Understand how businesses get found, understood and recommended by AI.
AI Visibility Questions & Answers
AI is becoming part of how buyers research suppliers, compare businesses and decide who deserves a closer look.
That creates a new set of questions.
Why does ChatGPT recommend one company and not another? Does SEO still matter? Do reviews, YouTube, Reddit and LinkedIn make a difference? Can you measure AI visibility? What happens when AI gets your business wrong?
This hub gives straightforward answers based on the work we do across AI visibility, GEO, search, content, technical optimisation and third-party authority.
Start with a 30-minute call. If you choose an audit, it costs £500 + VAT and is arranged and paid for afterwards.
Contents
Jump to a question
AI Visibility Fundamentals
What is AI visibility?
AI visibility is whether and how your business appears when people use AI-powered platforms to research a problem, compare suppliers or ask for recommendations.
It is broader than simply having your company name mentioned. We look at whether a business is mentioned, cited or actually recommended, how it is described, which competitors appear alongside it and what sources support the answer.
For a business, the commercial question is simple: when a potential customer asks AI about something you sell, are you part of the answer?
What is GEO?
GEO stands for Generative Engine Optimisation.
It is the work of improving the content, technical accessibility, expertise and external authority that can support how a business appears within generative AI answers.
That can involve strengthening existing pages, answering important buyer questions, improving business information, building expert authority, earning credible third-party references and monitoring how AI systems represent the business over time.
GEO does not mean manipulating or directly changing an AI model.
What is AEO?
AEO usually means Answer Engine Optimisation.
The principle is making information clear, useful and easy for search or answer systems to understand and surface when someone asks a question.
There is considerable overlap between AEO, GEO and modern SEO. We care less about arguing over terminology and more about whether the right buyer can discover your expertise, understand what you offer and find enough evidence to consider you.
What is the difference between GEO, AEO, AI Search Optimisation and LLM Optimisation?
They overlap, but they describe different parts of the problem.
GEO focuses on improving the content and authority supporting generative answers.
AEO focuses on providing clear answers to questions.
AI Search Optimisation strengthens the website, its structure, internal links, technical accessibility and content.
LLM Optimisation, as we use the term, focuses particularly on how AI systems understand, describe and associate your business with relevant services, people and expertise.
Together, they contribute to the broader goal: AI visibility.
Does AI visibility replace SEO?
No.
Good search foundations still matter. Search engines and AI systems need accessible, useful information about your business.
Crawlability, indexing, internal links, page structure, useful content and clear business information remain important. AI visibility extends the work beyond traditional rankings into how businesses are represented, cited, compared and recommended.
The aim is not SEO or GEO. It is making the whole online presence work together.
Getting Recommended by AI
How do I get my business recommended by ChatGPT?
There is no button that places a business into ChatGPT recommendations.
The practical approach is to make it easier for AI systems and buyers to understand who you are, what you do, who you help and why you are credible.
That means strong service information, useful answers to buyer questions, visible expertise, consistent company information, customer evidence and credible third-party references.
Then you monitor whether your position changes across commercially relevant questions.
How do AI platforms decide which businesses to recommend?
There is no single published formula that applies to every AI platform or every answer.
Different systems can use different models, search capabilities, sources and contextual information. The wording of a question and the conversation around it can also change the answer.
What we can examine is the evidence surrounding businesses that appear: the information on their websites, their expertise, third-party references, reviews, media coverage, community presence and how clearly they address the buyer’s question.
We look for patterns rather than pretending there is one secret ranking factor.
Why does ChatGPT recommend my competitors instead of me?
Sometimes a competitor simply gives the system more evidence to work with.
They may answer the buying question more clearly, have stronger category associations, appear in more relevant third-party sources, demonstrate more visible expertise or provide stronger evidence of suitability.
It can also be something more basic: AI may not understand your services clearly enough.
The first job is therefore not guessing. It is comparing what happens across a controlled set of buyer questions and competitors.
Can I influence what ChatGPT says about my company?
You can improve the information and evidence available about your business.
You control things such as your website, service descriptions, expert biographies and much of your published content. You can also pursue legitimate opportunities for reviews, industry coverage, interviews, directories, podcasts and other independent references.
You do not control the final output generated by ChatGPT or another AI platform.
That distinction matters.
Can you guarantee that ChatGPT will recommend my business?
No.
Neither Tenacious nor another agency controls what ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Google or another third-party platform chooses to display.
We can identify weaknesses, improve the information and evidence surrounding the business, pursue relevant authority opportunities and monitor what changes.
Anyone promising guaranteed placement inside independent AI answers should be able to explain exactly how they claim to control the platform.
Can a smaller company compete with a much larger company in AI recommendations?
Potentially, yes.
The strongest answer to a buyer’s question is not always the largest company.
A specialist business may have more relevant expertise, a clearer explanation, stronger evidence for a niche requirement or better information around a particular use case.
This is one reason we research commercially specific buyer questions, rather than asking only broad questions such as “Who are the biggest companies in this industry?”
What Influences AI Visibility?
