Short answer: yes, it matters, but not because ChatGPT is replacing Google. It isn't. Google still handles the large majority of searches, and if you rank well there, you've done real work that still pays. The reason to care about AI search is narrower and more practical: AI answers now appear on top of Google itself, they name only a handful of businesses, and a growing number of customers use them to build a shortlist before they ever visit a website.
This post lays out the honest numbers, what overlaps between the two, and what is actually different. For the full side-by-side, see our guide to AI search vs Google.
Google Is Still the Big One
Let's say this plainly, because a lot of marketing in this space doesn't. According to StatCounter, Google held roughly 90% of worldwide search engine market share in September 2026, with Bing at about 5%. ChatGPT, Gemini, Perplexity, Copilot, and Claude together are not close to displacing that. If someone tells you to stop caring about Google rankings, they're selling something.
But Customer Behavior Is Shifting Fast
Market share counts which search box people type into. It doesn't capture how people decide. A few data points worth knowing:
- BrightLocal's 2026 Local Consumer Review Survey (1,002 US adults, published February 2026) found that use of ChatGPT and other generative AI tools for local recommendations rose from 6% the year before to 45%. In the same survey, the share using Google for local recommendations dipped from 83% to 71%. It is one survey with a modest sample, so treat the exact figures as a direction, not a law. But the direction is clear.
- OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said at the company's October 2025 developer event that more than 800 million people use ChatGPT every week.
- Alphabet reported on its Q2 2025 earnings call that Google's AI Overviews reached 2 billion monthly users.
Notice what the BrightLocal numbers say. People aren't abandoning Google. They're adding AI on top of it. That's the whole story in one sentence.
Why It Matters Even If You Rank Well
A traditional Google results page gives a searcher ten blue links and a map pack of three. An AI answer gives them a paragraph and, often, two to five named businesses. The room on that list is small.
Pew Research Center looked at the browsing behavior of 900 US adults in March 2025. When a Google search showed an AI summary, users clicked a traditional result link in 8% of visits. When it didn't, they clicked in 15% of visits. Clicks on the links inside the AI summary itself happened in only 1% of visits. Pew's study is observational, so it shows an association rather than proof of cause, but it matches what many owners are seeing: fewer clicks, more decisions made on the results page.
If the decision is made before the click, then being named in the answer matters as much as ranking below it.
Where Google Rankings and AI Visibility Overlap
Here's the good news. The two are built on largely the same foundation. Google's own documentation says there are no additional requirements to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode, and no special optimizations or schema needed beyond normal SEO fundamentals: a page that is indexed and eligible to show in Search with a snippet. ChatGPT search, Perplexity, and Copilot also work from web content they can find and read.
The shared foundation looks like this:
- A crawlable, fast website with clear pages for each service and each service area
- A complete, accurate Google Business Profile
- Consistent name, address, and phone details across the web
- Real reviews, recent and answered
- Content that answers the actual questions customers ask
If you already do these well, you're ahead of most competitors in Oregon City, Lake Oswego, and West Linn, and you have a head start on AI visibility too.
Where They Differ
- The output. Google ranks a list. AI assistants write an answer and name a few businesses. There is no page two.
- The crawlers.ChatGPT search uses OpenAI's OAI-SearchBot, which is separate from GPTBot, the crawler used for training. OpenAI's documentation says sites that opt out of OAI-SearchBot won't be shown in ChatGPT search answers. A site that blocked every bot in its robots.txt file years ago can be invisible there without anyone noticing.
- The measurement. Google Search Console tells you about Google. Bing Webmaster Tools added an AI Performance report in public preview in February 2026 that shows how often your content is cited in Copilot and other Microsoft AI answers. Ask whether your current reporting covers any of this.
- Third-party mentions. An AI assistant leans on what the wider web says about you, not just your own site. Reviews, directory listings, local press, and association pages carry real weight.
What We Will Not Promise
Nobody can guarantee you the top spot in ChatGPT. Answers vary by question, by user, and by day. Anyone who sells a guaranteed AI ranking, a magic file, or a special markup trick is guessing. Google says plainly that no special markup is needed. The honest version of this work is making your business easy to find, easy to verify, and easy to describe, then checking regularly where you actually show up.
The Practical Takeaway
Keep your Google fundamentals strong. Then fix the gaps that keep AI assistants from seeing or trusting you. We explain how the assistants pick businesses in How AI Assistants Decide Which Local Businesses to Recommend, and you can run a free check yourself with How to Check Whether ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity Recommend Your Business.
If you'd rather have it done for you, our AI Visibility & Authority service starts with an audit of where you stand today. Or contact usand we'll point you in the right direction.
Sources: StatCounter Global Stats (September 2026); BrightLocal Local Consumer Review Survey (2026); Pew Research Center, July 2025; OpenAI DevDay keynote, October 2025; Alphabet Q2 2025 earnings; Google Search Central, AI features documentation; OpenAI crawler documentation.
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