Where do ChatGPT, Gemini and Siri get the businesses they recommend?
Mostly not from your website. ChatGPT runs a Bing search and reads the top results. Gemini reads Google Search and live Google Maps data. Claude's web search runs on Brave. Siri leans on Apple Maps, which shows reviews from partners such as Yelp. Each assistant reads a different part of the web, so a business can be well known to one and invisible to another.
One question, five different sources
Ask "who's the best plumber near me" in five assistants and you are asking five different databases. None of them has a private list of good businesses. Each one searches somewhere, reads what comes back, and repeats what looks trustworthy.
| Assistant | Where it looks | What that means for you |
|---|---|---|
| ChatGPT | Bing's index. For a local question it runs a Bing search and reads the top results | If Bing doesn't know your site, ChatGPT doesn't either |
| Microsoft Copilot | Bing and Bing Places | Your Bing Places listing matters, even if you never use Bing |
| Gemini | Google Search and Google Maps, which covers more than 250 million places | Your Google Business Profile is read directly |
| Claude | Brave Search, which Anthropic lists as its web search provider | An independent index most owners have never heard of |
| Siri and Apple Maps | Apple's own listings (Apple Business Connect) plus partner data, including Yelp reviews | Your Yelp page can be what an iPhone user hears about you |
| Perplexity | Its own live web search | Fresh, well-structured pages get picked up fastest |
Sources: Search Engine Land on how ChatGPT runs local searches; Google's announcement of Grounding with Google Maps (2025); Anthropic's published list of subprocessors, which names Brave Search (March 2025); Apple Business Connect documentation.
The places owners never check
Most owners look after one thing: their Google listing. The assistants read far more than that.
- Bing. Plenty of sites that rank on Google were never submitted to Bing at all. For ChatGPT, that is the difference between being read and not existing.
- Bing Places. Often created automatically from old data, with an old phone number or a closed location, and never claimed.
- Brave. It runs its own index. You can't claim a listing there, but you can make sure your site is readable, fast and linked from the places Brave crawls.
- Yelp and Apple Maps. Even owners who ignore Yelp are described by it, because Apple shows Yelp reviews to iPhone users.
- Directories, the BBB, Facebook and forums. ChatGPT's local answers regularly cite them. An old address on one of them can end up in the answer.
- Your own website's door. If your robots.txt or your hosting blocks AI crawlers, the assistant can't read you and describes you from everyone else's pages. See is your website blocking ChatGPT.
Why the answers differ between assistants
Because the sources differ. A business with a strong Google profile and no Bing presence tends to appear in Gemini and not in ChatGPT. A business with a neglected Yelp page can be described by Siri with reviews from five years ago. There is no single switch that makes you "AI visible". There are five or six doors, and each one has to be open and say the same thing.
What keeping up with this takes
This is slow, unglamorous work, and it never finishes, because every one of these sources changes on its own. In practice it means:
- your site submitted to both Google Search Console and Bing Webmaster Tools, with a sitemap each engine actually reads;
- your name, address, phone, hours and services identical on Google, Bing Places, Apple Maps, Yelp, Facebook and the directories in your industry;
- pages that answer the questions people ask, in plain sentences an assistant can quote (see how to get recommended by ChatGPT);
- asking the assistants themselves, regularly, who they recommend for your service in your city, and fixing whatever source they got wrong.
Check yourself in five minutes
- Search your business name on bing.com. Is your website there, with the right phone number?
- Search it on search.brave.com. Same question.
- Open Apple Maps on an iPhone and find yourself. Whose reviews do you see?
- Ask ChatGPT "who is the best [your service] in [your city]" and note who is named.
Check this on your own business
The free 60-second Check-Up reads your website and Google profile and shows where you stand on this: Presence on other platforms, Apple Maps, Directory presence, Facts match between site and listing. Public data only, no login, no card.
Run the free Check-Up →Or we run it for you
Every month we keep your facts right in Bing, Google, Apple Maps, Yelp and the directories assistants read, and ask the assistants themselves who they recommend for your service. Month to month, a new website included, plans from $199 a month.
See how it works →Questions
Does ChatGPT use Google?
Not for its web search. ChatGPT's search runs on Bing's index, so a site that exists only in Google can be invisible to it.
Can I pay to be recommended by ChatGPT or Gemini?
No. There is no paid placement in their answers today. What you can control is whether the sources they read have correct, consistent information about you.
Why does Siri show old or wrong reviews for my business?
Apple Maps shows reviews from partners such as Yelp. If your Yelp page is neglected, that is what iPhone users see. Claim your Apple Business Connect listing and your Yelp page.