Show up in ChatGPT. Four steps a local business controls.

ChatGPT searches the web when a question needs current information. OpenAI's help page on search says it rewrites the question into one or more search queries, may add the person's general location, and "sometimes partners with other search providers".

The pages it can show come from OpenAI's own crawler. OpenAI's crawler overview lists three, and only one of them decides whether a site can appear in search answers.

For reviews and listings, Yelp told Axios in July 2026 that it licenses reviews, photos and business information to OpenAI. The longer version, with Gemini and Claude side by side, is in how assistants find a local business.

Open yoursite.com/robots.txt in a browser. If the file blocks OAI-SearchBot, or blocks every crawler, ChatGPT search cannot show the site. OpenAI says a robots.txt change takes about 24 hours to apply.

A robots.txt file is not the only gate. Some hosts and security settings turn bots away before they reach the file. If you use a website builder, look for a setting about AI crawlers or search engines and leave search crawlers allowed.

A crawler reads text. Write these on the page in plain sentences:

• What the business does, service by service.
• The city, the neighborhoods or towns it serves, and the street address if customers visit.
• Opening hours, and the phone number customers should call.
• Prices or price ranges, if you publish them.
• Answers to the questions customers ask before they call.

Hours inside a photo of a sign and a menu that is only a scanned PDF cannot be quoted. The full list is in what a page needs to be quoted.

An answer is often put together from several sources, so one wrong listing can end up in it. In a field test by Ryan Doser in October 2026, 7 of 250 AI recommendations gave a phone number that did not match the business's Google listing.

Check the name, address, phone and hours on your own page, your Google Business Profile, Yelp and any directory for your trade. Fix the wrong one at its source.

Reviews are part of what Yelp licenses to OpenAI, and Google counts reviews in local results according to its local ranking page. Ask customers after a job, with a link or a QR code, as Google's review tips suggest.

Do not buy reviews or write them yourself. The Federal Trade Commission's rule bans fake reviews, including AI-generated ones.

Ask ChatGPT the question a customer would ask, with your city in it, in a new chat, at least five times. Count how often the business is named. One answer proves little, because the list changes from run to run. The method is in how to check whether assistants mention your business.

• Paying for a spot. OpenAI does not publish how ChatGPT picks a business, so nobody outside OpenAI can sell a place in its answers. See what nobody can promise.
• Submitting the business. There is no form. See can you add your business to ChatGPT.
• Chasing a rank. There is no fixed list to climb. The same question returns a different list almost every time.

An OnMap page covers steps 1 and 2: it is open to OAI-SearchBot, and the facts are plain text. Steps 3 and 4 stay with the business. See an example page or how it works.