The AI visibility ranking: 8 local-business verticals, 137 sites
I ran the same free, no-JavaScript scan across 137 real business homepages in 8 local-business verticals over the past two weeks, then lined up every median score in one table. Medical and aesthetic clinics dominate the top, clustered between 87 and 90 out of 100. Hotels and restaurants sit at the bottom, in the high 70s. Across all 137 sites, only 12 percent have FAQ markup, the one gap almost everyone shares.
This is every real scan I have run pulled into one place: eight separate vertical studies, 137 homepages, one ranked table. Each site got the same free Report Card check: homepage only, no JavaScript, the same fixed list of machine-readability signals (structured data, FAQ markup, title and heading basics) out of 100. The score measures how easily an AI engine or search crawler can read and understand a page, not how good the business is. A clinic with a five-star reputation and a template website with zero schema still scores low here, and that is the point: it is fixable in an afternoon.
The ranking, best to worst
| Vertical | Median | Sites | Have SD | Have FAQ |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| IVF and fertility clinics | 90 | 14 | 14/14 | 6/14 |
| Hair transplant clinics | 89 | 13 | 12/13 | 4/13 |
| Dermatology clinics | 89 | 17 | 13/17 | 1/17 |
| Cosmetic surgery clinics | 87 | 15 | 14/15 | 1/15 |
| Cosmetic dentistry clinics | 87 | 14 | 13/14 | 2/14 |
| US, Canada and Australia (mixed) | 85.5 | 24 | 18/24 | 3/24 |
| Restaurants (India) | 79 | 15 | 11/15 | 0/15 |
| Hotels (India) | 76 | 25 | 14/25 | 0/25 |
Read the table top to bottom and a pattern jumps out immediately. The top five, IVF and fertility (median 90), hair transplant (89), dermatology (89), cosmetic surgery (87) and cosmetic dentistry (87), are all high-ticket medical and aesthetic categories, and they cluster in a tight four-point band. A mixed US, Canada and Australia pool of local businesses lands in the middle at 85.5. Restaurants (79) and hotels (76) in India sit at the bottom, the only two verticals under 80. For reference, my earlier general Indian clinic index scored a median of 77 across 16 clinics, close to where hospitality lands now.
The likely reason is not that clinics care more about AI visibility. It is that IVF, hair transplant, dermatology, cosmetic surgery and cosmetic dentistry practices already fight for expensive paid-search clicks, so they invested in proper SEO and website builds years ago, and machine-readability basics like structured data came along for the ride. Restaurants and hotels in India mostly never had to compete that hard on search: bookings come from maps, aggregators and word of mouth, so nothing ever forced the website itself to be legible to a crawler.
Structured data is mostly solved now
Structured data (schema markup) is present on 109 of the 137 sites I scanned, 80 percent. In the top medical verticals it is close to universal: almost every IVF, dermatology and hair transplant site already has it. That means schema, which used to be the clearest gap in my earlier index work, is no longer what separates a high scorer from a low one in most of these verticals. If your site does not have it yet, the free schema generator will close that gap in minutes, but for most businesses in most categories, this box is already checked.
FAQ markup is the universal blind spot
FAQ markup tells a different story. Only 17 of the 137 sites, 12 percent, have it, and that number barely moves between the top vertical and the bottom one. It is the one gap every single vertical shares, medical or hospitality, high scorer or low. That matters because FAQ markup is exactly the format that answers the specific questions a real customer types into an AI engine (how much does this cost, do you take my insurance, are you open Sunday), in a structure the engine can lift straight into its answer. I have the before and after: the dental clinic case study documents one real clinic going from 81 to 92, a B to an A, in three days, and FAQ markup was one of the two structural fixes that did it.
What this means for your site
Wherever your business sits in this table, the playbook is the same three steps. First, structured data, if you are one of the 20 percent still missing it, that is the single highest-leverage fix and it takes an afternoon. Second, FAQ markup answering the real questions your customers ask, since that is the gap 88 percent of sites share regardless of vertical. Third, the on-page basics: a clear title tag and a real H1 that says what the page is about. None of this requires a redesign. Run the free Report Card first and you will know exactly which of the three you are missing.
Method and limits
This ranking covers 137 real business homepages across 8 datasets (IVF and fertility, hair transplant, dermatology, cosmetic surgery, cosmetic dentistry, a mixed US, Canada and Australia pool, restaurants and hotels), each scored once over the past two weeks with the free Report Card engine: homepage only, no JavaScript rendering, the same fixed list of machine-readability signals every time. Datasets range from 13 to 25 sites, small enough that the exact order between close neighbors (dermatology at 89 versus hair transplant at 89, for example) should be read as directional, not precise to the point. What is not directional: structured data and FAQ markup are binary, present or absent, and both were counted the same way across all 137 sites, so the 80 percent and 12 percent figures are as solid as the scan itself.
Frequently asked questions
Why do medical verticals score higher than everyone else?
Mostly because they were already competing hard on paid search. IVF, hair transplant, dermatology, cosmetic surgery and cosmetic dentistry practices spend real money on Google Ads, so their websites got proper SEO work years before anyone was thinking about AI visibility, and structured data and clean HTML came along with that investment. It is not that these businesses are more sophisticated about AI, it is that the underlying SEO work overlaps with what an AI engine needs to read a page.
Does this ranking mean my category is doomed, or safe?
Neither. A high median in your vertical does not mean your specific site scores well, and a low median does not mean you are stuck there. I have seen individual sites in top verticals score in the 40s, and the dental clinic case study shows a real site moving from 81 to 92 in three days. The vertical median sets your expectations, it is not a verdict on your own homepage. Run your own site through the Report Card to find out where you actually stand.
Is there one fix that helps everyone, regardless of vertical?
Yes: FAQ markup. It is the one gap shared by every vertical in this study, present on only 12 percent of the 137 sites, and it directly answers the format-specific questions people ask AI engines. If you do only one thing after reading this, write out five real questions your customers ask and mark them up as FAQ schema.
How was this actually measured?
With the same free, deterministic Report Card engine across all 137 sites: homepage only, no JavaScript rendering, one fixed list of machine-readability signals including structured data, FAQ markup, title length and heading structure, scored out of 100. Every site in every vertical was scanned the same way over the past two weeks, so the comparisons across verticals are apples to apples even though the sample size per vertical is small.