How to Get Recommended by AI: Being Found Isn’t Enough

Wondering how to get your business recommended by ChatGPT, Claude, and other AI tools? Want to know what to change on your website, Google Business Profile, and customer reviews so AI search matches you with the right buyers?

​In this article, you'll discover a four-step framework to get your business recommended by AI tools like ChatGPT, not just found in search results.

How AI Matches Customers With the Businesses It Recommends

AI platforms like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity learn about their users across every conversation, from work projects to recipe conversions. Vivienne Wagner describes the result as more than a personal referral. AI acts as a matchmaker, pairing a user with a business whose products or services fit that user's situation. That match only happens when the business is clear about who it is, what it does, and who it's for.

​Vivienne saw this firsthand after a reaction to several new skincare products. Over three to four months of conversation, ChatGPT helped her identify the problem ingredients and then recommended a $10 cleanser. When she pushed back, ChatGPT reminded her that her goal was to avoid irritants rather than chemicals and recommended the same product again. She bought it. 

She never would have searched for that product on Google because she didn't know what to search for, but ChatGPT knew her situation, and the brand was clear enough about its product to be matched with her.

Two conditions make it easy for AI to match a business. First, the business has to treat its marketing as an ecosystem rather than a set of silos. The website, social media channels, email marketing, and Google Business Profile all need to tell the same story. Businesses that have evolved or pivoted often tell two stories at once, one about who they are now and one about who they used to be, and that mismatch confuses both Google and AI.

​Second, the business needs solid SEO. AI doesn't pull answers out of thin air; it relies partly on SEO to find information. New acronyms like AEO, AIO, and GEO don't change that. At its core, SEO answers three questions: who a business is, what it does, and who it's for.

​Vivienne's agency puts these principles into a four-step process called the Clear Choice Framework: define, diagnose, align, and prove it.

#1: Define Your Brand Positioning Statement With an AI Interview

The first step is to create a brand positioning statement that clearly states who the business is, what it does, who it's for, and who it doesn't want to work with. Without that clarity, AI has nothing to base its opinion on and can't match the business with the right customer. Businesses evolve, mature, and pivot, so even a company that defined itself years ago should revisit its positioning now. Vivienne's agency went through this process for itself several months ago.

How to Build a Brand Positioning Statement Using AI

Start With the Best 80%: Identify the customers and offers the business wants more of. For a service-based business, that's the clients behind the 80% of work the team loves doing. For a product-based business, it's the products that make up 80% of sales.

​Draft a First Version: Write down who the business wants to work with, how it wants to make a difference, and who it's there to help. This draft doesn't need to be polished. It gives AI something to react to. Treat it as a thinking-cap conversation for the owner, the leadership team, and anyone else who helps make decisions about what the business wants to be known for.

​Have AI Interview the Business: Give the draft to an AI tool with a prompt like this: “This is what we think we know about ourselves. What are we missing? Please interview us and ask us other things we should be considering as we decide how to position ourselves in the market.” Vivienne notes that some people prefer Claude for this. The interview is necessary because a business owner can't see the label from inside the box, and AI provides a fresh set of eyes.

​Work Through the Hard Questions: During the interview, answer how to get more of the favorite customers, why the business wants to work with them, what its special sauce is, how it differs from competitors, how it will say what it stands for, and how it will quietly signal who it doesn't work with. This is a back-and-forth process, not a single prompt that produces a finished statement. Keep going until the result clearly reflects who the business is now and where it's going rather than where it's been.

​Confirm the Statement Covers Six Components: The finished brand positioning statement should define who the business is for, who it doesn't work with, what it wants to be known for, how it works with its customers, its tone of voice and brand personality, and its value proposition. It doesn't need to be a long mission statement.

​Use the Brand Positioning Statement as a Filter: Keep the finished statement as a Bible-like reference document. Every piece of marketing should be checked against it for alignment.

How to Define Your Ideal Customer by Pain Point, Not Service Requirement

No business serves everyone. Vivienne once worked with a med spa owner who said her ideal client was anyone with skin, a definition AI can't do anything with.

​The fix is describing the person and the problem rather than the service requirement.

