How to get your New York business recommended by ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews
Fix six concrete things on your website and listings so AI search can find you, quote you, and recommend you with confidence.
By the end of this guide you will have a short checklist of edits you can make this week, know exactly which pages and listings to touch, and understand what AI search actually reads when it decides which local business to mention. Before you start, you need two things: a website you can edit yourself or someone who can edit it for you, and the login for your Google Business Profile.
What AI search actually reads
ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews do not see your business the way a customer walking past does. They read text: your website pages, your Google Business Profile, your listings on review sites, and the reviews themselves. When someone asks for a roofer in Rochester or a dentist in Queens, the system looks for pages and listings that state the service and the area plainly, then quotes what it finds.
That is good news for a small business. The things AI reads are the things you control. You cannot buy your way into an answer, and no tool can promise you a spot, but a business that states its services, its area, and its answers in plain text is far easier to quote than one that does not.
The six fixes
Here is the checklist. Work through it in order. Each item names the page or listing you touch and what the result should look like.
- 01Write one page per service, per area
A Queens dentist (an example, not a client) should have a page for each service, like Invisalign, and each area, like Teeth cleaning in Astoria, so AI can match the page to the question a person asks.
- 02State your name, address, and phone the same way everywhere
Use the exact same wording on your website footer, your Google Business Profile, and any listing or directory, because mismatched details make AI and Google less sure the listings describe one business.
- 03Ask happy customers for reviews, and reply to them
Reviews give AI fresh, specific sentences about your work, and replies show the business is active. Ask right after a job and make replying part of your week.
- 04Answer common questions in plain text on your site
Add a short questions page or a few lines under each service: what it costs, how long it takes, which areas you serve. A Hudson Valley inn (an example) should say plainly whether pets are welcome and when check-in starts.
- 05Label your facts with structured data
Structured data is a small piece of code that tells machines what your text means: this is the address, these are the hours, this is the service. If you are not technical, hand this one step to whoever edits your site.
- 06Check the result the way a customer would
Ask ChatGPT or Google the way a real person would, for example, who fixes roofs in Rochester, and see whether your name comes up and what it says about you. That is your before picture for the next round of edits.
Where people get stuck
The name, address, and phone do not match
This is the most common problem, and the fix is boring but effective. Pick one canonical version of your business name, one address format, and one phone number. Write them down, then go to your Google Business Profile, your website footer, and every listing you can find and make them identical. Old phone numbers on a Yelp page or an old directory listing cause most of the mismatches we see.
The service pages read like brochures
A page full of we take pride in our work gives AI nothing to quote. Rewrite the top of each service page so it states the service, the area, and one plain fact in the first two sentences. A Rochester roofer (an example) should write something like: We repair and replace asphalt shingle roofs in Rochester and the surrounding towns. Free estimates, most repairs done in one day. A sentence like that can be lifted straight into an answer.
Nobody knows who should add the structured data
If you edit your own site, ask your website platform what it supports, because many site builders add structured data automatically when you fill in your business details. If someone else maintains your site, send them this checklist and ask them to confirm your business name, address, hours, and services are labeled. You do not need to write the code yourself to get this done.
A hand with this, or a team that learns it
If you would rather have a person walk this checklist with you, that is exactly what our AI Concierge does: a real person from our team learns your business and works on tasks like these with you on two 1-hour calls a month, and you can reach your concierge by voice message and email between calls with no limit on questions. Everything we build lives in your own accounts and is yours to keep. If you want your whole team to learn this kind of work, our AI Training for Business covers it in hands-on sessions built on your approved real tasks, with take-home routines and a follow-up check-in.
