When someone asks ChatGPT for a good electrician or asks Gemini to compare local banks, the answer doesn’t come from nowhere. The engine pulls from a specific set of sources it has learned to trust, then decides which businesses to name. If you want to be one of those businesses, it helps to know where these systems actually look.
The short version: they do not all look in the same places, and the sources they favor are mostly ones you can influence.
Do AI engines use the same sources?
No. That is the first thing to understand.
Yext studied this at scale. In an October 2025 analysis of 6.8 million citations across ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity, it found that 86 percent of citations came from sources brands already control, mainly websites and listings. But the three engines weighted those sources very differently. Websites made up the largest single share at about 44 percent, listings close behind at 42 percent, and reviews and social at 8 percent. The mix shifted by engine and by the type of question being asked.
Because Yext sells listings technology, I treat the exact percentages as directional. The pattern matters, and it holds across other research: AI engines assemble local answers from a business’s own website, its directory listings, and its reviews, in proportions that change from one assistant to the next.
Where does ChatGPT get local data?
ChatGPT’s web search runs on Bing’s index, not Google’s, because OpenAI’s search partnership is with Microsoft. That single fact matters more than most people realize. Your Bing Places listing feeds the index ChatGPT actually queries, and a neglected Bing profile is a real blind spot.
From there, ChatGPT leans on third-party listings and review platforms. In the Yext data, roughly 49 percent of ChatGPT citations came from directories and review sites such as Yelp, TripAdvisor, MapQuest and the Better Business Bureau. On subjective queries, the “best of” searches where someone is choosing a provider, that directory share climbs to about 46 percent. OpenAI has said ChatGPT Search uses location and trusted third-party providers to answer local questions, which lines up with what the citation data shows.
For ChatGPT, your presence on major directories and review platforms does a lot of the work.
Where does Gemini get local data?
Gemini behaves more like a traditional search engine, which makes sense given it is Google’s. In the same study, about 52 percent of Gemini citations came from brand-owned websites, the highest website share of the three engines. It rewards clear, structured content published directly on your own domain, and it draws on your Google Business Profile and the wider Google ecosystem.
Google’s own guidance for showing up in its AI surfaces is consistent with this: keep crawlable, useful pages, maintain an accurate Business Profile, and use structured data that matches what visitors actually see.
Where does Perplexity get local data?
Perplexity is a real-time search engine with a language model on top, working from a curated and comparatively strict source pool. It cites densely and commits to a short list of high-authority sources. For local queries, that means directories and vertical platforms specific to your industry, alongside recent, well-structured pages that answer the question directly. Freshness carries real weight here, so a page published once and left alone tends to fade.
What do all three have in common?
Underneath the differences, the engines agree on more than it appears.
First, they favor sources brands can influence. Websites, listings, and reviews made up the large majority of citations across all three. There are no tricks here. The work is getting your own footprint right.
Second, they verify before they name you. An engine cross-references your details across the sources it trusts. When your name, address, phone number, and category match everywhere, its confidence climbs. When those details contradict each other, it discounts them and names a competitor whose story is cleaner.
Third, most of the deciding evidence sits off your own website. Research in 2026 put roughly three-quarters of the citation surface off-page, which is why your directory accuracy and your reviews carry more weight than most on-site adjustments. Local search signals and AI search signals have effectively merged: the same inputs that help you in Google Maps help you across ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity.
Why reviews matter more than owners expect
Reviews are the part most businesses underestimate, and they feed both human and machine decisions.
Your reviews on Yelp, Facebook, Google, the Better Business Bureau and your industry platforms are not just social proof for shoppers. AI engines read them as evidence. They look for recent reviews that mention specific services and locations, a steady stream rather than a burst, and responses from the business. Review and social sources were a distinct slice of the citations in the Yext study, and separate research consistently lists Yelp, Google, and Facebook among the platforms AI engines cite most when recommending local businesses. Yelp alone shows up in roughly a third of AI local searches.
The human side is just as direct. In BrightLocal’s 2026 research, 47 percent of consumers said they would not use a business with fewer than 20 reviews, 31 percent said they would only use one rated 4.5 stars or higher, and 80 percent said they were more likely to use a business that responds to all of its reviews. Those numbers describe your prospects and, increasingly, the signals the engines weigh on their behalf.
So reviews are not a side project. Steady volume across Yelp, Facebook and the platforms that matter in your industry, with real responses, is one of the highest-leverage things you can do for both discovery and conversion.
What this means for your business
Put together, the picture is practical.
Claim and complete your Google Business Profile and your Bing Places listing, since those feed the two indexes behind most AI answers. Keep your listings accurate and identical across the major directories and the industry platforms your buyers actually use. Publish clear, well-structured pages on your own site that answer real questions. And build a steady flow of genuine reviews across several platforms, then respond to them.
None of this forces an engine to recommend you. What it does is make you easy to find, easy to verify, and hard to skip. That is how you earn a place in the answer.
If you want the broader framework behind this, start with our Answer Engine Optimization framework and our explanation of how search engines decide which sources get cited as experts.
Want help getting found in AI search?
Most businesses have never checked where they stand across ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity, or which competitors are getting named instead of them.
Our team audits your presence across the sources these engines pull from, fixes the gaps, and ties it into a broader search and answer-engine strategy. If you want to know where you are cited today and where you are invisible, contact us and we will map it out.