​Another of Vivienne's clients provides in-home senior care that helps people age in place. The owner described his ideal client as someone who wants 20 to 30 hours of help per week, but that's a service requirement, not a person. The real ideal client is the adult child of an aging parent who lies awake at night worrying about mom. Mom doesn't want to go into a home, but she's showing signs of dementia.

​That adult child is likely already asking AI about early signs of dementia and what to do about a parent's recent behavior. Vivienne calls these ongoing conversations the new search behavior. A website that clearly speaks to that pain point gives the business the opportunity to be matched with the people who need it.

#2: Diagnose the Gaps Between Your Positioning and Your Online Presence

The second step is to use AI to compare the brand positioning statement with what actually appears about the business online. Vivienne explains misalignment with an analogy: someone who says they're fit, athletic, and always make good nutritional choices, but who is seen on the couch in sweatpants covered in Cheeto dust, has a gap between story and reality. The diagnosis finds the Cheeto dust.

How to Run an AI Gap Analysis

Prompt for the Gaps: Give AI the brand positioning statement and the website, then ask: “Here's my positioning statement. Here's my website. Tell me the gaps.”

​Dig Into Each Gap: Ask follow-up questions about what's missing and why each item counts as a gap.

​Extend the Diagnosis Beyond the Website: Because marketing is an ecosystem, run the same check on social media, email marketing, and every other place the business touches the internet, such as a YouTube channel or Instagram account.

​Fix the Biggest Framing Miss First: The diagnosis will return a long list, so start with the biggest misalignment. Common examples include services the business no longer offers and types of customers it no longer works with. For most businesses, the website is the first place to work.

​Redirect Outdated Pages Instead of Deleting Them: Deleting a page for a discontinued service creates 404 errors. Following good SEO practice, redirect the page or refresh it and explain the change.

​Replace Vague Homepage Messaging: A home page that leads with “Celebrating 25 years in business” doesn't say what the business does or who it's for. Vivienne recommends stating what the business does in a single sentence of 70 characters or fewer. The company's history can still appear deeper in the copy, so AI knows the business isn't a fly-by-night organization.

How to Use Keyword Research to Find What Ideal Customers Search For

When rewriting copy, clear concepts matter more than individual words. “It is not important to be the loudest voice in the room,” Vivienne says. “It is important to be the clearest voice in the room.”

​Keywords still help inform that copy. Searches have become more conversational, but people still type keywords phrases into Google, and they often use different words than business owners expect. Vivienne recommends SEMrush or Ahrefs for this research. Here's how to run it in SEMrush:

1. Enter a general concept of one or two words rather than a single word.
   
   
2. Review the thousands of related keywords the tool returns, each with its average monthly search volume and a color-coded difficulty rating.
   
   
3. Prioritize keywords with high monthly search volume and low difficulty. High demand with low supply from competing websites is the ideal opportunity.
   
   
4. Check search intent to see whether people searching a term want information, have commercial interest, or want to complete a transaction, and filter the results accordingly.

Google Search Console shows which queries already surface a business's website, but that only reflects what the business is already doing. Keyword research shows what customers are actually looking for. Vivienne compares it to making dinner from whatever's in the fridge versus shopping for the ingredients for the meal she actually wants to make.

​High demand and low supply aren't the deciding factors they once were, but it still reveals opportunities. 

One of Vivienne's clients, a psychologist, moved her practice online and described her specialty as depression therapy. Every keyword containing depression, depressed, depressive, or therapy was saturated, with high demand and high supply. But the research uncovered tens of thousands of monthly searches from people seeking help with pornography addiction, because people search for their symptoms and their pain, not clinical labels. 

The psychologist treats that issue, so it became a new vertical with a dedicated page on her website. The page isn't keyword-stuffed. It clearly establishes her as a credible authority in that area.

#3: Align Your Website, Blog, and Page Structure With Your Positioning

The third step is fixing the gaps the diagnosis uncovered. Diagnosis identifies what's wrong; alignment is the work of correcting it.

How to Update Services Pages and Publish Aligned Blog Content

Start With Static Services Pages: Update every important services page first so each one tells the story in the brand positioning statement. These pages plant the business's stake in the ground about who it serves.

