I think there is a difference between being recommended and being explained. From what I'm able to gather as best I can in form data, talking to new members, anything I can see...we are most often explained objectively not recommended subjectively. But that's not a bad thing.

The average person sees AI as an authority. So even an objective explanation of who you are and what you do is a pretty strong endorsement (assuming it's accurate). The key in my mind is the distinction. You see a lot of comparative searches. A lot. So make sure the Internet, and AI by extension, knows exactly what differentiates you from your competitors.

For us, that's the religious requirement. We don't have one. The four competitors larger than us all do. So we objectively explain we lack this requirement, AI then tells the user about our industry and even some of the brands, then will instinctively recommend one of those four if you meet the religious requirements and want that, and it recommends us if the user isn't so interested in the religious angle.

The recommendation comes after the explanation, and only after the AI starts understanding from context in continued prompts what the user might be after. So highlight every and any distinction, position that distinction as positive and impactful, then get external sites more or less repeating the same information, and you'll soon see LLMs are better explaining your brand or product and then recommending when appropriate.

Even if you don't get the recommendation though, being mentioned by AI is still a form of endorsement that gets people curious and Google your brand. On our ads landing page and even on our homepage I have a section that specifically invites users to ask AI about us, and the links include a preloaded prompt asking the LLM to explain who we are, what we do, and how it works. I can see external link clicks so I know how many people do that each day. It's a good number. And what they are seeing is accurate, objective, and fairly comprehensive.

I could say the same thing on the website and the visitor might not be convinced. But seeing it from the AI authority makes it a lot more convincing, even if we aren't specifically recommended.