Measuring which businesses AI systems recommend, across models, markets, and time.
Totals as of . Audit and business totals are cumulative research counts, rounded down to the nearest hundred, and refresh hourly. Not every measured business appears in a published market. Latest research report: Vol 3, data current as of September 14, 2026.
Charleston, July 7 and September 10, 2026. Same business cohort, same 43 categories, same buyer questions. How many cohort businesses did each AI model recommend?
Count of distinct cohort businesses each model selected in a cold buyer query. Bars share one scale.
Cohort businesses selected rose from 89 to 130 of 687. 64 were selected both times, 25 dropped out, and 66 were new. Perplexity held at 77.
The July run had no live web retrieval on ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini. The September run had live retrieval on all four. Perplexity retrieved in both, and it is the one model that did not move.
This is not a trend, and it does not show cause. Retrieval, time, and model updates changed together. In the report’s controlled same-day test, selection fell slightly: Charleston 151 to 147.
Each model gets cold, single-turn buyer questions for a city and category. A model counts as recommending a business when it places the business in its top 3 in at least 2 of 3 phrasings.
ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity, each queried independently. Census batches have recorded model versions since late July 2026, and panel changes are dated.
Recommendations move. In Vol 2, 33 of the 89 Charleston businesses selected in early July were not selected three weeks later. One reading is a snapshot, not a finding.
Published wave comparisons use the same business cohort and the same categories. Added categories are reported separately, not counted as change.
Method versions, model panel changes, and data corrections are dated on the methodology page. Corrections stay published.
ARO Index is published by TaG Makes LLC, which also offers paid services. No client, partner, or data customer can pay to change a public ranking. Every score runs through the same audit process.
Observed AI recommendations under documented research conditions.
Actual customer conversions, all possible AI responses, guaranteed future recommendations, or direct influence over model training.
Find a business’s ARO Score and rank in its published market.
See which businesses AI recommends in a city, by industry.
Published comparisons across models and measurement waves.
Tell us the city and industry. We will email you when it is published.
Independent AI recommendation data for market intelligence, competitive research, and platform integrations.
Access is reviewed by use case. Commercial access does not influence public research findings or rankings.
Researchers, journalists, and educators may cite published findings with attribution. All research and notes
The ARO Index is public research that measures which local businesses ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity recommend, by city and industry. It reports what the models return, not what businesses advertise.
Each model is queried independently with cold, single-turn buyer-intent prompts for a city and category. A model counts as recommending a business when it places the business in its top 3, confirmed by a 2 of 3 majority across three phrasings of the query. Each business shows how many of the 4 models recommend it, for example 3 of 4.
ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity. Each model is queried independently, so a business can be recommended by 1, 2, 3, or all 4 of them.
Homepage totals show an as-of date and refresh hourly. Each market and category page shows when its rankings were last refreshed. Methodology changes and model panel changes are logged on the methodology page.
No. Businesses cannot pay to change their ARO Index ranking. Every score is re-measured through the same audit process.
Run the free ARO audit at aroindex.com/audit. It checks whether each of the 4 models recommends the business and which businesses it recommends instead.
ARO Index is researched and published by Therese Grittner, founder of TaG Makes LLC, Charleston, SC. LinkedIn