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Free AI check · 10 minutes

Is ChatGPT recommending your business? Check it yourself.

The short answer

Type three questions your customers ask, with your trade and town, into ChatGPT and Google's AI Mode. Ask each one three times, in a new chat each time. Note whether your business is named, whether your site is linked, and who is named instead. Then run the free check below to see whether those assistants can read your site at all.

Run the instant check

By , Founder & Principal ·

The 10-minute test.

  1. Write three questions the way a customer would type them

    Use your trade and your town. A custom home builder in London, Ontario would type these three:

    • best custom home builder in London Ontario
    • who should I hire to build a custom home in London Ontario
    • how much does a custom home cost in London Ontario

  2. Ask each one three times, in a new chat, in two assistants

    Use ChatGPT and Google's AI Mode. Start a new chat for every run, logged out or in a private window, so your own history doesn't steer the answer. That's 18 answers, about 10 minutes.

  3. Mark two things in every answer: named, and linked

    Named means the answer says your business name. Linked means your website is one of the sources it shows. They are different results, so count them apart. Copy the grid below into a spreadsheet or a note: one row per answer.

    Your tally: one row per answer, 18 in all. Select it and paste it into a spreadsheet, then put yes or no under named and linked.
    question,run,assistant,named,linked,who was named instead,sources used
Q1,1,ChatGPT,,,,
Q1,1,Google AI Mode,,,,
Q1,2,ChatGPT,,,,
Q1,2,Google AI Mode,,,,
Q1,3,ChatGPT,,,,
Q1,3,Google AI Mode,,,,
Q2,1,ChatGPT,,,,
Q2,1,Google AI Mode,,,,
Q2,2,ChatGPT,,,,
Q2,2,Google AI Mode,,,,
Q2,3,ChatGPT,,,,
Q2,3,Google AI Mode,,,,
Q3,1,ChatGPT,,,,
Q3,1,Google AI Mode,,,,
Q3,2,ChatGPT,,,,
Q3,2,Google AI Mode,,,,
Q3,3,ChatGPT,,,,
Q3,3,Google AI Mode,,,,

  4. Optional: write down who was named instead, and which pages the answer used

    Open the sources under each answer. The directories, review sites, lists and competitors' pages that keep coming up are where the assistant found the businesses it named. This takes longer than the 10 minutes, and it tells you where to start.

  5. Run the instant check on your homepage

    The check tests what those assistants need from your site before they can name or link it. It takes about 10 seconds.

    Instant check · 10 seconds

    Can AI read your site?

    Seven checks on whether the crawlers behind ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Google can read your homepage and show it in their answers. Three more things are reported but not scored. No email needed.

Why three runs, and why two assistants

Answers rarely repeat. In a SparkToro study published January 28, 2026, 600 volunteers asked ChatGPT, Claude and Google's AI the same 12 questions 2,961 times. The chance of ChatGPT or Google's AI giving the same list of brands twice was under 1 in 100. So the test counts how often you come up across runs, not whether you came up once.

< 1 in 100

Chance of the same list of brands twice from ChatGPT or Google's AI (SparkToro, January 2026)

Named and linked are different results

Semrush ran 115 questions through ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini and Google AI Mode, published June 9, 2026. Of 3,981 times a site showed up, 61.7% were a link with no brand name in the answer.

What each result in your tally means, and what to check next
Named and linkedThe answer names you and used your page.Keep that page's facts and prices current.
Named, not linkedYour name came from somewhere else: a review site, a directory, a list, or what the model learned before.Check that those places say what your site says.
Linked, not namedYour page fed the answer, but the answer didn't say who you are.Put your business name and town next to the facts on that page.
NeitherYou're not in its sources for this question.Look at who was named, and which pages the answer used. Then check the places a buyer checks too. For the London builder in the example: your Google reviews, Houzz or HomeStars, and your entry in the HCRA's Ontario Builder Directory.

What the instant check tests, and why

Seven things are scored. Three are reported but don't count: fetchers that act for a person may not follow robots.txt, blocking training crawlers is a business choice, and Google Search doesn't use llms.txt. Run it on your site.

