ChatGPT Just Revealed How It Chooses Local Businesses (2027 Strategy)

ChatGPT just changed how it recommends local service businesses. And if you think, oh, just goes to Reddit, find some information, goes to Google Business Profiles, and then puts it in ChatGPT, not anymore. I've been doing local SEO for home service businesses since 2018, and this is by far the biggest change in local AI search since ChatGPT was launched. In this video, I'll break down exactly what changed, why it matters, and then 3 steps that you need to do right now to prepare your business to be shown in ChatGPT when people search for local businesses. First, let's talk about how this used to look. ChatGPT recommendations would just pull from Reddit. This was very widely known that you just put a bunch of stuff on Reddit, ChatGPT is going to surface your stuff and it's going to recommend your business. And that's how it used to be. Or ChatGPT would only look at your Google Business Profile, go to Google, scrape the first page, and then say, hey, here's the companies that we would recommend. So why would I even go to ChatGPT if I could just go to Google? Both were true until last week when Yelp and OpenAI officially partnered. So what does that mean? Here's an exclusive Yelp deal pushes local reviews into ChatGPT July 23rd, 2026. So this just came out. Basically, Yelp and ChatGPT have partnered so that Yelp is licensing reviews, photos, and other business information to OpenAI, giving ChatGPT a new source of real-time local recommendation data. Now, it even goes further than this, which is that it goes through and Yelp's request to quote feature will also be added soon, allowing ChatGPT users to contact local service providers for quotes directly through the large language model. This is the biggest shift, right? The old way of doing things, Reddit, Google Business Profile, going into ChatGPT is gone. I imagine that ChatGPT did this because it doesn't want to use Google AI mode, Google Business Profile. It needs a second platform to be able to pull information from. So the Yelp and AI partnership. Yelp's licensing reviews, photos, and businesses. Yelp branding and links now appear inside ChatGPT. Request a quote is coming. You can contact providers right there. And Yelp already feeds Yahoo and Apple Maps this information. Now you probably hear this and you say, I hate Yelp. Oh my gosh, what's wrong with Yelp? I used to feel the exact same way. So I used to be at a home service business, $3 million. We scaled it to $5 million and sold. And I hated Yelp. The reason is, is because my local guy would call me all the time and try to get me to spend more money. And the worst thing is there was no attribution. So like the sales pressure, the unclear attribution, frustrating reporting, I get it. I'm going to give you some frameworks on how to help this in this video. But there's plenty of business owners that have felt burned by Yelp. They hide your reviews, they tell you to spend money, they don't give you the leads, and you got to message these people. All those things I get. And I want you to take that feeling and set it aside real quick because you're going to want to listen to what you have to do. Because if you want ChatGPT, and they're partnering with Yelp. Like, this is a big deal. But personal feelings don't change where AI gets its data, and ChatGPT more importantly is pulling this information because Yelp now is, is direct input into ChatGPT. So why does this matter? Searchers are asking ChatGPT instead of Google. And if you look at this report right here, this report shows us that Google versus ChatGPT market share for Q2 2026. Google search monthly active users 5.3 billion globally. But ChatGPT has a billion users globally, and this is only growing. The more that people do not like Google, the more people like ChatGPT or Claude or these other platforms. ChatGPT is the second search engine, specifically when we talk about local search, and this is why it's so important. So searchers are asking ChatGPT, not Google, why should I hire for— who should I hire for roof replacement? Or why is this happening over here? Or what company should I be doing? Or they're asking questions and then looking for businesses. ChatGPT, over a billion users. Google I/O Mode, over a billion users. Both represent massive opportunity for local businesses, and it's two separate strategies. Two separate strategies. This is why it's most important. The Google strategy is different. I made a video about that. This one is ChatGPT and why this is so important. So here's what you need to do. Step 1, build your Yelp portfolio, and I'm going to go through this, then I'm going to show you an example of a Yelp portfolio that's built out. So add project portfolios to your profile. What does this mean? If we go to a profile, this one of our clients, they generate 5 to 10x return on ad spend from their Yelp account every single month. If you look at their profile here, they have some updates, but more importantly, they have these portfolios built out. And now this is a