choose "View page source" and search for an important sentence. If you can't find it, the text is added by JavaScript after the page loads.
What to do: Most AI crawlers don't run JavaScript. Make sure your important pages arrive as HTML rendered on the server. On WordPress, Webflow or Shopify this is usually fine; the problem is common on custom single-page apps.
4. Your site doesn't say plainly what you do
How to tell: Ask ChatGPT "What does [your company] do?" If the answer is vague, wrong, or "I couldn't find enough information", your site lacks a sentence that says plainly what you do.
What to do: At the top of your home page and on your About page, write a plain sentence that answers who, where, for whom and what. Put the slogan under it.
5. No page answers your customer's question
How to tell: For a question where you don't show up, open the pages ChatGPT cites. Most of the time those pages carry the question in their title and answer it in the first paragraph: "Dental implant prices in Antalya 2026", "Shopify vs WooCommerce". Does your site have a page that matches that question?
What to do: Create a page for every important question your customer asks before buying: price, process, comparison, alternatives, trust. Put the answer in the first paragraph and the numbers in a table.
6. Other sites don't mention you
How to tell: Search your company name in quotes on Google and count the results other than your own site and social accounts. Are you in your industry's "best of" lists, directories and news?
What to do: AI wants to see a brand in more than one independent source before recommending it. Start with your Google Business Profile, industry directories, association memberships, comparison sites and trade publications. Buying links in bulk or paying for fake reviews doesn't work, and it does damage.
7. Your details differ from place to place
How to tell: Are your company name, address, phone number, founding year and prices the same on your site, your Google Business Profile, LinkedIn and directories? An old price or a closed branch can turn up in an AI answer.
What to do: Settle on one correct set of details and use it everywhere; mark it up with structured data (schema.org) on your site. If AI says something wrong about you, open the pages the answer cites, find where the error comes from, and fix it there.
8. Your customer asks in another language
How to tell: If your customers are abroad, ask in their language. I saw this clearly in one initial check: the same company appeared in four of nine questions asked in one language and in none of the seven asked in English.
What to do: Create pages in your target market's language, written for the searches people make in that language; a translation of your home-language page isn't enough. Link the language versions to each other with hreflang.
9. Competitors answer that question better
How to tell: Look at the pages ChatGPT cites for the competitors it recommends. They're usually clearer, more current, have more numbers and are mentioned in more places.
What to do: Write a better answer than your competitor's page: current numbers, real examples, a clear comparison table. Get into the lists and directories that recommend your competitor.
Good on Google, missing in AI
This is the most surprising case, and it's more common than people think. In my October 2026 test with 14 buyer questions, the site ranked #1 on Google was missing from ChatGPT's answer in 11 of the 14. I explain why, and what to do about it, in a separate article.
Where to start
Go in order: first 1–3 (technical blockers, checked in a day), then 4 and 7 (fixed within a week), and finally 5, 6, 8 and 9 (content and visibility work that takes months). You can work through the list yourself. Or I can check your brand and three competitors on 20 questions for free and tell you which of these applies to you.
Common questions
ChatGPT knows my company but doesn't recommend it. Why?
Being known and being recommended are different things. If you get a correct answer to "What does [company] do?", your basics are in place. To be recommended, you need to appear on pages that answer your customer's question, and in lists and comparisons on other sites.
ChatGPT gives wrong information about my company. What should I do?
First find the source of the error: look at the pages ChatGPT cites in its answer. It may be an old directory listing, a closed branch or an old news story. Fix the source, and state the correct information clearly on your site with a current date. The answer changes over time as the sources are corrected.
Can a new company show up in AI answers?
Yes, but getting ahead of big brands on general questions takes time. For a new company, the fastest route is narrow, specific questions: a particular city, service or type of customer. Winning "invoicing software for UK design studios" is far easier than winning "best invoicing software".
If I tell ChatGPT to recommend me, will it learn?
No. What you say in your own chat doesn't change the answers other users get. What changes the answers is the content AI reads on the web.