Does my website affect AI visibility?
Yes. Your website is one of the clearest sources of first-party information about the business.
It should explain your services, people, expertise, customers, locations and evidence in a way that is easy to navigate and understand.
Important information buried in PDFs, poorly connected pages or vague marketing copy makes the job harder for buyers as well as machines.
A strong site connects the question being asked to the relevant answer, supporting evidence and next step.
Do backlinks still matter for GEO?
Links can still matter, but counting links alone misses the point.
A relevant reference from an established industry source can help people discover your business and provide independent context around what you do.
For AI visibility, we are particularly interested in relevance, authority and what the source actually says about the business, rather than pursuing links purely because a metric says they have value.
Do Google reviews affect AI visibility?
Reviews can contribute to the wider evidence surrounding a business.
They show genuine customer experiences, reinforce reputation and give buyers another source against which to assess your claims.
That does not mean a particular number of five-star reviews automatically produces an AI recommendation. Reviews are one part of a much broader picture that includes relevance, expertise, content, external authority and the specific question being asked.
Does LinkedIn help with AI visibility?
LinkedIn can help make the people behind a business more visible.
Strong founder and expert profiles clarify who your people help, what they know and the experience behind their advice. Publishing useful material also creates another place where potential buyers can evaluate the expertise behind the company.
We treat LinkedIn as part of the wider Search Everywhere journey, not as an isolated posting exercise.
Does YouTube help with AI visibility?
YouTube can strengthen visible expertise and give people another way to assess whether you know your subject.
It is particularly useful for answering real buyer questions, explaining complex services and putting knowledgeable people in front of potential customers.
One strong expert answer can also feed a website answer, social content and other formats rather than every channel being treated separately.
Does Reddit affect AI visibility?
Reddit matters because buyers discuss real problems, products and suppliers there and because those discussions may appear during search and AI research.
That does not make Reddit an advertising channel where businesses should manufacture conversations.
We use technology to identify relevant discussions and opportunities, with participation reviewed by people and expected to fit the rules and context of the community.
Do PR, podcasts and media coverage help AI visibility?
They can.
Independent coverage gives buyers and machines information about a business beyond what the company says about itself.
That might include industry publications, interviews, podcasts, buying guides, awards or credible commentary.
The important words are relevant and credible. Ten random mentions are not necessarily more useful than one source directly connected to the subject a buyer is researching.
Does schema markup help AI understand my business?
Structured data can help machines understand specific information on a page, but schema is not a magic GEO switch.
We use appropriate structured data to describe visible information accurately, alongside clear page content, site architecture and technical accessibility.
There is no special “AI schema” that guarantees inclusion in Google’s AI features or a recommendation from ChatGPT.
Why is third-party authority important?
Because every claim on your own website is still a claim made by you.
Reviews, industry coverage, directories, interviews, customer evidence, expert references and other independent sources can give buyers additional reasons to believe the claim.
For AI visibility, those sources can also provide external context connecting your company with particular subjects, expertise or customer needs.
We therefore work on both sides: what you publish about yourself and what credible sources say about you.
What is entity clarity?
Entity clarity is how consistently the web explains who your business is and what it is connected to.
That includes your company name, services, people, expertise, locations, sectors, credentials and other important facts.
If your website says one thing, profiles say another and important expertise is never clearly associated with your people, the picture becomes weaker.
The goal is not repetition for repetition’s sake. It is a coherent, factual representation of the business.
Measuring AI Visibility
How do you measure AI visibility?
We start with the questions that matter commercially.
Then we record how the business appears across an agreed set of prompts and platforms, including whether it is mentioned, cited or recommended and which competitors appear alongside it.
Repeated checks help us look for patterns over time rather than treating one screenshot as definitive.
Where appropriate, we then compare visibility data with referral traffic, enquiries, opportunities and sales information.
What is the difference between an AI mention, citation and recommendation?
A mention means the business is named.
A citation means content associated with the business is referenced as a source.
A recommendation means the business is actually presented as an option relevant to what the buyer is looking for.
They are not the same thing.
A company can receive citations without being recommended, or be mentioned in an answer without being positioned as a serious option.
That is why we don’t just track rankings. We track recommendations.
Can you compare our AI visibility with competitors?
Yes.
Competitive comparison is one of the most useful parts of the process because visibility means little without context.
We examine who appears for the questions you want to win, how those businesses are presented and what relevant differences we can observe in their content and wider authority.
Your initial AI Visibility Audit includes 30 buyer prompts plus five comparison prompts.
Can AI visibility be connected to leads and revenue?
Sometimes, but attribution needs to be treated carefully.
We can track visibility alongside website referrals, enquiries, opportunities and sales data where those signals are available.
For businesses with long sales cycles, the commercial outcome may happen months after the original research.
We therefore distinguish between visibility signals and proven commercial outcomes rather than pretending every increase in AI appearances immediately caused revenue.
Why do AI answers change?
AI responses are not fixed search rankings.
The platform, model, wording of the question, conversation context, sources available and timing can all affect the response.
