In today’s marketing landscape, the concept of AI visibility has emerged as a critical concern for many professionals. As brands adapt to the changing dynamics of online search, understanding how they are represented in AI-driven platforms has become increasingly vital.
The phenomenon known as the zero-click reality has led to a surge in tools that aim to offer insights into when and where brands appear in AI chatbot responses. Research from the Pew Research Center indicates that users are less likely to click through to links when an AI-generated summary is presented at the top of search results. Specifically, users who encounter these summaries clicked on traditional search result links in only 8% of cases, compared to nearly double the frequency for those who did not see an AI summary.
As web traffic declines and more users turn to large language models (LLMs), the industry is in a quandary: are these visibility tools essential to strategy or merely another marketing gimmick?
Is this just another gamble for profit in the advertising industry?
Marketers are increasingly eager to understand their brand’s visibility and are wary of being overlooked in AI environments—something tech vendors are well aware of. While the precise number of available AI visibility, brand visibility, generative engine optimization, or answer engine optimization tools remains unclear, platforms such as Profound, Peec AI, and Ahrefs Brand Radar have emerged as prominent players, according to agency executives.
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According to Lauren Wang, founder and CEO of Flex, a feminine hygiene product brand, “In the days of Google, it was easier for a brand to understand its ranking. Now that information is largely opaque.” This lack of clarity often leads to inconsistent outcomes for marketers striving to achieve these new GEO wins, with many platforms unable to completely eliminate AI hallucinations or misattributions.
As AI visibility is still in its early stages, distinguishing between various tools is primarily based on the reliability of data and the platforms’ capacity to interpret brand content effectively, executives say. Agency leaders acknowledge that these tools function more as benchmarks rather than definitive sources of truth.
Thriving GEO Market
The landscape is filled with AI and brand visibility tools such as Profound, Otterly.AI, and AthenaHQ. Larger enterprise platforms have also introduced comparable offerings, including SEMRush AI SEO Toolkit and Ahrefs Brand Radar.
Notably, tech giants are making significant moves. Recently, Adobe acquired Semrush—a brand visibility platform—for $1.9 billion to enhance its AI discoverability capabilities. Meanwhile, Microsoft has expanded Microsoft Clarity to assist users in understanding which web pages are referenced in AI-generated answers and the frequency of those mentions.
In addition, some agencies and brands are opting to create their own internal AI visibility tracking tools to reduce costs. For instance, the “social-first” marketing agency Noise Media Group uses its Voodoo.ai tool to track how often a brand is referenced in LLM outputs. Flex employs existing platforms like Semrush while developing its own internal tool to reign in expenses, according to Wang.
This scenario leaves marketers dependent on predictions rather than certainties.
At a fundamental level, AI visibility platforms run extensive queries on LLMs like ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and Perplexity to retrieve cited sources. These platforms then analyze how often a brand is mentioned relative to its competitors.
More sophisticated AI visibility and GEO tools can deliver detailed reports that break down mentions by device type, location, and the specific prompts or keywords triggering those citations. However, many tools currently offer only “point-in-time” data instead of continuous evaluation, as noted by Heather Physioc, Chief Discoverability Officer at VML. A comprehensive view of brand discoverability trends across channels remains elusive.
Paul Dyer, CEO of /prompt—a native services agency—points out, “The challenges faced by SEO analytics tools like Semrush and social media listening are now also affecting GEO.” He states that different tools often yield conflicting results, saying, “Using three distinct tools with the same prompts can lead to three different outcomes.”
In terms of pricing, one agency executive, who requested anonymity, mentioned that Profound’s services can be as high as $1,000 per month. The company website states that its starter pack begins at $99, which includes tracking for ChatGPT and 50 prompts. For $399, marketers can track three answer engines, 100 prompts, and receive six optimized articles monthly, while enterprise pricing is custom-made.
Ahrefs’ basic plan starts at $129 monthly, covering 750 tracked keywords and five prompts, along with six months of historical data. Users can opt for a package at $249 for two years of historical data, 2,000 tracked keywords, and 10 prompts. The advanced package costs $449 a month, offering five years of historical data, 5,000 tracked keywords, and 20 prompts.
Benchmark or Source of Truth?
In some instances, clients are responsible for covering the costs of these tools, depending on agency partners to guide them on the value of each.
“We know too little about these companies to justify the charges, but it’s undeniably early in the game,” commented Joseph Levi, CEO of Noise Media Group. “What seems consistent and genuinely helpful is tracking how often your brand shows up across various types of queries.”
VML is actively experimenting with around 17 different emerging AI tools—including Profound, Adobe LLM Optimizer, and Evertune—according to Physioc. Conversely, the Markacy performance marketing team favors niche tools tailored for specific AI visibility tasks such as tracking and analytics, rather than broad platforms attempting to address every aspect of AI SEO visibility.
The lack of benchmarks, irregular outcomes, and challenges with attribution make it a tough landscape, yet investing in these tools has become almost imperative for marketers. The rise of AI chatbots has diminished website referral traffic, and marketers are instinctively seeking insights. Although AI visibility doesn’t offer a direct link to sales attribution, there’s a growing suspicion that enhanced AI visibility correlates with improved brand awareness and site traffic.
In the end, many marketers contend that, “There’s not much an AI tool can do beyond serving as a benchmark,” according to Ryan Mason, President and COO of Markacy.
