I need to appear in AI answers
A partner typed “best employment solicitors in Leeds” into ChatGPT and the firm was not in the answer. Someone else noticed that Google now shows an AI summary above the results for the questions the firm’s guides used to rank for. This page is what is actually happening, how to find out where the firm stands in an afternoon, why firms get left out, and what moves the needle without chasing something that changes every month.
AI assistants do not know your firm. They know what has been written about it, by it and around it, and they repeat the firms that are easiest to describe with confidence. That is a content and reputation problem, and those are solvable.
Trusted by firms including
Find out in an afternoon
Before anyone proposes a strategy, see what the assistants say about the firm today. Open ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity and Copilot, and Google with the AI Overview visible, and ask them the questions alongside with the firm’s matters and towns filled in. Ask each one twice, a day apart, because the answers vary. Write down three things: whether the firm is named, what is said about it, and which websites the answer cites.
The pattern is usually clear within the hour. Competitors who are named have something specific written about them: fee pages, named solicitors with real experience, a guide that answers the question directly, a directory listing that says what they do. Firms that are missing have a website that says “we are a leading firm” and nothing an assistant could quote.
Then ask the assistant about the firm by name. If the answer is thin, wrong, or describes a firm that merged five years ago, that is where the work starts, and it is usually not where firms expect.
- Which solicitors in [town] handle [matter] for [employees / individuals / businesses]?
- What does a [matter] cost with a solicitor in [town]?
- Who is a good [matter] solicitor near [town] with strong reviews?
- Tell me about [firm name]. What do they specialise in and who are their solicitors?
- Is [firm name] a good choice for [matter]?
- [The question clients ask before they instruct, in their words]
Why firms get left out
Assistants assemble an answer from what they can find and verify about a firm. Each of the reasons below is a gap in that record, and each one is the firm’s to close.
- Nothing specific has been written
The site says the firm is “dedicated” and “client-focused” and never says what it does for whom, at what cost, with which people. An assistant cannot cite an adjective. Competitors with a page that says “unfair dismissal claims for employees in Leeds, fixed-fee initial advice, handled by a named solicitor with fourteen years’ experience” get described in those terms because those terms exist.
- The firm is not consistent across the web
The website says one thing, the Law Society listing another, the Business Profile has an old address and a directory still lists a partner who retired. Assistants cross-check, and a firm that cannot be pinned down is left out in favour of one that can.
- The answers are elsewhere
The question the client asked has been answered by a bigger firm’s guide, by Citizens Advice, by a directory. The firm has no page that answers it and so has no claim on the answer. The assistant cites the page that does the explaining.
- The site cannot be read
Content inside tabs, accordions, images or scripts that only render in a browser; a robots file that blocks the crawlers the assistants use; pages that take eight seconds to load. If the assistant’s crawler cannot read the page, the firm does not exist to it.
- Nobody else mentions the firm
Assistants weigh what third parties say: reviews, directories, press, professional bodies, the regulator’s record. A firm with eleven reviews and no outside mentions is a firm the assistant cannot vouch for. The one with two hundred reviews and a Chambers listing gets the benefit of the doubt.
- The firm’s name is hard to find
A name shared with a bank, a town or a common word; a merger that left three names in circulation; a domain that does not match. The assistant is not sure which firm it is talking about, and uncertainty is resolved by leaving the firm out.
The firms that AI assistants recommend are the ones whose websites already answer the question, whose details agree everywhere, and about whom other people have written. None of that is new. The assistants have simply made the gap visible.
What moves the needle
In the order it pays, which is also the order it survives the next change to how any assistant works. Each step is something a client would also want, which is the test for whether it is worth doing.
- FirstSay specific things
Matter pages that state what the firm does, for whom, where, at what cost, with which named people and what experience. Fees published where the SRA requires and where it does not. The firm described in sentences that could be quoted.
- SecondAgree with yourself
Name, address, phone, people, matters and fees identical on the site, the Business Profile, the SRA and Law Society records, the directories and the professional bodies. One version of the firm, everywhere.
- ThirdAnswer the questions
The questions clients ask before they instruct, answered directly on the site, in plain English, by the person who answers them in real life, with the date it was last checked. The guides that assistants cite are the ones that answer rather than allude.
- FourthBe talked about
Reviews that accumulate. Listings in the directories that matter for the practice area. The regional press when there is news. Professional memberships stated. Each one is a third party vouching for the firm, which is what an assistant is looking for.
What is true, and what is being sold
AI search has a market of its own now, with new acronyms and new tools every month. Some of it is useful. Much of it is the old search engine tricks with a new name, and the same consequences.