That means a single screenshot is weak evidence.
We use repeated checks against a defined question set so that we can identify patterns instead of drawing conclusions from one answer.
How long does AI visibility take to improve?
There is no universal timetable.
A business starting with strong expertise, a well-built website and plenty of independent authority is in a very different position from one with unclear services, weak content and little external evidence.
We establish the starting point, prioritise the work and monitor the relevant questions over time.
For our monthly services, there is a formal review at three months so we can examine delivery, progress and priorities before the remaining period of the engagement.
When AI Gets Your Business Wrong
What should I do if ChatGPT gives incorrect information about my company?
Start by finding out where the incorrect information may be coming from.
Check the information you control, including your website and major business profiles, then look for inaccurate or outdated external sources.
We can improve information you control and pursue corrections elsewhere where possible.
What we cannot do is dictate when an independent AI platform will update its response.
Why do we rank well on Google but barely appear in ChatGPT?
Traditional search visibility and AI recommendations are related but not identical.
A page can rank for an important keyword while the wider evidence around the business is still insufficient for it to be confidently presented as a recommendation in a particular AI-generated answer.
AI visibility can involve additional questions around entity understanding, buyer-question coverage, expert authority, comparisons, reputation and independent references.
Why do we appear in ChatGPT but not Gemini or Perplexity?
Different platforms can use different models, retrieval systems, sources and methods for generating answers.
They may also interpret the same question differently.
That is why we do not assume success on one platform means the same result everywhere.
Where relevant, monitoring looks across multiple AI experiences and identifies recurring patterns as well as differences.
What if AI doesn’t understand what our company actually does?
That is often an information problem worth investigating.
Your important services may not be explained clearly enough. Your website architecture may separate related information. Your expert profiles may not support the positioning. External sources may describe an older version of the company.
We examine the information surrounding the business and identify where important associations are unclear, missing or inconsistent.
Do we need a new website to improve AI visibility?
Not necessarily.
Often the better first step is improving the website you already have: strengthening service pages, answering missing questions, connecting relevant evidence, improving internal links and resolving technical issues.
If the existing platform genuinely prevents the business from doing what it needs to do, a rebuild can then be considered separately.
Working with An AI Visibility Agency
What does an AI visibility agency actually do?
An AI visibility agency investigates how businesses appear during AI-assisted buyer research and then works on the factors that can strengthen that position.
At Tenacious, that can include research, website optimisation, buyer-question content, expert positioning, video, community intelligence, third-party authority and ongoing monitoring.
The exact mix depends on the company’s starting point, buyers and competition.
Can you work alongside our existing SEO agency or marketing team?
Yes.
AI visibility does not require throwing away good work that is already happening.
We can agree responsibilities with your existing marketers, SEO provider, developers, subject-matter experts and internal sales team.
In many cases, the valuable opportunity is connecting their existing knowledge and activity more effectively rather than replacing everybody involved.
What happens during an AI Visibility Audit?
We start with the buying questions that matter to your business.
The audit covers 30 buyer prompts plus five comparison prompts. You can contribute up to ten commercially important questions or scenarios to help shape the research.
We examine how your business appears, which competitors are being surfaced and what the findings suggest should be improved first.
You then receive the data and a findings walkthrough where we explain what we found and answer your questions.
Do I have to become a monthly client after the audit?
No.
The £500 + VAT covers the audit, findings meeting and improvement recommendations.
If you decide to proceed with Growth or Dominate, the £500 + VAT is credited against month one. If you do not proceed, you still have the findings and data to review.
How much does AI visibility support cost?
Growth and Dominate have custom pricing. Packages typically range from £2,000 + VAT to £6,000 + VAT per month, depending on the scope agreed. All prices exclude VAT.
Both have a six-month commitment, with an option to finish at the end of month three by giving written notice before that date. Continuing commits you to months four to six. After six months, the service continues with two months’ written notice to cancel.
You can also start with the £500 + VAT AI Visibility Audit to understand your starting position before deciding what level of implementation you need.
What should I look for when choosing a GEO or AI visibility agency?
Ask to see what they actually measure and what work they actually perform.
Can they explain the difference between a mention, citation and recommendation? Do they examine genuine buyer questions? Can they show the content, technical work and authority activity behind their strategy? Do they distinguish correlation from proven commercial results?
Most importantly, be cautious of anyone suggesting that they control the output of independent AI platforms.
AI visibility should be treated as measurable marketing and business infrastructure, not magic.
Want to know what ai says about your business?
The most useful question is not whether AI visibility matters in theory.
It is what happens when your buyers ask about your services, your competitors and the problems you solve.
Our £500 + VAT AI Visibility Audit examines:
- 30 buyer prompts
- Five competitor comparison prompts
- Your current AI visibility
- Who is being recommended instead
- The gaps worth addressing first
We walk you through the findings and give you the data afterwards.
If you move into a monthly Growth or Dominate programme, the £500 + VAT audit fee is credited against month one.
Start with a 30-minute call. If you choose an audit, it costs £500 + VAT and is arranged and paid for afterwards.