For 30 days, from August 14 to September 12, 2026, I asked four AI assistants the same buyer question every day: "Who is the best HVAC company in Houston for AC repair?" I keep every answer, dated and hashed, in a public record.
Three findings from the Houston record.
First, one business was named far more than any other. Abacus Plumbing, Air Conditioning and Electrical was named on 23 of the 30 days. Every one of those mentions came from Perplexity (22 days) or Gemini (10 days). ChatGPT and Claude, queried by API, named Abacus Plumbing, Air Conditioning and Electrical on 0 and 0 days.
Second, the assistants do not agree. 37 businesses were named on three or more days in this market. 33 of them were named by only one of the four assistants. None was named by all four in the 30 days.
Third, two of the four assistants rarely name anyone. Across every local market in the record, Perplexity named at least one real business in 87 percent of its answers, Gemini in 43 percent, Claude by API in 60 percent (many of its names are generic phrases rather than businesses), and ChatGPT by API in 22 percent.
What this means for a Houston buyer: the answer to "Who is the best HVAC company in Houston for AC repair?" depends on which assistant you ask, and on the day you ask it. What it means for a Houston business: being named by one assistant is not being named by AI.
The record is public and dated. Anyone can check any row.
| Assistant | Interface | Answers naming a real local business, all local markets, 30 days |
|---|---|---|
| Perplexity | API, search-native | 87 percent |
| Claude | API, no web browsing | 60 percent (many names are generic phrases) |
| Gemini | API, no search grounding | 43 percent |
| ChatGPT | API, no web browsing | 22 percent |
Rates are read off the public record for every local market in the index, not this market alone. A row is checkable by anyone.
Engines and interfaces: Perplexity (API, model sonar, search-native); Google Gemini (API, gemini-3.6-flash, no search grounding); ChatGPT (API, gpt-5.2-mini, Chat Completions, no web browsing); Claude (API, claude-haiku-4-5, no web browsing). Window: 2026-08-14 to 2026-09-12, one run per engine per day. Buyer question, verbatim: "Who is the best HVAC company in Houston for AC repair?" A business is "named" when its name appears in the engine's answer text; names are extracted mechanically and a fixed filter removes generic phrases; a business counts in this report when it was named on three or more of the 30 days. Raw answers: https://huggingface.co/datasets/Namebeam/namebeam-e1-ai-referral-index (CC BY 4.0). Index and per-business row pages: https://namebeam.ai/ai-referral-index
Answers vary by session, by day, by wording and by product updates. ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini were queried by API without web browsing or search grounding, which is not how most consumers use them; the consumer apps may answer differently. Name extraction is mechanical and can miss a business written in an unusual form. A mention is not an endorsement, a ranking or a quality assessment; it is a dated observation of what an assistant said on that day.
Any business named in this record may comment or correct the record by replying to this note. No payment alters a row, a finding or this report.
Write to [email protected] with the business name and the date in question.
Journalists and researchers: the raw answer files, the per-business rows and the daily CSV are public under CC BY 4.0. Cite the record, not this page. A CSV extract for this market and a one-chart summary are available on request.
Browse the index Raw record on Hugging FaceBusiness owners: a dated 30-day row for your own business name, with the raw answers, is a $7 row check at terryjcarter7.gumroad.com/l/row-check. No payment alters a row.
