Skip to contentOverplate Where the Bullet Holes Aren’t - AKA Why Isn't My Business Showing Up in ChatGPT or Google Search?
By Christopher Spencer B.A. (Hons) MCIM
Chartered Marketer and Co-Founder of Peak Media Marketing
Why You’re Not Showing Up in AI Searches and Why It’s Not About Working Harder.
You ever get that feeling where you’re doing everything right?
The posts are going out. The website’s live. You’ve even asked ChatGPT to write you some (microwaved) content. You’ve got the credentials, the testimonials, and maybe a nice little badge or two in the footer.
But you’re still invisible.
Still not showing up when people ask questions in AI tools.
Still not getting found on Google.
Still not on the shortlist when someone’s making a decision.
Yes, it’s frustrating. And yes, it’s also fixable.
And bizarrely, it starts with a statistician from the last century, called Abraham Wald.
The Planes That Didn’t
Come Back
During WWII, American engineers were trying to figure out how to reinforce their fighter planes. They studied the ones that made it home, they were peppered with bullet holes in the wings and fuselage and so the U.S. Army Air Force figured they’d just overplate the armour in those places.
But Wald pointed out the obvious: these were the planes that survived.
The real question was “where are the bullet holes on the planes that didn’t come back?”
Now, here’s where I feel I need to labour the point that they did not have the wreckage from the planes that went down. But that was the point.
The planes that did come back were full of bullet holes in the wings, the tail, and the fuselage. But there was barely any damage to the engines or the cockpit.
That did not mean those parts were not being hit. It meant that when they were, the planes did not survive.
That is what Wald saw. The lack of damage was the clue.
So they flipped the strategy. They started reinforcing the areas with no bullet holes at all, because that is where the real danger was.
They Were Overplating the Wrong Bits
That same logic applies to business.
Most people are reinforcing what’s visible.
The socials.
The homepage.
The Adobe / Canva graphics.
It’s not that those things don’t matter ... they do. But they’re not why you’re not getting found.
They’re not why ChatGPT isn’t surfacing you in answers.
And they’re definitely not why you’re stuck shouting into the void while your competitors get inquiries.
The truth? You’re probably overplating the fuselage while the visibility engine’s hanging out completely exposed.
Here’s what I mean by that.
5 Reasons You’re Not Showing Up
1. You’re Not in the Right Sources
AI models and search engines don’t pull from your feed. They’re not watching your Stories. They’re not scrolling your LinkedIn.
They pull from trusted, structured, indexable sources.
That means:
- GOV.UK
- Enterprise Nation
- Startups.co.uk
- Blogs written in a Q&A format
- Medium articles with schema
- LinkedIn articles with authority markers
If you’re not in these spaces, you’re not in the conversation.
Fix:
Write real blogs that answer real questions.
Structure them with FAQs and schema.
Get listed where AI looks .. not just where your mates follow you.
2. You’re Not Seen as a National Expert
You might be smashing it in your local area, cool!
But AI doesn’t care about that.
It’s trained to surface experts who answer broadly relevant questions, not just ones tagged “Derbyshire marketing.”
If your content isn’t designed for the wider ecosystem, it won’t show up.
Fix:
Write for the UK audience, not your postcode.
Sign off with your credentials.
Have a page that literally says who you are and what you do, in plain English.
And yes, you can ask ChatGPT to repurpose each post into a LinkedIn article. Just don’t let it sound like a bot microwaved / wrote it.
3. You’re Not Framing Your Services as Answers
Most businesses talk about what they do, whereas AI and search are interested in what you solve.
Nobody searches for “360 degree holistic brand package.”
They search for “how do I grow my business with no marketing budget?”
Fix:
Frame your services as answers to real questions.
Use headings that are questions.
Write landing pages like solutions, not sales decks.
If you’ve already got content, fine, just rework it. Turn it into a question-first format and watch what happens.
4. You’re Not Being Mentioned Elsewhere
AI looks for patterns. If your name, brand, or idea keeps showing up in different places - blogs, posts, lists, newsletters... that signal gets stronger.
If you’re not being mentioned at all? It assumes you’re not relevant.
Fix:
Start guest posting.
Swap content with someone in your network.
Get quoted in a roundup.
Say something useful somewhere else.
You don’t need a PR agency. You need a strategy.
5. Your Website Isn’t Feeding the Machine
You wouldn’t believe how many business owners are hiding their best pages from search.
"Noindex" tags, broken schema, weird site structures and all that invisible tech stuff that doesn’t feel important, but absolutely is.
Fix:
Audit your site.
Use schema markup .. especially FAQs and articles.
Make sure your key pages are crawlable, structured, and updated.
If it sounds overwhelming, ask ChatGPT to roleplay as a technical SEO and walk you through it. That’s what it’s good at.
It’s Not About Doing More. It’s About Doing the Right Things.
Everyone’s busy. But busy doesn’t mean visible.
If you’re not being surfaced in search, in AI tools, in buying moments it’s not because you’re lazy or slow.
It’s because the system isn’t picking up the right signals from you.
And those signals don’t come from “doing more.”
They come from reinforcing the parts that actually get you found.
That’s the difference between activity and visibility.
Want to Get Found? Start With a Human Strategy.
What’s missing from your AI visibility strategy? and how do you fix it with a plan built by humans, not prompts?
Most people ask ChatGPT what to write.
That’s the shortcut. The microwave meal. And it shows.
If you want to get found in AI tools, stop generating filler and start building structure.
Here’s what to do instead:
- Write blog posts that answer actual questions your customers are asking in plain English.
- Add FAQ schema to those posts so search engines and AI tools know exactly what you’re answering.
- Get your name mentioned in trusted, indexable sources; think guest articles, industry directories, podcasts, and roundups.
- Create an “About” page that spells out who you are, what you do, and why you’re credible. AI tools read that stuff. So will your next client.
- Fix your technical SEO no broken links, no weird page structures, no hiding your best stuff from the bots.
You don’t need more content. You need better signals.
That’s what we build at Peak Media Marketing.
Multi-channel surfacing systems that make sure your expertise turns up where it counts. It also means better rankings in search engines and better visibility on social media.
This is exactly what we have been doing since day one and when you put it all together, you get the rankings, the visibility and the discovery in AI.
Which means more brand awareness and more traffic to drive your business growth.
Want to know exactly where you're falling short and how to fix it?
Let’s talk. We’ll walk you through it like humans and not with some shonky playbook of copy and paste prompts.
So that you too can overplate where the bullet holes aren't.
LET'S CHAT ABOUT A STRATEGY FOR YOUR BUSINESS