How to Check Your Business's AI Visibility for Free

You want to know whether someone asking AI for a business like yours would actually find you. You don't need another subscription to start checking.

Pick a few customer questions, try them in the assistants you care about, and save the answers and sources. You'll have a useful starting record, plus a clearer idea of what needs attention.

The quick answer

• Choose one service and one city. Write a small set of questions a potential customer might ask.
• Try each question in a fresh AI conversation. Record the assistant, search settings and date.
• Save who gets recommended, the links shown and any wrong information about your business.
• Fix the facts you can verify, then repeat the same checks. One answer doesn't tell you how visible you are everywhere.

Which questions should you use for an AI visibility check?

Start with the work you want more of.

For a dog groomer in Raleigh, that might be appointments for anxious dogs. For a plumber in Phoenix, it could be water-heater replacements. Choose one service and one area before adding every town you cover.

Use questions that describe the customer's need without naming your business. Someone who already knows your name is checking something different from someone looking for a recommendation.

For the groomer, a starting set could be:

• Which dog groomers in Raleigh would you recommend?
• Where can I find a groomer in Raleigh who works with anxious rescue dogs?
• Which dog groomers in North Raleigh offer Saturday appointments?
• Which Raleigh groomers should I contact for a full-groom quote?

These are example questions, not measured searches. Keep the ones that fit your business. There's no value in testing Saturday appointments when you're closed on Saturdays.

Can Citywise AI help you choose questions?

Yes. Enter your website into Citywise AI's free question finder. It reads your homepage and suggests up to 12 questions based on what it can understand about your business. You can select up to six and copy them. There's no signup.

Review the suggestions before using them. A homepage can leave out things your customers care about, and generated wording can need a little work. Check any preference marked “Confirm fit.”

A location may be included when the tool can identify one. Questions can also arrive without a location. For a local check, add the actual city or neighborhood yourself before saving your final list.

The free tool helps you decide what to ask. You run the questions in the assistants and keep the results. It doesn't measure prompt popularity, run an automated visibility audit or track your rankings. Copy your selected questions somewhere you'll keep them; reloading the page clears the selection.

Should you ask about your business by name too?

Add a separate question such as:

What services does [your business name] offer in Raleigh, and where is it located?

Use your actual name and city. This checks how the assistant describes you when prompted directly.

Keep that result separate from your recommendation checks. Getting a named-business answer doesn't establish that new customers will discover you. It can still reveal an old address, a wrong service or confusion with another company.

How do you check ChatGPT and other AI assistants?

Start with two platforms you want to understand. ChatGPT and Google AI Mode are a practical starting pair; add another when a customer mentions using it or you want to compare its answers.

Use a fresh conversation for each question, and keep your setup consistent. Record whether you're signed in and which model or mode is shown. “Not shown” is a perfectly useful note.

A fresh chat isn't a perfectly neutral test. Location, settings and changes to the assistant can still affect answers. You're making your checks easier to compare, not recreating every customer's experience.

ChatGPT

Web search is available on the free plan and without signing in, subject to usage limits. Choose Search from the tools menu when you want a web-based check, and record whether it actually searched. Open citations and the Sources panel when available. That panel can contain additional relevant links, so distinguish those from links cited in the answer. OpenAI's search guide.

For a signed-in check, a non-personalized Temporary Chat can help limit the influence of your account's saved preferences. Check the option you're using: OpenAI also offers a personalized Temporary Chat option. Save the answer before leaving; temporary conversations aren't added to history unless you save them. Temporary Chat FAQ.

Put the city in your question. ChatGPT may also use approximate location from your internet connection, and optionally device location. A prompt containing “Raleigh” doesn't prove every result used only that location. Note any obvious mismatch. OpenAI's location explanation.

Google AI Mode

Open Google AI Mode, or choose AI Mode from Google Search. Start a new question, then save the businesses and supporting links shown. Record a links-only response too; Google says it may show web links when it doesn't have enough confidence in an AI answer. Google's AI Mode guide.

Use the same sign-in state and settings next time. A signed-out check can be useful as a separate comparison, but don't mix it into your original record without noting the change.

Gemini, Perplexity and Claude

Use the same questions and recording method:

These details come from Google's Gemini Maps guide, Perplexity's search explanation and Claude's web search guide.

Menus and availability can vary. Mark an unavailable assistant or search feature as unchecked.

What should you put in your check log?

A spreadsheet or a plain document is enough. Make one entry per question, per assistant, per run.

Copy this two-column template and fill in the right side:

Don't guess a hidden setting. Write “unknown” when the interface doesn't tell you. The assistant's explanation of how it chose a location or a business isn't a reliable record of its internal process.

