How to Get Into the \"Best in [City]\" Lists AI Cites

If ScoutRival’s Site Audit flagged “Present in the ‘best X in [city]’ lists AI reads,” it means the ranking lists AI quotes for your category and city don’t include your business. Since AI builds its “best” recommendations straight from those lists, getting into them is one of the most direct ways to become the answer. This guide shows you which lists matter, how to get into each one honestly, and the line you must never cross.

Why “best of” lists decide AI recommendations

Ask an AI engine “who’s the best roofer in Denver?” and it doesn’t form an opinion. It retrieves the pages that already rank roofers in Denver — the listicles, the directory “top 10” pages, the local magazine roundups — and synthesises them into an answer. If your business appears across several of those lists, the model names you. If it doesn’t, you’re invisible for that query no matter how good your work is.

The 2026 data makes the stakes plain: across more than 1,200 buying-intent prompts, 70.8% of AI citations were “best” or “top” lineups. That’s the dominant format AI reaches for on commercial questions. So the practical goal isn’t “rank #1 on Google” — it’s get included in the lists AI already reads. Almost no competing tool even checks whether you’re in them, which makes this one of the more overlooked levers in local AI visibility.

Here’s how ScoutRival approaches it: the platform runs “best [category] in [city]” the way a buyer would, sees which lists actually rank for that query, and shows whether you’re in each one. That turns a vague goal into a concrete to-do list: here are the five lists AI is quoting, you’re in two, here’s how to get into the other three.

The lists that matter — and how to get into each

Not every “best of” page is worth chasing, and each has a different path in. Here are the main types.

Three Best Rated

Three Best Rated is a curated directory that hand-picks three businesses per category per city. It runs a 50-point vetting process (reputation, history, complaints, reviews, licensing, and more). You can:

• Request consideration — submit your business for their vetting.
• Claim your entry if you’re already featured, so you can keep the details accurate.

Because it’s curated and capped at three per category, inclusion is a genuine signal — which is exactly why AI trusts it.

Expertise.com

Expertise.com ranks local businesses and is widely cited. Its selection is mostly editorial — its team scores businesses across several variables (reputation, credibility, experience, availability, professionalism), pulling from public data rather than applications. In 2026, its direct “Request a Review” option is open only to the Legal and Home Improvement categories.

• If you’re a lawyer or a home-improvement business: use the Request a Review path to put yourself in front of their process.
• Every other category: you can’t apply directly, so strengthen the public signals they score — steady reviews, verified licensing, years in business, a complete online presence. Those are the inputs their editorial process weighs, and improving them is the honest way to earn consideration.

Local blog and magazine listicles

Your city almost certainly has “best [service] in [city]” posts from local blogs, newspapers, magazines, and lifestyle sites. These are editorial, which means the path in is a pitch to the author or editor. To make it work:

• Find the specific lists ranking your category and city (ScoutRival surfaces these; you can also search “best [service] in [city]” and note the sites that appear).
• Reach out to the author with a genuine reason to include you: a credential, a specialty they haven’t covered, real results, a community project, or a milestone. Make it easy — offer the facts, a photo, and a sentence they could quote.
• Be patient and real. Editors ignore generic “please add me” emails; they respond to a specific, useful reason their readers would care about.

Category directories that feed the lists

Many “best of” lists and AI answers pull from the big category directories. Claiming and completing your profile on the ones that fit your industry — Yelp, Healthgrades or RealSelf for medical, Avvo for legal, Angi for home services — strengthens your presence across the whole ecosystem. That’s a related fix in its own right; see the review sites AI checks for your industry.

The line you must never cross

There’s a tempting shortcut here, and it will hurt you: spinning up fake review sites, buying your way onto sham “best of” pages, or astroturfing your own rankings.

Don’t. About 14.5% of ChatGPT citations already go to bot-farm “best of” spam — the ecosystem is full of fake listicles, and AI engines and search platforms are actively working to filter them out. Being adjacent to that pattern — a suspicious listicle that happens to feature you, a fake review site with your name on it — is a risk, not a win. If those pages get devalued or delisted, you go down with them, and your brand gets associated with spam.

The honest path is slower but durable: earn real inclusion in legitimately curated lists, strengthen the public signals editorial rankings score, and pitch real journalists with real reasons. That’s what builds a “best of” presence AI keeps citing.

How this ties to your wider AI visibility

Getting into “best of” lists isn’t a standalone trick — it compounds with your other off-site signals. Every list that names you is also a brand mention, the strongest off-site AI signal there is (see brand mentions beat backlinks). And the local listings and reviews that editorial rankings score are the same ones that feed AI’s picture of you as a real, trusted local entity. Work these together and each one reinforces the rest.

How to confirm it worked

• Re-run the ScoutRival check — you should now appear in at least one additional ranking list that AI cites for your category and city.
• Ask ChatGPT or Perplexity the real question — “best [your service] in [your city]” — and see whether you’re named. (Answers vary run to run, so try it a few times.)
• Confirm your new listings and claimed entries show your exact brand name and accurate details.
• Re-run your ScoutRival Site Audit — the “best [service] in [city] lists” signal should improve as you get included in more of them.

Common mistakes to avoid

• Spinning fake “best of” pages or astroturfing. A large share of AI citations already go to detectable “best of” spam. Being near it is a liability, not a shortcut. Earn real inclusion only.
• Buying fake reviews to game editorial rankings. Directories and editorial teams increasingly detect and penalise this, and it can get your profiles suppressed. Build a steady flow of genuine reviews instead.
• Sending generic “add me” pitches. Editors ignore them. Give the author a specific, genuine reason their readers would care about — a credential, a specialty, real results.
• Trying to “Request a Review” on Expertise.com outside eligible categories. Only Legal and Home Improvement can request directly in 2026. Every other category should strengthen the public signals the editorial process scores.
• Chasing every listicle equally. Focus on the lists AI actually cites for your category and city. A niche list nobody quotes isn’t worth the effort.
• Using inconsistent names across listings. If your name varies from list to list, you dilute the entity. Use one exact canonical name everywhere.

The bottom line

When someone asks AI for the best business in your city, it reads the existing “best of” lists and quotes them — and those lineups are the dominant format in AI citations. So the winning move is to get inside the lists AI already reads: request consideration where curated directories allow it, strengthen the public signals editorial rankings score, and pitch local authors with a real reason to include you. Do it honestly — never touch the fake-listicle spam that a growing share of AI citations already flow to — and you turn “best [service] in [city]” into a question that names you.

Want to see exactly which “best of” lists AI cites for your category and city — and which ones you’re missing? Run a free Site Audit with ScoutRival and get the list, plus the honest path into each one.