- ✓Google’s AI Overviews appear on a growing share of legal questions, and sit above the ordinary results
- ✓A minority of clients now start with an assistant rather than a search engine, and the share is rising
- ✓Assistants cite sources, and the cited sites get the visit
- ✓The firms they recommend are, overwhelmingly, the ones with specific, consistent, well-reviewed presences
- ✓Measurement is thin and improving; Search Console now reports AI Overview impressions within its totals, and assistants’ referrals show in analytics
- ✕“AI SEO” packages that mean publishing hundreds of question pages at speed, which Google’s scaled content policy already covers and which its spam policies treat as spam whoever wrote them
- ✕Hidden text, special files or markup that supposedly “tell the AI what to say”; none of the major assistants honours anything a client cannot see
- ✕Guaranteed placement in ChatGPT’s answers; nobody can guarantee what a model will say tomorrow
- ✕Dashboards tracking the firm’s “AI share of voice” to two decimal places, from answers that vary every time they are asked
- ✕Content written by AI about the law, unchecked by a solicitor, which the SRA will treat as the firm’s publicity when it is wrong
Where this fits with everything else
The work that gets a firm into AI answers is the same work that gets it into ordinary search results, into the map results, and into a referred client’s confidence when they check the firm before calling. Specific pages, consistent details, direct answers, third-party proof. A firm doing those four things for the clients’ sake will find itself in the assistants’ answers as a consequence; a firm doing them for the assistants’ sake will find it has built the same thing.
Which is why we do not sell AI visibility as a separate thing bolted onto a website that is not ready for it. The AI optimisation service page describes how we measure a firm’s current standing across the assistants and what the work involves, including the technical parts: making sure the site can be read, structured data that states the facts, and the monitoring. It belongs after the matter pages and the reviews, not instead of them.
If the afternoon’s test showed the firm is already named, and named accurately, the job is to keep it that way: keep the pages current, keep the details consistent, keep the reviews coming. If it showed the firm is missing, the six reasons above will say why.
- Named, accurate
- Maintain. Review the pages quarterly; keep details in step; keep asking for reviews.
- Named, wrong
- Fix the record: the site, the listings, the Business Profile. Old names and old people removed everywhere.
- Not named, competitors are
- Read their cited pages. Build the firm’s equivalents, more specifically.
- Nobody local named
- The answer is being taken from national sources. A direct, local, authored answer has the field to itself.
- Site cannot be read
- Technical first: crawl access, speed, content in plain HTML.
Questions firms ask about AI answers
-
Will AI search replace Google for finding a solicitor?
Not soon, and the two are converging anyway: Google’s own results now begin with an AI summary for many questions, and the assistants cite the same pages Google ranks. The work is the same. What changes is that a vague website now fails in two places instead of one.
-
Should we block AI crawlers to protect our content?
That is a legitimate decision, and some publishers make it. For a law firm whose content exists to bring clients, blocking the crawlers means the firm cannot be cited and competitors will be. Our view is that the pages are there to be found; if the firm disagrees, we will say what the trade-off is.
-
Can we see which clients came from an assistant?
Partly. Referrals from ChatGPT, Perplexity and the others appear as sources in analytics, and the firm’s “how did you hear about us” question catches more. Google’s AI Overview clicks are not separated out in Search Console yet. Expect the numbers to be small and to grow, and track them from now so there is a baseline.
-
Does it help to publish lots of question-and-answer pages?
A few, answering the questions clients actually ask, written by the fee earner, yes. Hundreds, generated to cover every phrasing, no: that is the scaled content Google now penalises, and the assistants cite the one good answer, not the two hundred thin ones.
-
An assistant said something wrong about our firm. Can we correct it?
Not directly. The assistant is summarising what it found, so the fix is to correct the sources: the firm’s own site, the listings, the Business Profile, and anywhere the old information still lives. Most wrong answers trace to a stale directory entry or an old news story. Correct those and the answers follow, usually within weeks.
-
What would you do in the first month?
Run the afternoon’s test properly across the assistants and the main matters, record it, and tell you where the firm stands and why. Then the work in the order above, starting with whichever of the six reasons applies. The first month is mostly finding out; the result is a plan with the firm’s actual gaps in it rather than a generic one.
Find out where the firm stands
Tell us the firm’s main matters and towns. We will run the questions across the assistants and Google’s AI results, record what they say about the firm and its competitors, and tell you which of the six reasons applies and what to do first.
- The matters and places the firm wants to be found for, and the competitors it worries about.
- A written record of what the assistants say today, with the sources they cite.
- The gaps, in order, and what closing each one involves.