​Publish Ongoing Blog Content: Blogging isn't dead. A business can only add so many static services pages, but ongoing blog posts keep giving AI more information about who the business is, what it does, and who it serves. Regular posts also signal that the business is recent, engaged, and a subject matter expert.

How to Add Credibility With Author Boxes and Author Pages

Attribute Posts to Real People: Publish blog posts under the business owner or other important strategic members of the company, not the business name. Vivienne's agency used to publish client posts as “written by Acme Shop” when ghostwriting, but no longer does. “Authority gets you noticed,” Vivienne says. “Credibility gets you trusted.”

​Add an Author Box: Include an author box with a short bio on every post that presents the author as a subject matter expert. The named author doesn't have to write the post. An agency or in-house writers can do the writing, as long as the author can stand behind the content.

​Link to a Standalone Author Page: Link each author box to a dedicated page that covers the author's years in business, credentials, education, experience, and the organizations they belong to. This is the place to toot their own horn. The page doesn't need to appear in the top navigation bar because AI will still find it.

How to Write Title Tags and H1 Headings That AI Understands

Write Title Tags of 50 to 60 Characters: A title tag is the text shown on a browser tab and as the blue headline in Google search results. It doesn't appear on the page itself, but Google's crawlers and AI use it to understand what the page is about. The maximum is 70 characters, and the sweet spot is 50 to 60. Use that space to say who the business is and what it does.

​Put Location at the End: Location-based businesses should include their location at the end of the title tag, not the front.

​Give Every Page a Meaningful H1: Treat page headings like an essay outline, a step many business owners skip. An H1 like “Celebrating 25 years in business” conveys credibility but doesn't specify whether the business is a dog groomer or a wedding venue. Instead, the H1 should state what the business does and who it's for. Leading with impact is fine.

​Use Keywords Only Where They Fit: Two years ago, Vivienne would have recommended putting keywords in every H1. Now she recommends a compelling H1 that tells the machines more about the business, with keywords included only if they fit naturally. Never leave an H1 blank or fill it with something unhelpful.

#4: Prove It With an Optimized Google Business Profile and Strategic Review Responses

The final step is proving the business is who it says it is. A Google Business Profile is one of the first places AI looks for information about a business because it treats it as a verified source, making it one of the most important assets for getting recommended. Virtual businesses that once couldn't get a profile without a physical address should check again, because that barrier appears to have eased.

How to Fully Optimize a Google Business Profile

Write a Business Description: Describe what the business does.

​Choose the Right Primary Category: Pick the category that makes the most sense and reflects the customers the business is trying to reach. Add secondary categories if the profile allows them.

​Complete the Standard Information: Add business hours if appropriate, an address, a phone number, and a website link.

​List Products and Services With Images: Use the profile's product and service categories and add images for each.

​Post to It Like a Social Media Platform: Treat the profile as a mini social platform. Post small billboards for upcoming sales, behind-the-scenes content, videos, and client testimonials. Many businesses don't take advantage of this.

How to Write Review Responses That Tell AI More About Your Business

Reviews are where a business proves its positioning. Make asking every customer or client for a review a regular habit, because if the business doesn't ask, the answer is always no.

​Then respond to every review. A review response isn't written for the reviewer. It's written for every future buyer who reads it before making a decision, and it gives AI platforms more information about the business. A reply like “Thanks for the five-star review. It was a joy to work with you” wastes that opportunity because it could apply to any business anywhere. Vivienne recommends this formula instead:

1. Don't open with thanks for the review.
   
   
2. Celebrate the customer's win.
   
   
3. Affirm the products or services that got them that win.
   
   
4. Reiterate that this is part of the business's philosophy and that it loves working with clients.
   
   
5. Thank them.

For example, if a bridal shop customer writes, “I found my dream dress and Kaylee was great,” the response could open with “We're so glad we helped you find the perfect wedding dress for your big day,” and then mention that Kaylee loves working with brides who want long sleeves. That reply celebrates the customer while reinforcing exactly what the shop offers.

​Use the same formula for negative reviews. Many buyers decide whether to work with a business based on how the owner responds to criticism.

Other Notes From This Episode

• Connect with Michael Stelzner @Stelzner on Facebook and @Mike_Stelzner on X.
• Watch this interview and other exclusive content from Social Media Examiner on YouTube.

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