sponsored feature, but when we talk about running ads on Yelp, you don't have to necessarily run ads. You can pay for upgrades to your portfolio or to your profile, which allows you to get portfolios. And if you notice these portfolios, have actual jobs that they've done, actual before and after pictures and stories in here, which allow them to say, oh, they do air conditioning repair. This is providing, just like your Google Business Profile, it's providing your Yelp profile information. Unfortunately, this is a paid feature that you would have to pay for on Yelp in order to do this. So add projects to your portfolio, upload before and after pictures. So let's go here, and you can upload before and after pictures without even paying any money. But if you go to photos and videos, you can add before and after pictures in here, and you can You see they have 97 photos. Add all your photos in here. Before and after is very important. Then what you want to do is describe the work you perform. So in your portfolios, make sure you explain the work. On your pictures, explain the work you perform. The more information that you can give Yelp, the more information that it can service on ChatGPT and show that you are the expert. Obviously, more context gives ChatGPT more to work with. Now, step 2, and this one is the hardest part, is get more Yelp reviews. And I'm going to explain why it's the hardest part. The first thing is that Yelp actually says that you cannot solicit Yelp reviews. When you talk about Google, Google says, "Hey, you know, you could scan this QR code, leave us a review," something like that, or people just naturally go to Google to leave reviews. Yelp says, "Do not do that." It's actually in their bylaws that you cannot solicit reviews. So how do you get more Yelp reviews? And this is where people feel jaded or burned, and listen, don't shoot the messenger. I'm just sharing with you how to do this and why we're encouraging our clients to do these things. So number 1, people who use Yelp are the ones who leave Yelp reviews. You can't just think that everyone out there is going to randomly leave you Yelp reviews if they don't actually use Yelp as a platform. So what does this mean? If people who use Yelp are the ones who leave Yelp reviews, then the fastest way to get more Yelp reviews is to go to the Yelp users, and that would be to run Yelp ads. Because when you run Yelp ads, you get Yelp users, and those Yelp users leave Yelp reviews. I know, there's a big web going on here, But at the end of the day, if you want more Yelp reviews so that ChatGPT shows you because you have the most reviews and it surfaces your reviews, then the quickest way to get more reviews is to find more Yelp users. And the quickest way to get Yelp users is to run Yelp ads. Now, we have clients that have got 300, 400, 500+ 5-star review profiles this way by running ads. And I'm not saying just run ads and, you know, blind eye to it because I'm going to walk you through actually how to make sure that you're making money from these ads.. But just like the example that I showed you with Jump, they're making 5 to 10x return on the ad spend that they're spending because they actually have a playbook. And I'll walk you through that in a little bit. But more reviews means more weight in ChatGPT AI recommendations. I think we can all agree on that. Now, before I talk about the ads and all this stuff, let's talk about step 3, which is optimize the entire profile. So complete every section, whether you're going to sponsor, run ads or not. You need to have a Yelp profile that's verified, and you need to make sure that that verified Yelp profile is completely filled out, as much information as you can for free. So for example, if we go here, there's a section most people miss, which is about the business. Like, you can write information about the business. This is a husband and wife team. Like, this business that I'm showing you right here is not some elaborate, uh, you know, 100-person team. It's a husband and wife team that's out here doing all the right stuff to make sure that they're being shown in Yelp, and then ultimately they're going to be on ChatGPT. So complete every section possible. Keep your business information current. So have some type of checking that happens every month or every 2 months, like your name, address, and phone number. Update some information on there. Treat it just like your Google Business Profile, like you would, like keep things updated. Upload high-quality photos and detailed service descriptions. As I mentioned, husband and wife team, but look, they hired a photographer, got some professional pictures, got their family in there. Like looking at this, it feels like a very high-quality professional team. That's what you want. Make sure you treat Yelp the way you would always treat a Google Business Profile. Google Business Profile is like the Holy Grail, right? We want reviews, we want response reviews, we want pictures, we want all the stuff. Yelp is the exact same way, and whether you pay or not, you want