How to rank on ChatGPT in 2026

“I found your agency by asking ChatGPT.”

A prospect told me this recently.

Ranking on ChatGPT will eventually overtake ranking on Google in importance.

And just like the brands who took SEO seriously in the early days and reaped the rewards, so too will those who understand how ChatGPT works.

(I say ChatGPT, but that goes for any of the other major LLMs such as Claude, Gemini, Perplexity, xAI/Grok.)

Like Google and old school SEO, ChatGPT does look at certain signals to determine which brands to mention.

A recent study by INK Communications surfaced some key areas that impact ranking.

Owned media – This includes your website, product pages, blogs, and other web content. Most companies have these assets.

Business directories

Bloomberg

BuiltIn

Capterra

CB Insights

Clutch

Comparably

Craft

Crunchbase

Datanyze

Dunn & Bradstreet

Forbes Advisor

Gartner Peer Insights

Glassdoor

LeadIQ

PeerSpot

Pitchbook

SaaSWorthy

Slashdot

Software Advice

Software Connect

Software Suggest

Software World

Solutions Review

Technology Counter

Tracxn

TrustRadius

ZoomInfo

Research analyst mentions

CB Insights

Emergen Research

Gartner

Forrester

Markets and Markets

Mordor Intelligence

Straits Research

Verified Market Research

Earned media

Industry trades

CRN

eWeek

TechRadar

TechTarget

Top tier tech:

Computerworld

TechCrunch

PCMag

WIRED

Role-based verticals

CIO

CSO Online

The Cconects

The CTO Club

Top tier business

Axios

Reuters

Wall Street Journal

Yahoo! Finance

Action Items

Assign someone to start auditing your owned media and owned content.

Ensure all content is updated, clear and properly structured. Use more question and answer formats, or FAQs, to help LLMs better understand.

Continue to invest in creating content for the company blog, LinkedIn pages, YouTube and other formats of content assets.

Assign someone to audit your presence on business directories.

Ensure all information is accurate and consistent. Contact or submit your company information on directories you’re not currently on.

Have an ongoing campaign to reach out to research analysts.

Unlike reporters, analysts want to hear from you. Their job is to make sure they are up to date on all the developments in their sector.

Some sites have forms you can fill out to request a “Vendor Briefing”, such as the one on Gartner’s: https://www.gartner.com/en/contact/vendor-briefings

Be sure you introduce your company to them, and keep them apprised of any product news.

Make public relations a key pillar of your marketing.

We’ve written about how media websites are one of the key sources for ChatGPT.

PR does take time and effort, but the rewards are immense.

The cumulative benefits of PR also create a moat that your competitors will find harder and harder to overcome.

If you’re getting 4 quality media mentions a month, that’s 48 in a year.

48 media articles that ChatGPT could potentially be drawing from.

With 2026 just around the corner, now is the perfect time to ensure all of the above factors are on your radar.

Don’t be the “best kept secret” and invisible to ChatGPT.

In the future, if ChatGPT doesn’t mention you, people may think you are irrelevant or worse, don’t even know you exist.

What would that mean for potential investors, prospects, and employees?

Want to chat further about getting your PR strategy in place for 2026? Email me at edward@firecrackerpr.com or fill out our form: https://www.firecrackerpr.com/contact/

**Special thanks to Kersa Haughey’s article in O’Dwyer’s summarizing INK’s study.