Ask ChatGPT for the best family day out near you, a good brunch spot for a group or an agency to help launch a new venue, and you’ll get a confident answer: a handful of names, a short reason for each and no page of links to wade through.
More people are starting their search this way. If your brand doesn’t come up, you may not be considered at all.
So, how do you get your brand recommended by AI? The short answer is that much of what works is what good brand communications has always done, just with far less room for inconsistency.
What does it mean for AI to “recommend” a brand?
AI assistants such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google’s AI Overview answer questions by pulling together information from across the web. When someone asks for a recommendation, the tool tends to favour brands it can describe confidently and that appear consistently across sources it trusts.
Nobody outside of the companies building these tools knows exactly how each one decides, and they change often – but the patterns are clear enough to act on.
How to get your brand recommended by AI
Five things make the biggest difference.
1. Be clear about what you do, and say it the same way everywhere
If your website says one thing, your LinkedIn says another and your Google Business Profile says a third, AI tools struggle to describe you. Settle on a clear description of who you are, who you’re for and what makes you different, then use it consistently across your site, profiles and listings. That’s positioning work, and it matters more now than ever.
2. Get talked about by other people
AI tools give weight to what others say about you, not just what you say about yourself. Press coverage, industry features, awards, reviews and creator content all add to the picture. Earned media isn’t only a reputation play any more, it’s part of how you get found.
3. Answer the questions your customers actually ask
These tools are built to answer questions, so content that answers questions clearly is easy for them to use. FAQ pages, practical guides and blog posts that give a direct answer in the first line or two, then expand, make it far easier for your brand to be quoted.
4. Keep the basics accurate
Opening hours, locations, prices, menus, booking links. If the information about you is out of date, or contradicts itself from one site to the next, you’re giving AI tools a reason to recommend someone else.
5. Look after your reviews
For hospitality, leisure and attractions especially, reviews are a big part of what shapes these answers when someone asks where to go. Responding to reviews and encouraging happy customers to leave them isn’t just customer service any more.
Why this is a brand job, not just a tech job
It’s tempting to hand AI search to the web team. Some of it does belong there – site structure and page speed still matter – but most of what gets a brand recommended comes down to clarity, consistency and reputation. That’s brand and comms work.
The brands that do well here will be the ones that know exactly what they stand for, and have other people saying it too. If you want to understand where that work starts, here’s what a brand communications agency actually does.
What to do before 2027
Start simple. Ask a few AI tools the questions your customers would ask, such as “best [your category] near [your area]” or “who should I use for [your service]”, and see who comes up. If it isn’t you, look at who it is and what’s being said about them.
Then check how you describe yourself across your site and profiles, look at where you’re being covered and reviewed, and work out which customer questions you’re not answering yet. None of this necessarily needs a big budget. It needs someone to own it.
What we’ve learned doing this ourselves
If you want to understand how your brand shows up in AI search from a brand comms perspective, and what to do about it before 2027, get in touch.
