Primary source · Data collected 2026-07-02
Who decides which local businesses AI recommends?
We asked ChatGPT and Perplexity “Who is the best [industry] in [city], Florida?” 100 times each, across 10 industries and 10 Central Florida cities, with live web search on. Perplexity cited Yelp in 91 of 100 answers. ChatGPT’s top source was a directory most business owners have never heard of. And the engines named specific businesses in 94 to 100 percent of answers. Someone is winning every one of these queries today.
What did we measure?
One prompt template, “Who is the best {industry} in {city}, Florida?”, run for every combination of 10 industries (roofing, HVAC, plumbing, personal injury law, dental, chiropractic, real estate, landscaping, pest control, accounting) and 10 cities (DeLand, Daytona Beach, Deltona, Ormond Beach, Port Orange, New Smyrna Beach, Sanford, Lake Mary, Orlando, Winter Park). Both engines ran with live web search: ChatGPT on gpt-5.3-chat-latest, Perplexity on sonar. Single run, collected 2026-07-02. We recorded every source URL each answer cited: 1,378 domain-citations across 581 unique domains in 200 answers.
What sources does Perplexity cite for local recommendations?
Perplexity runs on Yelp. It cited yelp.com in 91 of 100 answers and facebook.com in 65, averaging 9.3 cited sources per answer across 421 unique domains. If your Yelp profile is thin, unclaimed, or badly reviewed, you are close to invisible in Perplexity’s local recommendations, no matter how strong your website is.
| # | Cited domain | Answers citing it (of 100) | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | yelp.com | 91 | Directory |
| 2 | facebook.com | 65 | Social profiles |
| 3 | thumbtack.com | 24 | Lead-gen marketplace |
| 4 | bbb.org | 23 | Directory |
| 5 | angi.com | 23 | Lead-gen marketplace |
| 6 | healthgrades.com | 11 | Directory (medical) |
| 7 | reddit.com | 10 | Community |
| 8 | attorneys.superlawyers.com | 10 | Directory (legal) |
| 9 | justia.com | 10 | Directory (legal) |
| 10 | zillow.com | 10 | Directory |
What sources does ChatGPT cite for local recommendations?
ChatGPT’s local kingmaker is a site most owners have never heard of: bestprosintown.com appeared in 59 of 100 answers, nearly four times its next source. ChatGPT cites more sparingly than Perplexity (4.5 sources per answer, 232 unique domains), which concentrates power: getting into the few surfaces it trusts moves you into a majority of its answers.
| # | Cited domain | Answers citing it (of 100) | What it is |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | bestprosintown.com | 59 | Directory |
| 2 | reviews.birdeye.com | 16 | Review platform |
| 3 | experience.com | 14 | Review platform |
| 4 | expertise.com | 10 | Directory |
| 5 | homeadvisor.com | 10 | Lead-gen marketplace |
| 6 | lawnstarter.com | 8 | Marketplace |
| 7 | realtor.com | 7 | Directory |
| 8 | pinnacleroofinggroup.com | 5 | Local business (own pages) |
| 9 | mapquest.com | 5 | Directory |
| 10 | zillow.com | 5 | Directory |
How much of the answer layer do middlemen own?
Roughly one citation in three points to a named directory, review platform, or lead-gen marketplace (35% for ChatGPT, 33% for Perplexity). Counting multi-city lead-gen and franchise pages, over half of all citations point somewhere other than a single-location business’s own site (54% and 50%). To be fair to the engines: only 11 of 100 ChatGPT answers and 0 of 100 Perplexity answers cited no local business site at all. The engines do read business websites. But the gatekeepers, 72 domains cited by both engines, decide which ones.
The most interesting business in the dataset
One single-location Central Florida company cracked the gatekeeper layer from the inside. Pinnacle Roofing Group, a local roofer, was cited by BOTH engines in 5 of the 10 roofing cities, not for its homepage, but for its own “best roofing companies in [city]” comparison pages. Instead of waiting for a directory to rank it, it published the comparison content the engines wanted to cite and became its own gatekeeper. That is the single most repeatable play in this dataset, and it is available to any local business willing to publish honest comparison content in its service area.
What should a Central Florida business do with this?
Three moves, in order. First, claim and build out the gatekeeper profiles for your vertical: Yelp and Facebook matter for everyone on Perplexity; medical practices need Healthgrades, attorneys need Justia and Super Lawyers, home services need Angi and Thumbtack. Second, publish the comparison content yourself, the Pinnacle play, honestly naming competitors in your cities. Third, measure instead of guessing: the free EVOIX AI Readiness Audit queries the engines about your business directly, and our answer engine optimization service runs this whole program, including the Volusia County market this dataset covers.
FAQ
Which sources does Perplexity cite most for local business recommendations?
In this study, Perplexity cited Yelp in 91 of 100 local 'best provider' answers and Facebook in 65 of 100, followed by Thumbtack (24), the BBB (23), and Angi (23). A Central Florida business that is weak on Yelp is close to invisible in Perplexity's local recommendations regardless of how good its own website is.
Which sources does ChatGPT cite most for local business recommendations?
ChatGPT's most-cited source was bestprosintown.com, a low-profile directory that appeared in 59 of 100 answers, nearly four times its next source. Review platforms (Birdeye, Experience.com) and directories (Expertise, HomeAdvisor) filled out the top ten. ChatGPT cited far fewer sources per answer than Perplexity (4.5 vs 9.3 on average).
Do AI engines actually name specific local businesses?
Yes, nearly every time. ChatGPT named at least one specific business in 94 of 100 answers and Perplexity in 100 of 100. AI engines are not hedging on local queries. Every one of these answers already has winners, chosen largely from directory and review-platform data.
How can a local business get recommended by ChatGPT and Perplexity?
Two moves follow directly from this data. First, win the gatekeeper surfaces for your industry: Yelp and Facebook for Perplexity, plus the vertical directories (Healthgrades for medical, Justia and Super Lawyers for legal, Angi and Thumbtack for home services). Second, publish the comparison content yourself: the one single-location business that cracked both engines' top sources in this study did it with its own 'best companies in [city]' pages.
What is the methodology behind the Central Florida AI Citation Study?
100 identical-template questions ('Who is the best [industry] in [city], Florida?') across 10 industries and 10 Central Florida cities, asked to ChatGPT (gpt-5.3-chat-latest) and Perplexity (sonar) with live web search on, collected 2026-07-02 in a single run. We recorded every cited source URL in all 200 answers, 1,378 domain-citations across 581 unique domains. Published under CC BY 4.0; cite it freely.
Cite this study as: EVOIX (2026). The Central Florida AI Citation Study: 200 AI Answers to 100 Local Provider Queries. https://evoix.io/research/central-florida-ai-citation-study. Published under CC BY 4.0. Companion studies: the 4-engine AEO agency citation audit and What It Takes to Get Cited by AI. Scoring framework: the EVOIX AEO Score methodology.