Here is the short answer. Write down fifteen to twenty questions a real customer would ask, the kind with a service and a town in them, and run each one through ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity without naming your business. Write down whether you get mentioned, who gets mentioned instead, and which sources get cited. Then check Search Console’s Generative AI report and your GA4 referrals for the automated picture. The whole exercise takes about twenty minutes, and this guide walks you through it step by step.
Why bother? Because a growing share of your customers now ask an AI assistant for a recommendation instead of scrolling through Google results. If the assistants never mention you, you are missing enquiries you will never hear about. The good news is that finding out where you stand is free, and fixing it mostly comes down to things you should be doing anyway.
The 20-minute audit: ask like a customer would
Start with a blank page and think like someone who has never heard of you. Write fifteen to twenty questions covering the services you sell and the towns you serve. A plumber in Leeds might write “who is the most reliable emergency plumber in Leeds” or “how much does a boiler service cost in Headingley”. The two rules, taken from the method described by barkstreetdigital.co.uk: put the service and the town in the prompt, and never put your business name in it. The moment you name yourself, you stop testing what a stranger would see.
Run every question through ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity, and for completeness run them through Google too, since Google’s AI Overviews now answer many of the same queries. For each answer, record three things: whether your business gets a mention, which competitors get mentioned instead, and which websites the assistant cites as sources. A simple spreadsheet does the job. One column per assistant, one row per question, and a notes column for the cited sources.
Do the whole run in one sitting so the results are comparable, then repeat it monthly with the identical prompts. The repeat is the point. A single test tells you where you stand today. The same test every month tells you whether you are moving in the right direction, which is far more useful.
Reading your results: count mentions, not single answers
Before you celebrate or panic, you need to know one thing about how these assistants behave. Their answers change from run to run. Ask the same question twice and you can get two different lists of businesses.
There is a proper study behind this. SparkToro ran an experiment with 600 volunteers and 2,961 runs across ChatGPT and Google, and found there is less than a 1 in 100 chance that the same list of brands appears twice, as reported by vient.org. That sounds discouraging, but it actually gives you a workable rule. Do not judge yourself on a single answer. Count frequency across runs. If your business is named in four out of five runs, the assistants genuinely recommend you. If you appear once out of five, you are on the edge. If you never appear, you have a visibility problem, and the rest of this guide is for you.
The cited sources column in your spreadsheet is just as revealing. AI assistants build their answers from sources they trust: review sites, directories, news coverage, and your own website. If the same two or three directories keep appearing as citations for your competitors, those are the listings you need to be on. Your competitors have effectively handed you their source list.
The automated version: let Search Console and GA4 do the watching
The manual audit tells you what customers see. Two free tools tell you what is actually happening, without you lifting a finger after setup.
First, Search Console. If your pages appear in Google’s AI Overviews or AI Mode, those appearances are counted in your regular Performance report under the Web search type. Google has also added a dedicated Search Generative AI performance report, which finished rolling out to all sites by 31 August 2026. It shows impressions, pages, countries, devices and dates for your AI Overview and AI Mode appearances, though not clicks, according to vient.org. Check it monthly alongside your manual audit. If your manual test says the assistants ignore you but the report shows impressions, you are appearing in contexts your test questions did not cover, which is useful intelligence on its own.
Second, GA4. Some AI assistants send visitors to your site with a referrer you can track. Set up a custom channel group in GA4 for the main AI referrers: chatgpt.com, perplexity.ai, copilot.microsoft.com and gemini.google.com, a setup described by cavuno.com. Once that is in place, AI-driven visits show up as their own channel instead of dissolving into direct traffic. And if you use Bing Webmaster Tools, its AI Performance dashboard, launched in February 2026, shows how often your site appears in Copilot answers.
