How to Get Recommended by ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews (Malaysia & Singapore, 2026)

On 18 September 2026 we ran two searches on Google with the country set to Malaysia, logged out. For a narrow search naming a partner programme we belong to, the AI Overview at the top named two companies working here, and one of them was us. For a broad search for our service category, the AI Overview named six companies. We were not one of them.

Same website, same day, two different answers.

That gap is what this guide is about: how to get recommended by ChatGPT and Google's AI Overviews when nobody can make an AI answer choose you. OpenAI says so in four words: "Placement is not guaranteed." What you can do is make your business easy to name. Six steps follow, and where a step is our advice rather than the platforms' guidance, we say so.

On 23 September we repeated the test with the country set to Singapore. For the same narrow partner-programme search, the AI Overview listed four providers and put us first, and our Singapore page ranked second. For the broad category search, it named other firms, and we were not in the first nine results. Google blocked logged-out searches that day, so we used a signed-in browser that Google marked "Results are not personalised", from Shah Alam. A searcher in Singapore may see something different.

What Google and OpenAI say you do not need

Google says there are "no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, nor other special optimizations necessary" (AI features and your website). AI Mode is Google's chat-style search. The page must still be indexed and able to show a snippet, the short preview under a result. Your site must also stay included in a Search Console setting covered in Step 1.

You do not need llms.txt, a plain-text summary file some sites publish for AI tools; Google Search ignores it. Nor do you need special schema.org code, the tags that label facts on a page. Our post on AI SEO vs traditional SEO explains why.

For service businesses, OpenAI is no more specific. Any public website can appear in ChatGPT search, ranked on "multiple factors". In the help pages we checked, the only factors it lists are for merchants selling physical products.

Where the platforms have ruled on payment, it buys nothing. Ads "do not influence ChatGPT's answers", and for local results, "There's no way to request or pay for a better local ranking on Google."

Step 1: Let the crawlers in

AI answers read your site through crawlers, automated visitors that fetch pages. A file at yourdomain.com/robots.txt tells each crawler what it may read. Check three first:

• Googlebot. Google's checklist is that Googlebot "isn't blocked, the page works", and the page has indexable content, which "covers you for search generally, including AI formats."
• OAI-SearchBot, OpenAI's search crawler. Block it and your site "will not be shown in ChatGPT search answers". It is separate from GPTBot, OpenAI's training crawler, so you can refuse training and still allow search.
• Bingbot. Microsoft says Bing powers AI tools "like ChatGPT"; OpenAI says only that ChatGPT search "sometimes partners with other search providers". Our advice is to allow Bingbot either way.

How to check. Open your robots.txt in a browser. A Disallow: / line under a crawler's name shuts that crawler out of the whole site. Google's crawlers follow only the most specific section that names them and ignore the rest, including User-agent: *, so read each crawler's own section first.

Then ask your hosting or CDN provider to confirm it lets these crawlers through, a step Google and OpenAI both list.

Two Google settings. Since 31 August 2026, Search Console, Google's free dashboard for site owners, has had a "Search generative AI" setting that is on by default. Keep it on; a site must be included to be eligible for AI Overviews and AI Mode.

Leave Google-Extended allowed if you want Gemini to be able to draw on your pages. Blocking this robots.txt token "does not impact a site's inclusion in Google Search", but Gemini will not use opted-out content for grounding, meaning supporting its answers.

Step 2: Put your service and your town in plain words

State what you do and where in the first lines of each service page. This is our advice, not a published rule. OpenAI says ChatGPT "may use an approximate location based on your IP address" for local results and may rewrite a question into a search like "top restaurants San Francisco." A page that names the service and the town is the closer match for such a search.

Compare these opening lines:

• Office renovation for companies in Petaling Jaya and Shah Alam.
• Aircon servicing for homes and offices in Tampines.
• Your space, reimagined by experts.

Only the first two tell a reader, human or machine, what to repeat.

We have seen this echoed once. When the Singapore AI Overview described us on 23 September, its description matched the two facts our Singapore Claude partner page states plainly: our Suntec Tower One address and that we scope work in SGD. A single match like this shows correlation only.

Serve both countries? Give each its own page, and keep these facts in visible text: Microsoft warns against hiding answers "in tabs or expandable menus".

Step 3: Use the same name and details everywhere

Represent your business on your Google Business Profile the way it is "consistently represented and recognized in the real world". Fill in every field. Complete, accurate profiles are more likely to show in local results, and a profile "can help" when AI answers include local businesses.

Then set up Bing Places, Microsoft's free listing, which can import your Google one. Microsoft says it helps keep your details "current and eligible for inclusion in AI-generated responses" in its own AI answers.

ChatGPT is the unknown: OpenAI says local results may come from "trusted third-party providers" and does not name them. So make every listing match.

In Malaysia, start from your registered name. If your business is incorporated as a company, the Companies Act 2016 requires your registered name and registration number on your website. Use exactly that name everywhere (a starting point, not legal advice).

