Last Updated on November 2, 2026 by Kristal Espinoza

You’ve put the work into getting your brand mentioned in ChatGPT. Your content is optimized, your website is technically sound, and you’ve managed to earn some citations for the searches your customers use. Then you start testing the same prompts in Claude and discover something frustrating: your brand is nowhere to be found.

So what gives?

The good news is that you don’t necessarily need to start over. Many of the strategies that improve your visibility in ChatGPT also apply to Claude. The catch is that these platforms don’t all search the web the same way, pull from the same sources, or recommend the same businesses.

If you want your brand to show up in Claude’s answers, you need to understand what makes its search process different and where your existing strategy may be falling short.

How is Claude different from ChatGPT?

At their core, Claude and ChatGPT work in similar ways. Both are AI assistants trained on large amounts of information, and both can search the web when a question needs current or extra details.

When someone asks Claude for a product recommendation, a service provider, or a comparison, it may search the web before it answers. According to Anthropic’s own documentation, Claude can review multiple sources and include direct citations in its response.

ChatGPT does something similar. But just because they can answer the same question doesn’t mean they’ll land on the same answer, because the search systems behind them aren’t the same.

Neither company shares exactly how its search works, and it changes often. But there are clues. OpenAI partners with Bing, along with other sources it hasn’t named. Claude appears to lean on Brave Search. In March 2025, TechCrunch reported that Anthropic added Brave Search to its list of data partners, and a developer found that Claude and Brave returned the same citations for at least one search.

That means Claude may be pulling from a different set of websites than ChatGPT, and recommending different companies as a result.

So if your website performs well on Google, or regularly shows up in ChatGPT citations, that’s a great starting point. It just isn’t a guarantee that Claude will find or recommend you.

Where is Claude finding information about your business?

Think about the last time you researched a product or service you weren’t familiar with. Chances are, you didn’t just read the company’s website and immediately pull out your credit card. You probably checked reviews, looked at a few competitors, and maybe headed over to Reddit to see what real customers were saying.

Those same sources can come into play when Claude searches for information to answer a question.

A company may have a beautifully optimized website, but if its competitors are appearing in industry publications, comparison articles, business directories, and relevant online discussions, those competitors have more opportunities to be discovered.

This doesn’t mean Claude automatically considers a Reddit discussion more credible than your website, or that getting mentioned in a bunch of roundup articles guarantees you’ll be recommended. Anthropic hasn’t published a formula explaining exactly how it selects citations. What it does mean is that your website is only one potential source of information about your business, and depending exclusively on it can limit your reach.

How to improve your chances of getting sourced in Claude

There’s no secret formula for getting Claude to recommend your business. If someone promises they can guarantee a citation with a few website changes, I’d be skeptical. 

What you can do is make it easier for Claude to find accurate information about your business across the websites and conversations relevant to your industry so that there’s a higher chance that Claude will find it and recommend it. 

1. Make sure Claude can find your website

Before you worry about content strategies or third party mentions, there’s one technical issue worth checking: whether Claude can access your website.

Websites can restrict which automated systems are allowed to visit their content, and some businesses have blocked AI search tools by accident while trying to protect their sites from unwanted bots.

Anthropic runs three crawlers, and its documentation explains what each one does:

• ClaudeBot collects content that may be used to train Anthropic’s AI models.
• Claude-SearchBot visits websites to improve Claude’s search results. Blocking it stops Claude from indexing your content, which can make your site harder to find in Claude’s answers.
• Claude-User visits a page when someone asks Claude a question. Blocking it stops Claude from pulling your content in response to that person’s question.

If you don’t want your content used for AI training, you can block ClaudeBot and still allow the other two, so Claude can find and cite you in search.

You don’t need to be a developer to check this. Type your website address followed by /robots.txt into your browser and look for “Claude-SearchBot” or “Claude-User” with “Disallow” under them. It’s also good to check your website builder or security tools (like Cloudflare), since many now have a setting that blocks AI bots automatically.