Between the monthly manual test and these two dashboards, you get both sides of the picture: what the assistants say about you, and what actually reaches your website.
| Method | What it tells you | Effort | How often |
|---|---|---|---|
| Manual prompt test (ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google) | Whether you get mentioned, who beats you, which sources get cited | 20 minutes | Monthly, identical prompts |
| Search Console Generative AI report | Impressions, pages, countries and devices for AI Overview and AI Mode appearances (no clicks) | One-time setup, then glance monthly | Monthly |
| GA4 AI-referral channel group | Actual visits arriving from chatgpt.com, perplexity.ai, copilot.microsoft.com, gemini.google.com | One-time setup | Ongoing |
| Bing Webmaster Tools AI Performance | How often your site appears in Copilot answers | One-time setup | Monthly |
Invisible? Fix these first
If the audit shows the assistants barely know you exist, work through this list in order. It is drawn from the fix loop described by indibloghub.com and barkstreetdigital.co.uk, and none of it requires an agency retainer.
Complete your Google Business Profile. For local queries this is one of the biggest sources AI assistants draw on. Every empty field is information they cannot use. Fill in services, hours, photos, and the business description, and keep them accurate. An assistant that finds conflicting opening hours across the web will simply recommend someone else.
Earn reviews and directory listings. Assistants trust businesses that the wider web vouches for. Ask happy customers for Google reviews, and make sure you are listed, accurately and consistently, on the main directories for your trade. Consistency matters: the same business name, address and phone number everywhere. Mixed signals make assistants cautious.
Update your pages when facts change. AI answers go stale when websites do. New service, new price, new opening hours, new town covered: put it on the site with a date on it. Fresh, specific, dated facts are exactly what assistants prefer to cite, because they read as verifiable.
Write the way customers ask. Your service pages should answer the questions from your audit in plain language, with the service and the town in the headings. You are not writing for a robot. You are writing the clearest possible answer for a person, which happens to be what the assistants quote.
This is also where AI agents come into the picture more broadly. Assistants that recommend businesses and agents that act for customers are converging fast. Our guide to AI agents for small business explains what that means for owners who want to stay ahead of it.
If you would rather have someone run this audit for you and hand you the fix list, book a free consultation. We will test your visibility across the assistants, check your Search Console and GA4 setup, and tell you exactly where you stand, in plain English.
Frequently asked questions
How should I phrase my test questions to ChatGPT?
Write them the way a customer would, with a service and a town but no business name. “Best accountant for freelancers in Manchester” is a good test. “Is Smith and Sons accountants in Manchester any good” is not, because naming yourself changes what the assistant does. Aim for fifteen to twenty questions covering your main services and areas.
Why do I get different answers every time I ask?
Because that is how these systems work. A SparkToro study of 600 volunteers and 2,961 runs across ChatGPT and Google found less than a 1 in 100 chance of the same brand list appearing twice, as reported by vient.org. Judge yourself on frequency across runs, not on any single answer. Named in four out of five runs means the assistants recommend you. Once out of five means you are on the edge.
How often should I repeat the audit?
Monthly, with the identical prompts. The value is in the trend: are you mentioned more often than last month, cited by better sources, losing ground to a new competitor? Keep the spreadsheet and compare month to month. Quarterly is the absolute minimum; the assistants retrain and the web changes far faster than that.
Does Search Console show my AI Overview appearances?
Yes, in two places. Appearances in AI Overviews and AI Mode are counted in your regular Performance report under the Web search type. There is also a dedicated Search Generative AI performance report, rolled out to all sites by 31 August 2026, showing impressions, pages, countries, devices and dates. It does not show clicks, according to vient.org, so treat it as a visibility measure rather than a traffic measure.
How do I track AI assistant traffic in GA4?
Create a custom channel group for AI referrers covering chatgpt.com, perplexity.ai, copilot.microsoft.com and gemini.google.com, as described by cavuno.com. Visits from those domains will then appear as their own channel instead of being buried in direct traffic. If you use Bing Webmaster Tools, its AI Performance dashboard, launched in February 2026, separately shows your appearances in Copilot answers.
What is the single most important fix if AI assistants ignore my business?
Complete and accurate business information everywhere it matters. A fully filled Google Business Profile, consistent name, address and phone number across directories, genuine customer reviews, and service pages that answer real customer questions in plain language. Assistants recommend businesses they can verify. Make yourself verifiable and the mentions follow.
Want the audit done for you? Get in touch and we will run the full twenty-minute test on your business, check your Search Console and analytics setup, and send you a plain-English report with the fixes in priority order. Free, no obligation.
