How Law Firms Get Recommended by ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Gemini

A client who asks an AI assistant “which solicitor should I use?” usually gets three to five names. Most never look further. This is what decides those names, and what your firm can do about it.

Clients have changed where they start

Someone going through a divorce, a dispute with a builder or the sale of their company used to search Google, open ten tabs and compare. Many now ask ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity or Gemini instead, often late at night and in their own words:

• “My business partner wants to buy me out. Which commercial solicitors in London can help?”
• “Who is the best divorce lawyer for someone with a family business?”
• “I’ve been left out of my mother’s will. Is there a solicitor near Leeds who deals with this?”

The answer is short. It names a handful of firms or individual solicitors and explains why. If yours is not one of them, that client may never see your website at all.

What AI assistants look for

Nobody outside these companies knows exactly how each tool chooses, and the answers change between people and from day to day. But the same signals come up again and again.

1. Pages that clearly answer the question. An assistant can only recommend you for “contested wills” if your website says, plainly, that you handle contested wills: who for, how, and in which places. A single “Private Client” page that lists twelve services in one paragraph gives it very little to work with.

2. People, not just the firm. Clients often ask for a person: “the best family lawyer for high net worth divorce”. Assistants answer with names, so they need partner and solicitor profiles that say what each person specialises in, with their experience, qualifications and the kinds of cases they take on.

3. Proof that others agree. Legal directories, Law Society and SRA listings, reviews, articles, talks and mentions on other trusted websites all help an assistant decide you are a safe name to give.

4. Facts that match everywhere. Your name, offices, practice areas and contact details should be the same on your website, your Google Business Profile, your SRA listing and the directories. When they disagree, an assistant has less reason to trust any of them.

5. A website the tools can actually read. Fast pages, clean structure, clear headings and structured data (the hidden labels that tell search engines “this is a law firm, this is a solicitor, this is their specialism”). Many law firm websites are built on templates that hide their best content behind tabs, PDFs or slow pages.

Practical steps for your firm

1. Ask the questions yourself. Write down ten questions your clients would really ask, and try them in ChatGPT, Claude, Perplexity and Gemini. Note who appears. That is your starting point.
2. Give each practice area its own page. Explain who you help, common situations, how the process works and what it costs where you can. Under the SRA Transparency Rules, firms offering certain services (such as conveyancing, probate and employment tribunal claims for employers) must already publish price and service information, so make it easy to find.
3. Rewrite your people pages. Each profile should say what that person is known for, in the words a client would use, not just a list of past roles.
4. Answer the common questions. “How long does a divorce take?”, “Do I need a solicitor to contest a will?” Clear, honest answers on your own site are the kind of thing assistants quote.
5. Check your listings. Make your Google Business Profile, SRA details and directory entries match your website exactly.
6. Track it over time. Re-run your questions every few weeks. AI answers move, and you want to know which way.

What this looks like in practice

One family law partner we worked with appeared in none of the AI or Google searches we tracked when we started. Eight weeks later they ranked first in 14 of 18 tracked searches and in the top four for all 18. You can read the full case study, including what we tracked and how.

A note on promises

No one can promise a place in an AI answer, and you should be wary of anyone who does. What can be done is to make sure the right information about your firm and your people is there to be found, clearly and consistently, and then to measure what happens.

Want to see where your firm stands?

See what we do for law firms, or get in touch. Someone senior will reply within one working day with honest first thoughts on where your firm appears today.