Reviews. More reviews and higher ratings can help your Google local ranking. Ask every customer, not only the happy ones, with a review link or QR code. Offering discounts or freebies for reviews, or asking "selectively" for positive ones, breaks Google's rules.

Singapore's e-commerce guidelines known as TR 76, updated in September 2025, address fake reviews directly. We found no Malaysian rule that names reviews, though the Consumer Protection Act 1999 bans false or misleading claims of endorsement.

Step 4: Earn mentions on other sites

Google says its AI features "can show what's being said about products and services across the web, including in blogs, videos, and forum discussions." It also warns that seeking inauthentic mentions "isn't as helpful as it might seem" (Google's AI optimisation guide).

Our 18 September searches, run logged out with the country set to Malaysia, are consistent with this but prove nothing. The ordinary results for the broad category search were led by government pages and "top 10" directory lists. The AI Overview for one company's name cited an agency directory.

Where to earn mentions is our advice, and the legitimate routes are slow:

• your trade association's member directory
• local business press and industry publications
• supplier, partner and client pages describing work you did
• review sites your customers already use

Skip paid mentions nobody would otherwise write.

Step 5: Answer the questions customers actually ask

Google says people using its AI search ask "longer and more specific questions", plus follow-ups. One example from our own Search Console data: between 23 June and 21 September 2026 we averaged position 3.3 for an 11-word question asking which providers in Malaysia work without long-term contracts, shown 38 times.

List the questions your sales team hears each week and answer each on its page. In our experience the usual ones are price in RM or SGD, areas covered, contract length and turnaround.

Google calls generic pages like "7 Tips for First-Time Homebuyers" commodity content that "typically adds little unique insight". And do not mass-produce pages: Google's spam policy treats "using generative AI tools or other similar tools to generate many pages without adding value for users" as scaled content abuse.

Step 6: Check where you stand each month

Our routine:

1. Pick 10 to 20 questions your customers ask.
2. Each month, ask ChatGPT and Gemini, then search Google, in a private window.
3. Write down who is named and which sources are cited.
4. Repeat with the country set to each market you serve. The answer can change: on 23 September, in the same signed-in, non-personalised browser from Shah Alam, Google's AI Overview for the broad category search named us with the country set to Singapore and did not with it set to Malaysia.

Then add what the platforms report:

• Search Console: AI Overview and AI Mode visits appear in the Performance report under "Web". Its generative AI report, live since 31 August 2026, counts impressions but not clicks.
• Bing Webmaster Tools, Microsoft's counterpart: its AI Performance report, launched as a public preview in February 2026, shows how often Copilot and Bing's AI summaries cite your pages.
• Google Analytics: ChatGPT tags its links utm_source=chatgpt.com, so you can follow those visits through to an enquiry.

Google suggests judging results on conversions such as sales and signups as well as clicks. For a service business, that usually means enquiries.

Malaysia and Singapore: what to do differently

Ask in your customers' languages. As of September 2026, Google lists AI Overviews and AI Mode in both countries, with Malay and Chinese among the supported languages. In Singapore's 2020 census, Mandarin was the main home language for 29.9% of residents aged five and over, so an English-only check can miss a lot of homes.

Weight your check by market. OpenAI's own country data ranks Singapore first of 147 countries for ChatGPT messages per head in the second quarter of 2026, and Malaysia 59th. If your customers are mainly in Singapore, check ChatGPT first. If they are mainly in Malaysia, give Google's AI Overviews at least equal weight.

In Singapore, apply before you pay. Only pre-approved packages qualify for the Productivity Solutions Grant, which covers up to 50% of eligible costs. On 23 September 2026 its directory listed 57 "Digital Marketing Packages", some including SEO. We make no claim that our own service qualifies.

In Malaysia, do not budget on a grant yet. Bank Simpanan Nasional's (BSN) MADANI digital grant covered digital marketing under Budget 2025, capped at RM5,000. We could not confirm a 2026 round.

Two limits to plan around

Even a page that does everything above may not appear. Google says AI Overviews "often don't trigger", and OpenAI warns that "Search results and citations can be incomplete, outdated, or incorrect." So check what the answers say about you, as well as whether they name you. And be wary of anyone selling guaranteed citations: neither platform guarantees placement, even for a page that meets every requirement.

Start today: open your robots.txt, then ask ChatGPT the question your best customer asked last month, in a private window, and note who it names. That is your baseline.

Our AI SEO service

Our AI SEO service does this work from RM899 a month, month to month; Essential adds a one-time RM899 onboarding fee for sites we did not build. Every plan includes monthly AI visibility tracking: we put 10 to 50 of your customers' questions to the major AI assistants and record who is named. It serves Singapore businesses as well as Malaysian ones. We do not guarantee a mention. For the wider market, see our SEO price guide for Malaysia, and how our AI SEO agent works.

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