Guide

How to Get Your Practice Recommended by ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini

By Mark Gossman, Founder and Chief Strategist, Modern Harvester · Published September 30, 2026 · Updated September 30, 2026

Why this matters for your practice now

Your patients' questions haven't changed. Where they ask them has. More than 40 million people ask ChatGPT health questions every day (source). About 70% of those conversations happen outside clinic hours. And 45% of US consumers now use AI tools to find local businesses (source).

When a patient asks, "Who treats Hashimoto's with a root-cause approach near me?", the assistant names a few practices. If yours isn't one of them, that patient never finds you.

You can't pay your way in, either. ChatGPT ads aren't allowed near personal health topics, and ads don't change its answers (source). Earning your place is the only way in.

How do ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini choose which practices to name?

Each assistant runs a quick web search, reads a handful of pages and names the practices those pages agree on. Each one searches a different index, so a practice can show up in one and not another.

Healthcare leans on directories more than most fields. In one study of 6.8 million AI citations, listings drove 52.6% of healthcare citations (source). Sites like WebMD and Vitals carried much of that weight.

Step 1: Make sure AI tools can read your website

This is the most common problem we find, and the easiest to fix.

• Let the search bots in. Check your robots.txt file. It should allow OAI-SearchBot, ChatGPT-User, Claude-SearchBot, Claude-User, PerplexityBot, Googlebot and Bingbot. You can block the training bots (GPTBot and ClaudeBot) and still show up in search. They're separate (source).
• Check Cloudflare. If your site uses Cloudflare, look for the "Block AI bots" setting. It can be on by default for new sites, and it stops AI tools before they ever reach your pages (source).
• Make sure your words are in the page itself. The crawlers behind ChatGPT and Claude don't run JavaScript (source). If your site builds its text in the browser, they may see an almost empty page. We found this on our own site in 2026: tools that didn't run JavaScript saw our homepage's title on every page until we switched to server rendering. To test yours, view the page source and look for your headline.
• Keep key facts in plain text. Hours, services, locations and credentials shouldn't live only in images, PDFs or booking widgets.
• Add structured data. Schema markup labels your facts for machines. Use MedicalClinic or MedicalBusiness for the practice, Physician for each provider and FAQPage for your FAQs. On health articles, MedicalWebPage can show who reviewed the page and when.
• Skip the llms.txt shortcut. A study of 300,000 sites found no link between having an llms.txt file and being cited by AI (source). It doesn't hurt, but it won't fix anything.

Step 2: Answer the questions your patients actually ask

AI tools quote pages that answer a question directly. Vague pages get skipped.

Give every important topic its own page:

• Each condition you treat, and how you approach it
• Each provider, with credentials, training and specialties
• What a first visit looks like, how long it takes and how payment works (cash pay, membership or insurance)
• Where you are, and whether you offer telehealth

Write each page like this:

• Put the answer in the first two sentences.
• Use your patients' questions as headings.
• Keep sentences short and plain.
• Cite research for health claims, and never promise cures.
• Add "Medically reviewed by" with the clinician's name, credentials and the review date.

Step 3: Make every listing say the same thing

AI tools trust what several sources agree on. Your name, address, phone, providers, services and hours should match everywhere:

• Google Business Profile and Bing Places. ChatGPT's search leans on Bing, so Bing Places matters.
• Healthgrades, WebMD, Vitals and Zocdoc
• Your professional directories, like IFM's Find a Practitioner or the ACLM directory
• The NPI registry
• Your social profiles

One old address or a former provider still listed can be enough for AI to skip you or describe you wrong.

Step 4: Earn proof from patients and peers

• Reviews. Ask every patient the same way. Never pay for reviews or offer rewards for them. The FTC bans both (source). Don't ask only your happiest patients either. Google's review rules forbid it (source). When you reply, never confirm that someone is a patient. That protects you under HIPAA.
• Outside mentions. Local news, podcasts, association pages, speaking events and guest articles all count. When respected sources mention your practice, AI tools are more confident naming you.

How to check whether AI recommends your practice

1. Write 10 questions a patient might ask, using your city and specialty.
2. Ask each one in ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Gemini once a month.
3. Note whether you're named, who is named instead and which sources are cited.
4. Add "AI assistant (ChatGPT, Claude, etc.)" to the "How did you hear about us?" question on your intake form.
5. Set up Bing Webmaster Tools. Its AI Performance report (in preview) shows when your pages are cited in Microsoft Copilot and Bing's AI answers.

How long does it take?

Some fixes, like unblocking AI bots, can show up as soon as AI tools read your pages again. Building trust across directories, reviews and outside mentions takes longer. Measurable gains usually take 3 to 6 months (source). No one can promise a spot in AI answers, so be wary of anyone who does.

Common mistakes

• Blocking AI bots without knowing it
• Putting key information only in images, PDFs or JavaScript
• Leaving old addresses or former providers on directories
• Treating llms.txt as a fix
• Buying reviews or asking only happy patients
• Making cure claims or promising outcomes