---
title: "How to get your safari camp found on ChatGPT, Gemini and Google: a plain guide for owners"
slug: "get-safari-camp-found-chatgpt-gemini"
language: "en"
date: "2026-10-29T10:01:25.593Z"
updated: "2026-10-29T10:11:08.354Z"
author: "NJ"
description: "Guests now ask ChatGPT and Gemini where to stay. What that means for a safari camp, what you can check this week, and what we do for camps in Kenya."
canonical: "https://blog.karibukit.com/get-safari-camp-found-chatgpt-gemini/"
tags: ["safari lodges", "kenya", "ai", "marketing", "direct bookings"]
---

I'm currently talking to camp owners and tour operators around my area (the Maasai Mara) to sort of sell [KaribuKit](https://karibukit.com) (the hotel software we built at [SimbaStack](https://simbastack.com) and run our own lodge on). What I'm seeing is everyone really is just looking to get more business. And they're all hearing a lot about AI, ChatGPT, Gemini and all of that, but they're not sure where to start.

I run [Mara Hilltop](https://marahilltop.com), the lodge I started near Sekenani Gate in the Maasai Mara. We're still new and still trying to get our name out, so I often ask guests how they found us. Quite often they say they found us through Gemini or through ChatGPT. And many of them say they love the blogs I'm writing, that they're very helpful, and that's how they found us. So I think that's what has really contributed to people finding us online.

![Drone photo of Mara Hilltop at sunset: the curved main building with its rooftop deck and pool, tents among the acacia trees, and the Maasai Mara plains stretching to the horizon](https://blog.karibukit.com/_media/mn6jqwec.jpg)

## How guests find a safari camp now

A guest planning a safari used to type "where to stay in Masai Mara" into Google, read TripAdvisor and a few lodge websites, and then email three or four camps. A lot of them still do. More of them now ask ChatGPT or Gemini the same question and get a short list of names back, and Google itself now writes an AI answer at the top of many searches.

It's still early. On its [results call this summer](https://www.phocuswire.com/news/finance/booking-holdings-q2-2026-earnings), Booking.com's parent company said traffic sent by AI chatbots was under 1% of its room nights. In an [Expedia survey in April](https://skift.com/2026/04/14/expedia-ai-survey-travel-discovery-booking-8-percent/), 53% of travellers said they were happy for AI to suggest options, but only 8% would trust it to book for them.

Here's where visits to [our own website](https://marahilltop.com) came from this month.

![Bar chart of where visits to marahilltop.com came from, 1 to 28 October 2026, 2,404 visits in total: direct 993, Google search 821, Reddit 161, Instagram 59, Google Maps listing 51, Bing 46, ChatGPT 30, Facebook 25. Note: guests who found us on ChatGPT or Gemini often read the answer and then search our name on Google, so those visits are counted as Google or direct.](https://blog.karibukit.com/_media/zqtu5vjw.png)

If you only look at the analytics, ChatGPT is tiny, 30 visits out of 2,404. The guests telling me they found us on Gemini don't show up as Gemini. They read the answer, then type our name into Google, so they're counted as Google search or as direct.

These AI answers lean on what the rest of the internet says about you: TripAdvisor, Google reviews, Reddit threads, YouTube, travel magazines, booking sites, and your own website. So your website on its own isn't enough.

## What you can check and fix this week

1. Ask the AI about yourself. Open ChatGPT and Gemini on your phone and type what a guest would type. "Where should I stay near [your gate or town]?" "A quiet camp in [your area] under $300 a night?" "Is [your camp's name] good?" Write down if you're named, and what it says about you (the price, and what kind of place it thinks you are). Do the same thing again in a month.

2. Sort out your Google listing. That's the box that shows up on Google Maps when someone searches your name. Phone number, website, real photos, and a reply to every review.

3. Put your prices on your website, as text. Not only inside a PDF, and not "contact us for rates". A guest wants to know if you're in their budget before they write to you, and an AI assistant can only repeat a price it can read. Even "from $X per person sharing, full board" is better than nothing.

4. Fix your listings where AI reads. TripAdvisor, Booking.com, SafariBookings and the Kenya directories. Use the same name and description everywhere, check the location is right, and claim the listings you haven't claimed. Ours on TripAdvisor was filed under the wrong village, unclaimed, with no phone number and no website, so it didn't show in the main "hotels in Maasai Mara" list at all.