Keep mentions and citations separate. An answer might name your business without linking to your website. It might also cite your article without recommending your service.

Save the complete answer as well as your notes. Later, “we appeared” is much less useful than seeing whether you were recommended, compared unfavorably or simply mentioned in passing.

How do you turn the results into useful fixes?

Seeing a competitor named while you're missing can sting. Give yourself a moment before deciding your whole website needs rebuilding.

Open the links and check what they actually say. Does a competitor's service page explain the exact thing the customer asked for? Is a business profile showing current hours? Does a directory list your old address?

Citations give you something to investigate. They aren't a complete explanation of how the answer was produced, and a missing citation doesn't establish that the assistant never encountered your site.

Choose your next step from what you can verify:

• Your business has wrong details in the answer. Check your website and public profiles. Correct any actual errors there. Save and report the AI error too when the platform offers feedback.
• A service you offer is missing from your website. Add a useful explanation: what the service includes, who it's for, where you provide it and how to book.
• A cited listing is incomplete or outdated. Update it through the listing provider. You may need to request a correction from the publisher.
• You're absent but can't find an obvious information problem. Repeat the check and compare more answers before spending money on a supposed fix.

Make a short work list with the page or profile, the change needed and the person responsible. Recheck after the changes are live, keeping a record of when you made them. An improved answer afterward is encouraging, but one before-and-after comparison doesn't prove which change caused it.

For a closer look at the gaps, read why ChatGPT recommends your competitor but not your business.

What would that look like for a local business?

Here's a hypothetical example, not a customer result.

Suppose you run a Raleigh grooming business. An AI answer recommends other groomers for anxious dogs. You open the cited pages and notice that they explain how they handle nervous pets.

Your team offers quieter appointments too, but your website just says “full-service grooming.” Separately, you find an old address on a directory listing.

You have two concrete jobs: explain those appointments accurately and request the address correction. Keep the original question and answer, then check again after the information changes.

You haven't established why you were omitted. You've found information worth fixing for anyone trying to choose or visit your business.

Are there other free reports worth checking?

Yes, especially when you already have access to your website's search reports.

As of September 2026, Google's generative AI performance report in Search Console reports impressions for links to your site in AI Overviews and AI Mode. Google says the rollout reached websites worldwide on August 31, although a report may remain unavailable when a site lacks enough impressions.

Bing Webmaster Tools' AI Performance report tracks citations across supported Microsoft AI experiences, including Copilot and AI summaries in Bing. Citation counts don't show your position within an answer.

Use these alongside your manual log. Google's link impressions, Bing's citations and your recorded business recommendations measure different things. Combining them into one “visibility score” would hide those differences.

What mistakes make an AI visibility check misleading?

Watch for these five:

1. Only searching your business name. Include questions from someone who hasn't heard of you yet.
2. Changing several things between checks. Keep your original wording and note changes to settings, location or model.
3. Repeating a question until you like the answer. Keep the misses too.
4. Treating every displayed link as a recommendation. Record what the answer actually says about the business.
5. Assuming a missing mention proves a technical problem. It gives you a reason to investigate. It doesn't identify the cause.

What else should you know before checking?

Is this a list of the most popular questions people ask AI?

No. Citywise AI generates suggestions from your homepage. It doesn't access private ChatGPT conversations or measure how often those questions are asked. Use customer calls, emails and enquiries to improve your list. Ask any provider selling prompt-volume data how it was collected and what population it represents.

How often should you repeat the check?

A manageable starting routine is every two weeks while you're making changes, then monthly for ongoing review. That's a suggested working schedule, not a research-backed threshold. Keep your original questions and add new ones as separate entries when you launch a service or cover another area.

Can you do this with just one question?

You can start there. You'll learn what one assistant answered under those conditions. Try a few different customer needs before drawing a broader conclusion, and repeat them over time. Two questions with saved answers and sources are more useful than a long session you can't look back at.

Does the free tool fix the problems it finds?

The free question finder suggests questions; it doesn't diagnose or repair your website. You use the answers and sources to investigate. Citywise AI's paid team service covers website work, profiles, relevant mentions and ongoing checks. See what City Partner includes before deciding what help you need.

Does appearing in an AI answer mean you'll get customers?

A recommendation creates a possible route to your business. It doesn't establish a visit, enquiry or sale. Track those outcomes separately through your website analytics and enquiry records, and ask new customers how they found you. Keep their actual answers instead of attributing every new lead to AI.

What should you do first?

Choose one service and one city. Get your starting questions for free, keep the ones that sound like your customers, and save your first answers.

Pick one verified information problem to fix. When the work list grows beyond what you can handle yourself, Citywise AI's team can help with the changes and ongoing checks.