How ChatGPT and AI Overviews decide which business to recommend

When ChatGPT or a Google AI Overview names a business - "you could try so-and-so" - it is not pulling that recommendation from thin air, and it is not a lottery. It leans on the same signals Google has always used to rank: relevance, authority, and reputation. Clear structured information, good reviews, and consistent details across the web. There is no separate magic that gets you named. If that sounds anticlimactic, good - it means you already know most of what to do.

Let me walk through what actually drives those recommendations, because a lot of nervous energy is being spent chasing a secret that does not exist.

It's the same three signals as Google

AI systems are trained on and draw from the open web. So when they decide who to recommend, they are effectively reading the same signals a search engine reads. It comes down to three things, and they multiply rather than add.

Relevance

Does your business clearly match what the person asked? If someone asks for a "commercial electrician in Perth," the AI needs to be able to tell, unambiguously, that that is what you are and where you are. Pages that state plainly what you do, for whom, and where you do it are easy for an AI to match. Vague, clever, everything-to-everyone pages are not.

Authority

Do other credible sources point to you? Links and mentions from reputable sites are still how the web signals "this one is trustworthy," and AI inherits that judgement. Relevance without authority is not enough, and authority without relevance is not either - they work together. I have unpacked exactly why in relevance times authority.

Reputation

Reviews, ratings, and what people say about you across the web feed directly into whether an AI feels safe recommending you. A business with a strong, consistent review profile is a safer bet for the AI to name than one with none - the same way a person asking a friend trusts the place with fifty happy customers over the unknown.

AI recommendations are not a new game. Be clearly relevant, be genuinely authoritative, have a real reputation. That is the same job SEO always was.

- Tom McSherry

Consistency is the quiet multiplier

One thing worth calling out on its own: consistency. Your business name, location, services, and contact details need to match wherever they appear - your website, your Google Business Profile, directories, social profiles. When those details conflict, an AI (like a person) gets less confident about the facts, and a less-confident system recommends you less. Tidy, matching information everywhere is unglamorous and genuinely powerful.

What this means for local businesses

If you are a local service business, the strongest thing you can do for AI recommendations is also the strongest thing you can do for ordinary local search: nail your Google Business Profile and your reviews. The map pack and AI recommendations are drinking from the same well. Everything in winning the Google map pack applies here almost unchanged - do that well and you are already positioned to be the business AI names.

So there's no special trick?

Not really, and I would be suspicious of anyone who tells you there is. The businesses AI recommends are, overwhelmingly, the businesses that were already doing the fundamentals well - clear pages, real authority, strong reviews, consistent information. This is the same conclusion I reach in my plain-English take on what GEO actually is: the label is new, the work is not.

The reassuring part is that you do not have to reverse-engineer a black box. Do the honest, boring, effective work - be clearly the right answer to the question, earn genuine authority, and look after your reputation - and you tilt the odds in your favour across Google and AI at the same time. I hold that view strongly, and I would be happy to be proven wrong as these systems change. But so far, the businesses that deserve to be recommended are the ones getting recommended.

What to actually do about it, if you are a local business, is in AI search for local business.