to make sure that you do that. Now, I want to make this very clear. I have been on both sides of this equation, and I can share from both sides. The DIY side of things, when you run Yelp ads or you try to do Yelp ads, I fell into this trap, which is I was spending $2,500, $3,000 a month, and I had no visibility., and the guy kept calling me from a Chicago phone number saying, hey, spend more, spend more, spend more. And I'm like, I can't prove this out. And the reason is because the attribution is hard on Yelp. You can't really see the leads that come through. You can't really see the messages. And now they're doing a really good job of trying to get this cleaned up, right? They partnered with Hatch. They're trying to release more information, but for a DIY person to run Yelp ads, it's very, very difficult unless you just blind faith that this is actually working. So let me just walk you through this DIY versus agency partner. What I didn't know at the time when I was DIYing it was that they actually have a, a marketing program that they rolled out where they partner with marketing companies like myself, where they have a Yelp person who— we have a rep, his name's Peter, and he helps us with all of our clients. Then the business owner never gets communicated to by Yelp, those annoying calls, all the stuff. And then we have a person that we can put on a call with us and say, hey, this is not working or this is working, and they're directly working on all of our Yelp accounts for our clients. And we're forcing them to make a return on ad spend and figure out what's going on. So when you're DIYing it, you're managing your own campaigns, you're trying to track your own return on ad spend, you're trying to do profile optimization, and it's literally like a part of your job if you're DIYing it. If you have an agency partner, they should be doing all those things. They should be managing your campaigns, they should be fighting for return on ad spend, they should be optimizing your profile. The other thing is when you're DIYing it, you have a Yelp person who hopefully is helping you. When you work with a marketing partner, Yelp gives us a rep that has access to a bunch more reports. They can hop on reports, they can look at competitor analysis, they have a much more wide range of information. Also, like, we work with home service businesses, they work with other home service businesses. It's not just random, you know, law firm type things. And then the partner can hold you accountable, we can hold them accountable for performance, make sure that happens. We have a lot more clear reporting. All right, before I go through the old way versus the new way, if you own a home service business doing between $1 million and $10 million and you want a marketing partner that actually is on the cutting edge of what's going on with AI search and helping prepare their home service businesses for success in the future, I'll put a link down below. I'd love the opportunity to talk with you, at least see if we might be able to help you grow. All right, so the old way of doing things, optimize only your Google Business Profile. The new way we just outlined is don't just focus on your Google Business Profile only, You also need to have Yelp. And the reason is because Google Business Profile is great for Google. Yelp's good for ChatGPT. Both of those have over a billion users. We want to make sure that we're separate, that we're ready to go for both places. Ignore or dismiss Yelp reviews altogether. Clearly, you understand why Yelp reviews are important. Build out portfolios, even if you don't want to run ads. Try to fill out as much as you can on that profile. Local search means Google, period. We used to say, "Hey, just be on Google. That's where everyone's at." Not so much anymore. A billion people on ChatGPT. Local search means Google AI mode, ChatGPT. Manage Yelp alone and hope it works. The new way is work with a partner agency for accountability, return on ad spend reporting, and make sure that you have Yelp set up so that way it shows on ChatGPT and you can be sure you can be shown. All right, let's go through the summary checklist of exactly what you need to do just to lay it out. Build out your Yelp portfolio with photos, projects, stories. Invest in Yelp ads to attract users who will leave reviews if you want to. Optimize every section of your Yelp profile. Track return on ad spend closely. Don't just spend blindly. Please don't do that. Track it. Work with a company that's going to help you track it. If you're going to spend money on ads, consider a Yelp marketing partner for accountability and prepare now. AI-powered local search is already here. Google AI mode, ChatGPT. Work with a company that actually knows what they're doing. Again, if you want a company that's— you're between $1 million, $10 million in home service business, that's exactly what my business does. I'd love the opportunity to talk to you. I'll put a link down below. If not, all good. Be sure to hit like and subscribe, and I'll see you in the next video.