If you find a block, the fix is usually simple. If you see those lines in your robots.txt file, most website builders and SEO plugins let you edit the file, so you can delete them or change “Disallow” to “Allow.” If your website builder or Cloudflare has an “AI bot blocking” switch turned on, turn it off, or look for an option that blocks AI training bots but still allows AI search. If you’re not sure where to find any of this, your website builder or hosting company’s support team can point you in the right direction.

2. Make your content useful, not just optimized

There’s a difference between writing content that describes your business and writing content that answers the questions someone has über your business. 

Let’s say you run a company that sells home security systems. Your website explains that your products offer reliable protection, innovative technology, and peace of mind. Great. But what happens when someone asks Claude whether they need a professionally monitored security system or if a self monitored setup is enough? If your website doesn’t address that question, there’s not much there for Claude to reference. A competitor that explains the differences, breaks down the costs, and discusses the advantages and limitations of each option provides considerably more useful information.

That’s the kind of gap worth looking for in your existing content. Not because Claude has a published preference for a particular article format, but because clear, specific information is more useful when an AI assistant is trying to answer a question.

The same applies to pricing, product features, customer concerns, and comparisons. You don’t need to write an encyclopedia to know about your industry, but you should be addressing the things potential customers would want to know.

3. Build your presence beyond your own website

If there’s one thing worth remembering about AI visibility, it’s that you don’t control every source Claude might encounter when someone asks about your business.

And frankly, you shouldn’t want to.

Independent reviews, industry publications, and real customer experiences offer perspectives that your company website can’t provide. They’re also places where your competitors may already have a significant presence.

Rather than try to get your company mentioned on every website you can find, start by researching where the conversations in your industry are already happening. Look at the publications reviewing your competitors, the questions being asked in relevant subreddits, and the comparison articles that repeatedly show up when you test Claude. You might discover that your competitors are receiving coverage in publications you’ve overlooked. Or that people are discussing a problem your product solves, but nobody seems to know your company exists. Those are useful gaps to identify because they give you a reason to develop relevant content, contribute legitimate expertise, or pursue editorial coverage. 

And yes, Reddit can absolutely be a part of that strategy. But participating in a community and pretending to be a satisfied customer are two very different things. If you’re going to engage, do it transparently and make sure you’re contributing something useful rather than manufacturing recommendations.

4. Answer the questions your customers are asking

A mistake a lot of businesses make with AI visibility is focusing exclusively on the most obvious recommendation prompts.

For example, an accounting firm might want to appear when someone asks Claude, “What are the best accounting firms for small businesses?” And that’s a valuable question, but it probably isn’t the only one their potential clients are asking. Someone else might ask, “Should I hire an accountant or handle my bookkeeping myself?” And another person might want to know what accounting services they need in place before expanding their business.

These questions represent different points in the customer’s decision making process, and they may lead Claude to different sources. So instead of creating content around one ideal recommendation prompt, think about the broader conversations happening in your industry:

• What problems are customers trying to solve? 
• What are they confused about? 
• What information do they need before making a purchase or signing up for services?

Use those questions to plan your website content and to find conversations where your business can be helpful.

If you aren’t sure where to start, look at customer support questions, industry forums, Reddit discussions, and the types of searches bringing people to your website. The goal is to be a helpful source throughout the research process, not just show up when someone asks for a list of recommended companies.

5. Pay attention to where your competitors are showing up

Here’s something worth doing before publishing another ten blog posts: ask Claude questions about your industry and look at the sources it uses.

And not just which competitors it recommends, but where it’s getting the information.

Is Claude repeatedly citing a particular industry publication? Are competitors appearing in comparison articles you’ve never considered? Do certain directories or review websites keep showing up? Those patterns can tell you quite a bit about where your brand might be missing.

For example, if Claude regularly cites an industry-specific website when discussing products like yours, that’s a publication worth investigating. If your competitors are being discussed in relevant Reddit communities but your company is absent, that might point to another gap. This doesn’t mean you should immediately try to get your business mentioned everywhere a competitor appears. Some sources may not be relevant to your audience, and not every mention is worth pursuing.