The checks, why each matters, and where that comes from
robots.txt lets the AI search crawlers in: OAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, Claude-User, PerplexityBotOpenAI says sites that block OAI-SearchBot won't be shown in ChatGPT search answers. Anthropic says blocking its search crawler can cut your visibility in Claude's answers. PerplexityBot is how Perplexity finds and links sites. The check reads robots.txt only, so a firewall or your host's AI bot settings can still block them.OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity crawler pages; Cloudflare, updated July 1, 2026
Your homepage text is in the HTML the server sendsIn Vercel's December 2024 study, the crawlers from OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity didn't run JavaScript, so text added by scripts never reached them. Google's crawler does run scripts.Vercel, December 17, 2024
Googlebot is allowed, and there's no noindex or nosnippetGoogle: to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, a page must be "indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet". A page blocked in robots.txt shows in results with no description.Google, updated December 10, 2025
Your business is described in schemaNot required: Google says its AI features need no special markup. It still states your name, services and area in one place.Google, updated December 10, 2025
Your email or phone is readable without JavaScriptCloudflare's email obfuscation shows "[email protected]" to readers without JavaScript, unless the address is marked to skip it.Cloudflare documentation
A page title, a description and a sitemapGoogle builds your result's title and description from several sources, your page title and meta description among them. A sitemap lists the pages you want crawled.Google, updated December 10, 2025 (titles), April 20, 2026 (snippets) and July 8, 2026 (sitemaps)
Fetchers that act for a person: ChatGPT-User, Perplexity-UserNot scoredThey open a page because someone asked. OpenAI and Perplexity say robots.txt may not apply to them, so a block there doesn't count either way.OpenAI and Perplexity crawler pages
Training crawlers: GPTBot, ClaudeBot, Google-ExtendedNot scoredYour call. Blocking them keeps pages out of model training. Google-Extended also covers answers grounded in the Gemini apps, and doesn't affect Google Search.OpenAI, Anthropic; Google, updated October 30, 2026
llms.txtNot scoredGoogle says Google Search doesn't use llms.txt or other AI text files.Google, updated July 10, 2026

We ran it on our own site

On November 1, 2026, at 1:35 a.m. Toronto time, spaceandstory.co passed 6 of 7 checks. It caught one real problem: Cloudflare's email obfuscation hides our address from anyone who reads the page without JavaScript, as the crawlers from OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity do. At 3:17 a.m. we re-scored the site with the rules on this page, which report ChatGPT-User and Perplexity-User instead of scoring them and also check Googlebot. It was still 6 of 7, with the same miss.

The instant check on spaceandstory.co, run
robots.txt lets AI search crawlers inPassOAI-SearchBot, Claude-SearchBot, Claude-User and PerplexityBot allowed
Pages can be read without JavaScriptPass876 words of text in the server HTML
Google may show the page with a snippetPassGooglebot allowed; no noindex or nosnippet
The business is described in schemaPassProfessionalService found
Contact details are readable without JavaScriptWorth fixingEmail hidden by Cloudflare's obfuscation; no phone on the page
Title and description are setPassBoth present
A sitemap lists the pagesPassFound
Fetchers that act for a personNot scoredChatGPT-User and Perplexity-User allowed
Training crawlersNot scoredGPTBot, ClaudeBot and Google-Extended allowed
llms.txtNot scoredFound one

What to fix first

Go by your tally. If you were named in none of your answers, work down this list:

  1. Your Google Business Profile and your reviews. Google says Business Profiles can help a business show up in AI responses. Fill in every field, and ask every client for a review.
  2. The lists, directories and review sites that kept coming up in the sources. Get onto them, and make sure they say what your site says.
  3. A page for each service you really do, with your town, your prices and your real jobs on it.
  4. Technical fixes, only where the instant check flags them: a crawler blocked in robots.txt, text the server doesn't send, noindex or nosnippet, or contact details hidden from readers without JavaScript.

What this test can't tell you

  • How often real customers see you. Your 18 answers are a sample, from one place, on one day.
  • Why an assistant chose someone else. The sources you noted in step 4 are your best clue.
  • Whether you'll be named next month. No one can promise that, and we don't.

To track it month by month, see how to measure AI search visibility. For how the choice gets made, read how ChatGPT recommends businesses.

When to use something else

A similar test, run for you every weekA paid tracker. Otterly starts at US$29 a month for 15 questions, with Google AI Mode a $9 add-on on that plan. LeapOne is CA$60 a month and checks ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Gemini, Perplexity and Claude.
One score, with no effortHubSpot's free AI Search Grader. It reports what ChatGPT, Perplexity and Gemini say about you, based on their training data.
Someone to do it for you, freeOur 24-page audit. It checks how often six AI tools mention you, against your closest competitor, within 24 hours.
Get the free 24-page audit

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