For plumbing firms
How plumbers get recommended by ChatGPT
When a boiler fails on a Sunday night, people ask ChatGPT for a plumber who can come now, is Gas Safe, and will not wreck the kitchen. In a 2026 East Anglia study of 2,255 plumbing firms, only 95 were ever named. The rest left the recommendation to a directory or a competitor with a site the engines could quote. launchAEO is how you get onto that shortlist: make the plumbing pages readable, put Gas Safe and the towns in HTML, and on Growth see whether ChatGPT names you on the questions a leaking homeowner actually asks.
Questions customers already ask AI
These are the prompts, not keywords. An assistant that cannot match them to a page on your site will name someone else.
- Can you recommend a plumber in Norwich who can come today?
- Who should I use for a new bathroom in Leeds?
- Find a Gas Safe engineer for a Worcester boiler service in Bristol.
- Is there a 24-hour plumber near me who won’t charge a call-out scam?
- Best plumber for a burst pipe in a flat in Manchester.
Why someone else gets named
ChatGPT reads Checkatrade before it reads you
In that East Anglia run, ChatGPT pointed at a trade directory in 32 of its 40 plumbing answers. Checkatrade was the page it opened. If your Gas Safe number, trading name and town live only on the van, the engine never meets them.
A boiler job is a licence check, not a slogan
For heating work, ChatGPT tells the customer to confirm Gas Safe registration. Firms that never put the licence number next to the postcode give the model nothing official to quote. A competitor with a public register listing gets the cautionary sentence — and the job.
Emergency copy is missing, so someone else’s 24/7 line wins
The prompt is often “come today”, not “award-winning bathrooms”. If the homepage is a gallery of chrome taps with no town, no out-of-hours number and no “burst pipe” page, the engine fills the gap from a directory profile that does say those words.
What launchAEO checks
Whether ChatGPT can load the plumbing pages
A booking widget that only exists in JavaScript, or a PDF price list, is invisible to a crawler. launchAEO scores whether the HTML actually contains the services, towns and Gas Safe details a model can quote.
Whether Google, the site and the directory look like one firm
Local trust in launchAEO compares the name, phone and address on the site with the Google listing. Split identities — “Dave’s Plumbing” on the van, “DJP Heating Ltd” at Companies House — read as three businesses.
The questions a leaking customer would ask
On Growth, launchAEO runs buyer questions across ChatGPT, Google AI, Perplexity, Claude and Gemini and records who was named. You see the gap: you, or the firm Checkatrade already fed the model.
What to change
Same shape as the action plan in the product: what’s wrong, why it matters, how to fix it.
What’s wrong
The homepage never says plumber, town, or Gas Safe.
Why it matters
The engine matches the customer’s words. “Bathroom inspiration” does not match “Gas Safe plumber in Bristol”.
How to fix it
Put the trade, the towns you cover, the licence number and an emergency number in the first screen of HTML. launchAEO’s action plan flags when those facts are missing.
What’s wrong
The Checkatrade profile and the website disagree.
Why it matters
ChatGPT treats the directory as the source of record for trades. Conflicting phone numbers look like two firms, so it names neither confidently.
How to fix it
Use one trading name, one phone, one address everywhere. The reviews screen in launchAEO is built to catch that mismatch.
What’s wrong
There is no page for the job people actually type.
Why it matters
“Boiler service”, “unvented cylinder”, “leak on a Saturday” are the queries. A single services dump does not answer them.
How to fix it
Give each job its own page with the town in the copy. The action plan turns those gaps into the next pages to publish.
Where assistants look
Gas Safe Register
The legal UK register for gas work. ChatGPT tells customers to check it before anyone touches a boiler.
Checkatrade
The directory ChatGPT opened most often when asked for a plumber in the East Anglia study.
TrustATrader
The second trades list Google AI Mode cites after Checkatrade.
MyBuilder
Public job reviews that still show up next to Checkatrade in UK plumbing answers.
Questions about this
How can plumbers get recommended by ChatGPT?
Put plumber, town, emergency cover and the Gas Safe number in HTML a crawler can read, under one name that matches Google. launchAEO shows whether the site is ready, what to fix, and on Growth whether answers name you. A directory listing helps. It is not a substitute for the site.
Does ChatGPT care about Gas Safe?
Yes, for anything involving gas. Independent tests of boiler-repair prompts found ChatGPT telling the user to confirm Gas Safe registration. Put the licence on the site, not only on the van.
Do Google reviews replace a plumbing website?
No. Named firms in that East Anglia plumbing data had more reviews, but Gemini already quotes contractor websites when it names someone. Reviews help you get noticed. The site is how you get recommended as the firm. launchAEO is built around that site.
What does launchAEO actually check for a plumbing firm?
Whether AI tools can read the plumbing pages, whether the site and Google look like the same business, the issues blocking crawlers, and an action plan written as what’s wrong, why it matters, and how to fix it. On Growth, whether ChatGPT names you on the leak and boiler questions.
Where these facts come from
Independent studies, not launchAEO scores. We summarise them; we do not pretend we ran them.
Other businesses
Electricians
EICRs, rewires, EV chargers. Google AI cites NICEIC; Gemini reads the contractor’s own pages.
Builders
Extensions and lofts. ChatGPT uses directories less; Gemini looks at Glenigan and finished jobs.
Trades
ChatGPT citing Checkatrade 85% of the time is the gap: most trade sites are not ready. launchAEO gets the firm recommended instead.
The full playbook sits in the 2026 guide to getting recommended by ChatGPT.
Get onto the recommendation
Free is a homepage check, not a trial. launchAEO shows whether AI can read the site, what to fix, and — on Growth — whether the answers name you. Prefer us to handle it? Managed services are quoted separately.