Overview
This Week’s Issue
We collected a few hundred observations of how four AI platforms answer a Los Angeles client who needs a defense lawyer. Only 4% of the firms and lawyers they named showed up on all four.
Here is what we found and what you can do to improve your odds.
The Search
We asked each platform what a client types when they are choosing a lawyer, deciding whether to hire one, or standing in the middle of a bad night. “Best criminal defense attorney in Los Angeles, California.” “Criminal defense lawyer near me Los Angeles.” “I was arrested in Los Angeles what do I do.” “Should I talk to police without a lawyer in Los Angeles.” “Public defender vs private criminal defense attorney in Los Angeles” to name a few.
🎯 One firm appeared in 9 of 9 hiring answers across three platforms, and two platforms named no firm on any crisis question.
What The Platforms Said
Manshoory Law Group and Eisner Gorin LLP were the only two names to show up on all four platforms, with 11 and 9 appearances.
ChatGPT. It showed a map in 40% of its answers, all of them on searches about hiring a lawyer. Manshoory Law Group appeared in every one of those answers, shown with a 5.0 rating. On the crisis questions ChatGPT named no firm and pointed to court and sheriff sources where it cited anything.
Claude. It answered 50% of its questions from memory without opening a single source, and it named a firm in the answer on 30% of them. Every firm on its map results carried a 4.9 or 5.0 rating. Chambers Law Firm’s own website supplied 5 of the sources behind Claude’s answer on when to hire a lawyer.
Google. Its AI Overview appeared on 100% of the searches we checked, up from 60% in our Nashville family law audit, and a local pack followed on 60%. Firm sites supplied 72% of the sources Google returned, and 79% of the firms Google named appeared on no other platform.
Perplexity. It was the outlier. It attached 114 sources to its answers, and 51% came from directories and ranking lists, against 15% on Claude and 18% on Google. Avvo and FindLaw each appeared in 90% of its answers, and Eisner Gorin LLP was the first firm it named in all three hiring answers.
Where They Disagree
83% of the firms and lawyers named appeared on only one platform. Nashville family law came in at 68%.
Changing “top rated” to “near me” swapped 80% of ChatGPT’s names. Perplexity returned the same five firms in the same order, a 0% change.
Every platform brought names no other platform did. That was true for 42% of ChatGPT’s firms, 50% of Perplexity’s, 53% of Claude’s, and 79% of Google’s.
Platforms answered with and without looking anything up. Claude answered 50% from memory, ChatGPT 20%, Perplexity and Google 0%.
Platforms strayed from the city. 2 of the 114 sources Perplexity cited came from firms outside California.
🎯 A strong showing on one platform told us little about the others.
The Signal
The data says the platforms are not copies of each other. Your firm can lead a map, hold a spot in Google’s local pack, and still be absent from the answer a client reads on another platform. 83% of the names appeared on one platform only, and the two that crossed all four were the exceptions.
🎯 Treat each platform as its own front door.
The section below breaks down every step to increase your odds of showing up across more platforms.
What You Can Do This Week
Claim the directories that keep getting cited. Avvo supplied 19 of the 188 sources, about 10%, and it appeared on Claude, Google, and Perplexity. Lawyers.com added 9 more and Super Lawyers 6. Open your profile on each and fill every field, since those are the pages the platforms had in front of them.
Check your Google profile against 4.9. Every firm on Claude’s map results carried a 4.9 or 5.0, with review counts from 105 to 380. ChatGPT’s maps ran wider, from 4.3 to 5.0. Compare your own rating and review count with that range before anything else.
Write a plain answer page for each crisis question. Firm sites supplied 55% of Claude’s sources, against 24% on Perplexity. On the police and timing questions, Google’s AI Overview opened with the answer itself in its first sentence. Open your page the same way, with the answer first and your firm second.
Get onto the lists Perplexity pulls from. Yelp, Expertise.com, and ThreeBestRated each appeared in all three of its hiring answers. Claim your Yelp page and check which ranking lists name your city.
Own the public defender comparison. On that search, Google’s local pack gave 2 of its 3 slots to county public defender offices. A plain comparison page is the one place your firm can speak to that search.
🎯 Start here. Type the search a client would use to hire your firm into ChatGPT and into Perplexity. Write down the names on each list, count how many appear on both, and look for your own.
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