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Free playbook · PDF

How to get your B2B software recommended by ChatGPT and other AI assistants

A playbook for B2B software marketers: how buyers use AI assistants from problem to pricing, how to position so engines can place you, a 100-plus prompt library by buying stage, the pages and third-party sources that get cited, and a 90-day plan for measuring shortlist share.

  • Prompt library: 114 templates across seven buying stages
  • Comparison and alternatives page templates that stay fair
  • Category placement sentence and consistency audit
  • Third-party amplification checklist for review sites, analysts and marketplaces
  • Shortlist share scorecard by stage, with a 90-day plan

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The short answer

To get your B2B software recommended by ChatGPT and other assistants, name your category in buyers' words, state who you serve and which use cases you fit, publish fair comparison, integration, pricing and documentation pages, and earn consistent descriptions on review sites, analyst coverage, communities and partner marketplaces. Then measure your shortlist share by buying stage.

For product marketers, demand-gen and SEO leads at B2B software companies

What you will learn

  1. Chapter 1

    How software buyers use assistants, from problem to pricing

    • For a growing share of software buyers the shortlist is drafted in an assistant conversation that marketing never sees.
    • Buyers ask different questions at each of six stages, and you can be absent from any one of them.
    • The constraints buyers state, such as size, industry, stack and regulation, are the filters that decide whether you are named.
    • Each member of a buying committee asks different questions, so each needs a page that answers them.
    • Count recommendations, not mentions: a caveated mention can cost you the deal.

  2. Chapter 2

    Position so engines can place you

    • An engine has to file you in a category before it can recommend you, so lead with the category name buyers already use.
    • A placement sentence covering category, audience, use cases, integrations and who you are not for gives every source the same thing to repeat.
    • Broad products need explicit use-case and audience pages, or an engine has no reason to name them for any one job.
    • Consistency across your site, review profiles, marketplaces and press boilerplate is a list to work through, not a slogan.
    • Check whether assistants confuse you with another company, and publish a plain page that says what you are not.

  3. Chapter 3

    Build the prompt set that tests your shortlist

    • A fixed, tagged prompt set is the measuring stick that makes AEO changes visible over time.
    • Write prompts in the buyer's words, with the constraints buyers really state.
    • Most of the set should be unbranded, because only unbranded prompts test the shortlist.
    • Run each prompt several times on each engine, and record how often you appear rather than a single result.
    • Freeze the set for a quarter so that a change in the numbers reflects a change in the answers.

  4. Chapter 4

    Pages that get cited

    • Comparison and alternatives pages are used when they agree with other sources, so write them to be fair, dated and specific.
    • A page per important integration lets an engine connect you to the stack constraints buyers state.
    • If you do not say what you cost, an engine will quote someone else's figure.
    • Public documentation and use-case pages answer implementation and fit questions far better than marketing copy.
    • Search crawlers and training crawlers are separate decisions; check each vendor's documentation and your firewall before blocking either.

  5. Chapter 5

    Third-party sources: reviews, analysts, communities and marketplaces

    • Engines separate vendors using sources that belong to none of them, so review sites, analysts, communities and marketplaces are part of the job.
    • Prioritise the third-party domains cited in answers where competitors appear and you do not.
    • Reviews that describe use cases, company sizes and integrations do more for placement than ratings alone.
    • The FTC's 2024 rule bans fake reviews, sentiment-conditioned incentives and undisclosed insider reviews; ask for honest reviews only.
    • Make it easy for analysts, writers and partners to describe you accurately, and correct them politely when they do not.

  6. Chapter 6

    Measure shortlist share, and a 90-day plan

    • Shortlist share is the share of runs of unbranded prompts in a stage where you are recommended, measured per engine.
    • Record description, accuracy, competitors and cited sources as well as presence; the sources tell you what to fix.
    • The stage where you drop out points to the work: positioning, use-case evidence, third-party caveats, integrations or pricing.
    • Report observable signals, such as self-reported discovery and assistant referrals, rather than an invented revenue figure.
    • Run a baseline, fix access and accuracy, build the pages and sources it points to, and rerun at 90 days.

7 worksheets inside

The chapters explain the method. The worksheets are what you fill in to run it: print them, or copy the tables into a document of your own.

  • W1Category placement sentence and consistency audit
  • W2Prompt library: 114 templates by buying stage
  • W3Comparison page template
  • W4Alternatives page template
  • W5Third-party amplification checklist
  • W6Shortlist share scorecard and 90-day plan
  • W7Run your first baseline
Get the playbook

Questions

How do I get my B2B software recommended by ChatGPT?
Make it easy for the engine to place you and give it independent evidence. Name your category in the words buyers use, publish pages for your main use cases, integrations, pricing and comparisons, and earn reviews and coverage that describe the same audience and use cases. Then track unbranded prompts by buying stage to see where you are missing.
What is AEO for SaaS?
Answer engine optimisation for SaaS is the work of getting a software product named, and described accurately, in the answers AI assistants give to buyers. It covers positioning, owned pages such as comparison, integration and pricing pages, third-party sources such as review sites and analysts, and measurement of how often you make the shortlist.
How do I show up when someone asks an AI for the best [category] software?
The engine needs to file you in that category and connect you to the buyer's constraints. Use the established category name on your site and review profiles, publish use-case pages for the sizes and industries you serve, and earn reviews that mention them. Check which sources the engine cites for that question and work on the ones where you are absent.
Is GEO for B2B different from SEO?
It builds on SEO but measures something else. SEO aims for a position on a results page; GEO and AEO aim to be named in an answer that may list only a few products. Crawlable, clear pages still matter, but third-party descriptions, consistency of positioning and fair comparison content weigh more heavily in whether you are recommended.
Do comparison and alternatives pages help with AI answers?
They can, when they are fair, specific and dated, because engines look for pages that compare named products. A page that only lists your wins contradicts the reviews and threads the engine also reads, so it is easy to discount. Say where the competitor is stronger and name several alternatives, not only yourself.
Which review sites matter for AI visibility in B2B software?
The ones that appear as cited sources in answers about your category. For many software categories that includes G2, Capterra, TrustRadius, Gartner Peer Insights and PeerSpot, plus category-specific sites. Check the cited sources in your own tracked answers rather than assuming, then complete those profiles and ask customers in your lead segments for honest reviews.
How do I measure whether AEO is working for my SaaS company?
Track a fixed set of unbranded prompts by buying stage, run each several times on each engine, and calculate the share of runs where you are recommended. Record the description, competitors and cited sources too. Alongside that, ask buyers how they found you and segment assistant referral traffic, rather than claiming a revenue figure you cannot trace.
Should I block AI crawlers from my SaaS website?
Decide training and search crawlers separately. OpenAI, Anthropic and Perplexity each document separate agents for search or user requests and for training, and OpenAI says sites that opt out of OAI-SearchBot are not shown in ChatGPT search answers, apart from navigational links. Blocking search agents usually costs visibility; check each vendor's documentation and your firewall rules before changing anything.
Is Get on the Shortlist: AEO for B2B SaaS free?
Yes. Give a first name and a work email and the download starts at once. We also email you the link, and one person from the Noma team follows up a day later; reply and say so if you would rather not hear from us.
Why do you ask for a work email?
The playbooks are written for teams at companies, and a work address tells us which company is reading, so a follow-up can be about your brand rather than generic. Personal and temporary inboxes are not accepted.
What format is it?
A PDF of 51 A4 pages, laid out to print, with worksheets you can fill in by hand or copy into a document of your own.

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Updated 20 October 2026 · Written by the Noma team · All resources