Pet Services and Pet Brands: 88% Score Zero in AI Search

What we measured

We scanned 16 businesses in the pet services and pet brands segment to see how often AI assistants surface them when people ask buying questions about pet food, supplies, and care. Using Claude with live web search, we tracked visibility scores, the share of businesses that got zero mentions, and how many common buyer questions went unanswered by each business.

The results were stark. The average visibility score across all 16 businesses was 3 out of 100. Every single business scored under 30. And 88% of them scored zero, meaning they did not appear at all when AI assistants answered relevant questions. On average, each business had 4.9 buyer questions per scan where they were completely absent from the answer.

What AI assistants answer instead

When shoppers ask AI assistants about pet food, supplies, and care decisions, the assistants are not pulling blanks. They are citing other sources instead. In this scan, the most frequently cited sites were:

• dogfoodadvisor.com (13 mentions)
• chewy.com (12 mentions)
• akc.org (11 mentions)
• forbes.com (11 mentions)
• zooplus.co.uk (9 mentions)
• technobark.com (7 mentions)
• zooplus.com (6 mentions)
• webvet.com (5 mentions)

This mix of large retailers, review sites, and general reference publishers suggests AI assistants default to established, content-heavy domains when individual pet businesses do not have clear, citable answers available online.

The questions that go unanswered

The scan surfaced specific buyer questions where the 16 businesses were missing from the AI response entirely. Examples include:

• Best dog food for sensitive stomachs
• Affordable dog food under £5
• Best rabbit food for nutrition
• Fish food vs pellets for aquariums
• Promotional marketing software vs daily deal sites
• Yak chews vs buffalo horns for dogs
• Is a pet fitness tracker worth it
• Dog toys under £20

These are practical, everyday questions a real customer would type before making a purchase. They are not obscure or overly technical. The fact that none of the scanned businesses showed up for them points to a gap between what these businesses sell and what is written down in a form AI assistants can find and cite.

What to do this week

There is no guaranteed fix that puts any business at the top of every AI answer, but there are concrete steps that improve the odds of being cited:

1. Write direct answers to buyer questions. Create pages or sections that answer specific questions like "best dog food for sensitive stomachs" in plain language, with a clear recommendation and reasoning. 2. Compare products explicitly. Questions like "yak chews vs buffalo horns" or "fish food vs pellets" reward content that lays out a side by side comparison rather than a general product page. 3. Include price context. Several unanswered questions involve budget thresholds like "under £5" or "under £20." Make sure pricing is stated clearly on pages, not buried in a cart flow. 4. Check what competitors are getting cited for. The sites listed above are getting picked up because they have structured, specific content. Look at what they cover and identify the gaps in your own site. 5. Re-scan periodically. AI visibility changes as content changes and as assistants update their sources. A single scan is a snapshot, not a verdict.

Method

This report is based on 16 scans conducted in the last 90 days across the pet services and pet brands segment, using Claude with live web search enabled. Visibility scores range from 0 to 100 based on whether and how prominently a business appeared in AI-generated answers to common buyer questions in its category. Cited sources and unanswered questions were logged per scan and aggregated for this report. No rankings are guaranteed by acting on these findings.

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