Instead, look for credible opportunities to contribute useful information, earn legitimate coverage, and expand your presence in the places customers already use for research. It’s a more targeted approach than assuming more content automatically equals more AI visibility.

6. Track your Claude visibility separately

If you’ve been monitoring ChatGPT recommendations, you’re already familiar with how useful it can be to see where your brand appears and which sources are being cited.

Now you need to do the same thing for Claude.

Start by taking a handful of relevant customer questions and asking them on both platforms. Compare the recommendations, citations, and websites each platform references. You may find that both platforms recommend similar companies but cite completely different articles. Or you might discover that Claude regularly recommends competitors that barely appear in your ChatGPT results.

When you spot a difference, look at what Claude is citing. That’s often where your next opportunity is.

Tools like Peec AI can help businesses monitor visibility across AI platforms, but you can also start with manual testing. The important thing is to evaluate patterns rather than relying on a single response. AI generated answers can change from one search to another. Getting mentioned once is encouraging, but consistently appearing across relevant questions is a much better indication of how visible your brand has become.

And remember, there’s a big difference between being mentioned and being cited. Claude might recommend your company without linking to your website, or it might cite a third party article that talks about your brand. A mention gets your name in front of people, but a citation gives them a link to click. If Claude keeps citing someone else’s article about you, check that the article is accurate and up to date, since that’s what people will read before they ever reach your site.

Do you need an agency to improve Claude visibility?

Not necessarily.

If your business already has a strong SEO strategy, an active content program, and established relationships with relevant publications, you may be able to expand those efforts internally. The challenge is coordinating everything while keeping track of how different AI platforms are using your content.

That’s where specialized AI visibility agencies can help.

Agencies like ScaleVisible take a more comprehensive approach to AI visibility, looking beyond what’s happening on your website to understand where your brand is showing up across the web. That includes analyzing which sources Claude and other AI platforms are citing, identifying where competitors are being mentioned, and finding opportunities to build visibility through editorial coverage, relevant online communities, and content that answers the questions customers are really asking.

The benefit of this approach isn’t that an agency has special access to Claude. They won’t. The benefit is having a coordinated strategy that considers the different places AI platforms may encounter your brand, rather than treating your website as the only source that matters. For some companies, that means working with a specialized agency. For others, an in house team supported by SEO, PR, and AI visibility tracking tools may be enough.

Either way, the focus should be on improving your overall visibility, not just producing more content and hoping something sticks.

How do you know if your Claude strategy is working?

This is where businesses need to be careful about what they’re measuring. A single Claude citation doesn’t necessarily mean your strategy is successful, just as missing from one recommendation doesn’t mean your business is invisible.

Start with a consistent group of questions that reflect what potential customers might be asking. Track how often your business appears, whether it’s recommended, and which sources Claude cites. Over time, you’ll want to see whether your company is becoming more visible across relevant searches, rather than just appearing for one carefully worded prompt.

You should also monitor which third party sources are associated with your brand. If a publication starts featuring your company and later appears in Claude’s citations, write it down. It doesn’t automatically prove the publication caused the citation, but it gives you something concrete to evaluate.

This is ultimately what separates a useful AI visibility strategy from chasing individual mentions: you’re looking for sustained improvements that connect to the way customers research your industry.

The bottom line: don’t abandon your ChatGPT strategy, expand it

If you’ve already been working to improve your visibility in ChatGPT, you don’t need to throw everything out and start over because Claude produces different results.

The fundamentals are still important. You need useful content, a website AI search systems can access, accurate information about your business shared, and a credible presence across the web. What changes is how you measure your success and where you look for opportunities.

Claude may find different sources than ChatGPT, and those differences can reveal gaps in your existing strategy. Maybe your website content needs to be clearer. Maybe your competitors have a stronger presence in industry publications. Or maybe your company simply isn’t appearing in the conversations your customers are having before they make a purchase.

Whatever the issue, the first step is finding out where you’re missing. Because the goal isn’t to optimize for one AI assistant and call it a day. It’s to make sure your business is discoverable, credible, and relevant wherever your customers are looking for answers.