How to appear on ChatGPT: the practical guide

The problem: your site exists, but AI can't see it

You have a website. It might even appear on Google's first page. But when someone asks ChatGPT "What's the best [your industry] service?", your name is nowhere to be found.

It's not a bug. It's an optimization problem. AI doesn't read websites like Google does. It looks for specific signals — and if your site doesn't provide them, it will never cite you.

Here are the concrete steps to change that.

Step 1: Allow AI crawlers

AI sends robots to read your site, just like Google. But they're different robots. Here are the main ones:

• GPTBot and ChatGPT-User (OpenAI)
• ClaudeBot and Claude-Web (Anthropic)
• PerplexityBot (Perplexity)
• Google-Extended (Google AI)

If your robots.txt file blocks these robots, AI simply cannot read your content. Check that your robots.txt doesn't contain lines like:

User-agent: GPTBot
Disallow: /

In total, 14 different AI crawlers exist. TryGEO checks all of them automatically.

Step 2: Add JSON-LD structured data

JSON-LD is a data format you inject into your site's code. It's invisible to visitors but AI reads it first.

The most useful types for GEO:

• Organization — Who are you? Name, logo, contact info
• Article or BlogPosting — For content pages: author, date, topic
• FAQPage — Structured Q&A (AI loves this format)
• Product — Price, availability, reviews (for e-commerce)
• LocalBusiness — Address, hours, service area (for local businesses)

A study demonstrated that GPT-4 improves its correct response rate from 16% to 54% when structured data is available.

Step 3: Structure your content as Q&A

AI extracts information modularly. It looks for "answer capsules": a heading in question form, followed by a 40-to-150-word answer paragraph.

Instead of writing:

Our company has been providing consulting services since 2010. We support SMBs in their digital transformation with a personalized approach...

Write:

What services do you offer?

We've supported SMBs in their digital transformation since 2010. Our services include online presence auditing, website redesign, and content strategy. Over 200 businesses trust us across the country.

The second version gets extracted 3 times more often by AI.

Step 4: Clearly identify yourself

AI doesn't trust anonymous content. It checks:

• Who writes? — Author name, title, biography
• When? — Publication and last update dates
• What proof? — Cited sources, referenced studies, statistical data

Systematically add:

• Author or organization name on every page
• Visible publication date
• At least 2-3 links to reference sources (.gov, .edu, studies)

Step 5: Create an llms.txt file

The llms.txt file is an emerging standard, similar to robots.txt but designed specifically for AI. It helps AI quickly understand your site's structure and identify your most important content.

Place it at your domain root (e.g., yoursite.com/llms.txt) with a summary of your business, key pages, and expertise.

Step 6: Add sourced statistics

AI looks for tangible evidence to support its answers. Content with precise, sourced statistics is 30% more likely to be cited than content without data.

Bad: "Most companies use the cloud."

Good: "According to Gartner (2025), 84% of mid-size companies have migrated at least 60% of their infrastructure to the cloud."

Step 7: Check your GEO score

Each step above corresponds to a check that TryGEO verifies automatically:

• AI crawler access (14 robots checked)
• JSON-LD structured data
• Q&A content structure
• Author and dates identified
• llms.txt file
• Sourced statistics
• Expert citations

The diagnostic is free for your homepage and takes 30 seconds.

Summary: 7 actions to remember

1. Verify your robots.txt allows AI crawlers
2. Add JSON-LD (Organization, Article, FAQPage)
3. Structure your content as Q&A
4. Identify the author, date, and sources
5. Create an llms.txt file
6. Include sourced statistics
7. Measure your GEO score with TryGEO