AI answers lean national unless the customer asks for independent

One word in a prompt changes which businesses AI recommends. It is not the word most owners would guess.

One word in a prompt changes which businesses AI recommends. It is not the word most owners would guess.

What the study found

Vaer AI tested 20,000 shopping prompts across the U.S. and Canada. The prompts produced 200,000 AI responses without web search and 260,000 with search turned on. The study covered ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, and Google AI Overviews.

With live search on, large retailers were the top recommendation in 46% to 58% of responses. They held the top spot about 2.5 times as often as small retailers.

Then researchers added one word to the prompt: independent. In a sample of the prompts, small and local stores went from about a third of the stores named to nearly four fifths.

The part worth slowing down for

"Local" did much less. So did "near me." The study noted that AI can count a nearby branch of a national chain as local. A customer who asks for a local store can still get a chain.

Being found is not being recommended. Large and small retailers each made up about 38% of the stores AI cited. The chains still took the top recommendation far more often. AI saw the small stores. It named the big ones.

Specific requests favored chains. For broad searches, small stores took about a third of top recommendations. When the shopper named a specific product, that fell to about 10%.

What this does and does not tell you

The study covered retail shopping. It did not test plumbers, roofers, or other service businesses. The pattern may carry over. Nobody has measured it yet.

It was also commissioned by Lightspeed Commerce, a company that sells software to independent retailers. That does not make the numbers wrong. It is worth knowing.

And the study tested the words customers type. It did not test the words on a business's website. Adding "independent" to your homepage is not proven to change what AI recommends.

What an owner can do with it

1. Test your own market. Ask ChatGPT and Google for your service in your town. Ask again with the word "independent." Note who gets named each time.
2. Say what you are, in plain words. Independent. Locally owned. Family owned. If it is true, put it on your site and your Google Business Profile. AI can only match a customer's request to facts it can read.
3. Do not rely on "local" alone. A chain branch down the street is local too. Name the owner. Name the town. Say how long you have been there.

The takeaway

AI answers lean toward the biggest names unless the customer asks for something else. You cannot control what customers type. You can make sure that when they ask for an independent business, yours is clearly one.

Both machines and people need to understand what your business is. Say it plainly.

Source: Search Engine Land, September 30, 2026. Study by Tom Wells of Vaer AI, conducted on behalf of Lightspeed Commerce.

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