5. Write about what your guests actually ask you. Your WhatsApp is full of the topics. How do I get from Nairobi to the camp? What does a Mara safari really cost? Is it safe? When is the migration? Our post on [whether Nairobi is safe](https://marahilltop.com/blog/is-nairobi-safe-where-to-stay/) got 5,918 Google impressions and 277 visits in the last four weeks, more than any page on our site except the homepage. Posts like that are also what ChatGPT and Gemini pick up.

6. Check your website isn't blocking AI assistants. Some website security settings block AI bots by default, and then ChatGPT and Claude can't read your site at all. Ask whoever built your website to check (it's a quick setting for them).

7. Let guests check rates and availability straight away, instead of having to contact you and wait. If a guest has to send a message and wait until tomorrow for a price, a lot of them will have booked somewhere else by then.

8. Ask guests how they found you, and write it down. Do it at check-in, or put it in your booking form.

## What's coming in 2026 and 2027: AI that books

I know that the way people plan their trips is changing, and very soon everyone is going to have an AI agent of their own, like a personal assistant who does their searching, researching and booking and everything else. Even if it's not booking, just looking at the initial information, that's what people will be doing over the next few months and years.

So that's why I thought we need to make our property the most inviting for AI agents. We want to make sure it's visible to them, it's indexed properly, it's in the format they like, and if they want more information, they can ask questions. They can also make reservations if needed.

![How an AI assistant books a room at Mara Hilltop, in four steps. 1: the guest asks their assistant, for example for a camp near Sekenani Gate for two nights in March. 2: the assistant checks the lodge's live rooms and real prices in KaribuKit. 3: it holds a room and sends the guest a deposit link. 4: the guest pays and the lodge confirms the booking. Every price comes from the lodge's system, never from the AI.](https://blog.karibukit.com/_media/53553t86.png)

Mara Hilltop is bookable by ChatGPT and Claude today (we wrote more about [how the lodge uses AI](https://marahilltop.com/blog/how-our-safari-lodge-uses-ai/) on its own blog). A traveller's assistant connects to our system (the technical name for this connection is MCP), checks live availability and our real prices, and holds a room. The guest pays the deposit through a link, and we confirm. For now a guest adds our link in their assistant's settings, and we're working on getting listed in the ChatGPT and Claude app directories.

The big platforms are going the same way. In August, Google started [booking hotels inside its AI Mode](https://blog.google/products-and-platforms/products/search/book-travel-ai-mode/) in the US, and the launch partners were Booking.com, Expedia and the big hotel chains. Independent camps weren't on that list. If the only way an assistant can book you is through an OTA, you pay the OTA's commission on those guests too.

## What we do for camps

This is where [KaribuKit](https://karibukit.com) comes in. We have a complete package where we're literally hand-holding you through it: getting you discovered by Google and these AI platforms, getting you ready for the agentic stuff, and getting you to the modern era right now.

It starts with a free check of where you show up today (Google, Maps, ChatGPT, Gemini and your listings), before we build anything. That's the baseline we measure against later.

| What a guest (or their AI) needs | What we set up |
|---|---|
| To find you on Google, Maps and in AI answers | A website built for search and AI to read, your listings sorted, and a blog I help you with |
| To see a price, not "contact us for rates" | Your real prices on your own site |
| An answer now, not tomorrow | A website chat that answers any time with your real prices, and hands over to your team when it needs a person |
| To book without emails back and forth | A live booking page with a deposit link, and bookable by ChatGPT and Claude |
| For you, to know it's working | The numbers every month: where you show up, how many guests asked, how many booked, and how they found you |

All of it runs on KaribuKit, the hotel system we run Mara Hilltop on ([six months of numbers here](https://blog.karibukit.com/ai-native-safari-lodge-software-kenya/)), so your rooms and prices are the same on your website, on Booking.com and in the AI assistants.

We can't guarantee bookings, and nobody honest can promise you a spot on Google or in ChatGPT. Compared to what most camps have right now, which is a basic website, no blog at all and one mention somewhere, this is going to increase your visibility and your chances of getting more bookings. At least that's what helped us at Mara Hilltop this year.

## Who this is for

Camps, boutique lodges, safari camps and small resorts in Kenya (the places run by owners who'd rather spend their time with guests than on the internet). We're starting in Kenya, and we're expanding soon to other countries in the region.

If that's you, just give us a shout. We'll do the free check on your camp and show you where you stand. The WhatsApp button is on [karibukit.com](https://karibukit.com), or message us directly on [WhatsApp](https://wa.me/17176839393).

— NJ