AI SearchAI in Dentistry
The 2026 Dental AI Search Visibility Report
Who do ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Google AI Mode actually recommend when a patient asks for a dentist? The first dental AI search visibility report.
·11 min read
Cofounder, VP of Sales & Strategy at Lasso MD
Hey, I'm
Pete Johnson
Helping dental practices unlock sustainable growth through data-driven marketing strategy and AI-powered intelligence.
I partner with dental practices to identify hidden opportunities, build competitive advantages, and create marketing systems that actually work.
1,500+
Practices Helped
Who is Pete Johnson?
Co-founder of Lasso MD. Dental marketing strategist. AI search speaker.
Pete Johnson is the co-founder and VP of Sales & Strategy at Lasso MD, a dental marketing platform based in San Diego, California. He has worked with more than 1,500 dental practices across the United States, specializing in AI search visibility, data-driven marketing strategy, and new patient acquisition for dental practices and DSO organizations.
Pete speaks at dental industry conferences including the IDIA Hawaii Symposium, Rocky Mountain Dental Convention, and Smile Together Las Vegas. His signature lecture, “Mastering AI Search Visibility,” addresses how dental practices can improve their discoverability in AI-generated search results from tools like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI Overviews.
Prior to co-founding Lasso MD in 2018, Pete held sales leadership roles at ProSites and WEO Media — two of the largest dental marketing agencies in the U.S. He maintains a personal site at petejohnsoniv.com with dental marketing education and strategy resources.
Start where it makes sense for you.
Different visitors, different needs. Pick the path that fits.
Why this site exists
Built in the trenches, not in theory.
Most dental marketing content is either too generic to trust or too self-serving to be useful.
I work inside the category every day, talk to practices constantly, study what actually moves patient acquisition, and build around real data instead of recycled agency talking points.
This is where that thinking lives.
The Method
Every recommendation starts with the 4-Signal Audit.
Before I suggest a single change, I measure four things that decide whether a practice gets found and chosen. It's the free competitive analysis I run on every discovery call. No guesswork, no recycled agency playbook.
01
Local Search Authority
Google Business Profile completeness, review velocity, and how fast you respond. The signals Google's local pack actually weighs when it decides who shows up.
02
Findability
Where you rank for the procedures that pay, and whether you only show up for your own name. Service-page coverage plus branded vs. non-branded visibility.
03
AI Search Visibility
Whether ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google's AI Overviews recommend you when a patient asks. The fastest-growing front door in dentistry, and the one almost nobody audits.
04
Conversion Readiness
Site speed, booking flow, and whether your service pages turn a click into a booked consult. Traffic you can't convert is wasted spend.
9 in 10
dental practices we audit are missing the schema markup that tells Google and AI engines what they actually do.
So when a patient asks ChatGPT or Google's AI for a recommendation, those practices are invisible.From 4-Signal Audits across 1,500+ practices · Lasso MD platform data
Results
Proof that goes beyond big claims.
General Dentistry · 8 months
From 18 to 42 new patients per month.
A general dental practice came in with decent fundamentals but too many missed opportunities across local search, service-page clarity, and conversion flow. After tightening the right inputs and measuring what actually mattered, patient flow more than doubled.
18
Before (mo)
42
After (mo)
133%
Increase
Built, not just advised
Most marketers talk about AI search. I built a product in it.
I founded dentalist.ai, an AI tool that matches patients to the right dentist based on what they actually need, not who pays the most to show up first. It's the opposite of how dental directories work today.
Building it meant learning exactly how AI engines decide which practices to recommend. Those are the same signals I now audit for every practice I work with.
What I write about.
Topic hubs organized around the areas that move the needle most for dental practices.
Results That Speak
Numbers don't lie. Neither do clients.
Real results from real dental practices that trusted the process.
$50M+
Patient Revenue Generated
1,500+
Practices Helped
12+
Years in Dental Marketing
20+
Speaking Engagements
“Pete's lecture on Mastering AI Search Visibility was one of the standout sessions at our Hawaii symposium. He makes complex topics actionable, our members were taking notes the entire time. That's why I keep inviting him back.”
DAKG
Dr. Arun K. Garg
Founder, International Dental Implant Association
Latest Insights
From the dental marketing trenches
Strategies, data breakdowns, and practice growth playbooks — straight from 12+ years in the industry.
Speaking
Speaking for conferences, groups, and dental organizations.
Talks built on real examples, not recycled trend decks. Topics include AI search visibility, local SEO, and what's actually changing in dental marketing right now.