How to rank on ChatGPT — what actually seems to matter?

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Hi folks :eyes:

We looked into how brands show up in ChatGPT, and a few patterns stood out:

  • Content that’s clear, structured, and directly answers questions gets picked up more often
  • Depth and topical authority seem to matter more than surface-level SEO
  • Being mentioned across trusted sources increases your chances of being included

But even then, it’s not always predictable :thinking:

Have you actually managed to rank on ChatGPT yet? (and if yes – what actually made a difference for your business?)

Share your experience below!

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Hi Kristina, interesting breakdown, but I’m a bit skeptical.

This still feels a bit like SEO thinking. From what I’ve seen, it’s less about formatting and more about how often you’re mentioned across the web overall. Feels like if you’re not a large brand with a strong presence and a budget to be everywhere, even well-written content can easily get lost in the noise.

For smaller/local businesses though, I’ve noticed real reviews on platforms such as Google reviews, Trustpilot, and TripAdvisor + GBP and Maps activity seem to matter way more than perfectly optimized content.

Curious, have you actually seen smaller brands outperform bigger ones purely through better optimization (despite having fewer mentions)?

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That’s a valid take :raising_hands:

Mentions and overall presence definitely create a strong baseline, especially for competitive topics.

But for niche or very specific queries, yes – we’ve seen smaller brands appear simply because they’re a better match for what’s being asked. So it’s less about outperforming and more about showing up in the right contexts and owning smaller slices of intent.

And agree on reviews, they seem to matter disproportionately for local and service-based searches.

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