What are buying-intent prompts?

Buying-intent prompts are the specific questions people ask an AI assistant when they're close to choosing who to buy from — "best med spa in Scottsdale", "who should I hire to reroof my house in Tampa", "top B2B payroll software for a 20-person startup". They matter more than any other kind of query because they're the moment the assistant effectively makes a shortlist, and whoever gets named captures the buyer while everyone unnamed stays invisible. Tracking your AI visibility means testing these real, category-and-location-specific prompts rather than vanity questions about your own brand name — because a model happily describing you when asked "tell me about Acme Co" says nothing about whether it names you when a stranger asks for the best option. The work of getting recommended is really the work of becoming the answer to your category's buying-intent prompts: clear entity signals, strong reviews, and citations on the sources the model trusts for exactly those questions.

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FAQ

Why do buying-intent prompts matter more than brand-name queries?Because they're where the decision happens. An assistant will describe you when someone asks about you by name, but that reveals nothing about whether it names you when a buyer asks for the best option in your category — which is the query that actually wins or loses the customer.

What does a good buying-intent prompt look like?Category plus qualifier plus, often, location or use case: 'best personal injury lawyer in Denver', 'most reliable HVAC company near me', 'best CRM for a small agency'. These mirror how buyers really ask, so they reveal who the assistant actually shortlists.

How do I find out how I rank on my category's prompts?Run a free Cited scan — it checks the AI-search readiness signals on your website (crawler access, llms.txt, structured data and answer-ready content) and lists the fixes to make first.

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