How to Get Your Law Firm Cited by ChatGPT (and Gemini and Copilot)

Step 1: Let the right crawler in

OpenAI documents separate crawlers with independent settings. OAI-SearchBot "is used to surface websites in search results in ChatGPT's search features," and sites opted out of it won't be shown in ChatGPT search answers. GPTBot is the one tied to training generative AI models. Because each setting is independent, a firm can allow OAI-SearchBot and block GPTBot if it prefers. OpenAI says a robots.txt change can take about 24 hours to take effect.

Check your robots.txt and your host's bot-blocking settings. A firewall or CDN rule that blocks unknown bots can shut out search crawlers without anyone deciding to. If you're not sure, ask whoever runs your site to confirm in writing which user agents are allowed.

Step 2: Make sure Google and Bing can index you

Google states a page "must be indexed and eligible to be shown in Google Search with a snippet" to appear as a supporting link in AI Overviews or AI Mode, and adds that there are no additional requirements or special optimizations. It also says no special schema.org markup is needed. Standard search fundamentals apply: indexable pages, important content in text, and structured data that matches visible content.

For Microsoft Copilot, Bing Webmaster Tools has an AI Performance report, in public preview since February 2026, showing how often your pages are cited in Copilot and Bing's AI summaries. It doesn't show clicks. Verify your domain and look. Our Bing AI Performance guide covers the setup.

Step 3: Make your firm's basic facts identical everywhere

This step is our recommendation, based on what we see in AI visibility audits, not a rule any vendor publishes. If an assistant can't settle who the attorney is, what the firm is called, where it works and what it handles, it has little to say about you. So write four facts the same way on your website, your bar profile, your Google Business Profile and every directory listing you control:

• Firm name, exactly as registered
• Lead attorney names
• City and office addresses
• Practice areas in plain words

Step 4: Publish pages that answer the question a client asks

Assistants answer questions, so pages built around a specific question, with a direct answer in the first paragraph, are easier to quote than a generic practice-area page. Write for the situation a client is in. Add named attorneys with bios, since "who handles this" is a common question. Keep dates visible and update pages when the law changes.

Google says to keep important content in text, rather than only in images or video, and that applies here too.

Step 5: Test, wait, test again

Run the AI visibility test before you change anything, and again a few weeks after. Assistants vary between sessions, so judge by repeated runs. If your firm is invisible across assistants and you'd rather have the sources traced for you, the AI visibility diagnostic does that.

For where firms are getting cited on the Microsoft side, see why most firms are invisible inside Copilot. For the broader marketing picture, read AI for legal marketing and SEO.

Sources

• OpenAI, Overview of OpenAI crawlers (OAI-SearchBot, GPTBot and the 24-hour robots.txt note)
• Google Search Central, AI features and your website
• Bing Webmaster Blog, Introducing AI Performance in Bing Webmaster Tools (Feb 2026) (Public preview; citation counts, not clicks)

Operational information, not legal advice or a ranking guarantee. Vendor documentation was read October 21, 2026 and can change. Step 3 and Step 4 are our recommendations.