Visibility across ChatGPT, Perplexity and Google AI Overviews

For decades, typing a question into Google’s search bar was the natural reflex whenever we needed answers. Today, that’s no longer a given. AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini are reshaping how people search and discover information online.

Even though Google still accounts for the vast majority of search queries, it’s becoming increasingly important for businesses to focus on achieving visibility within the answers provided by AI agents and large language models (LLMs). Unlike traditional Google searches, users don’t just receive links here–they get direct answers.

At the same time, the rise of AI chatbots is also reshaping Google’s results. With AI Overviews (AIOs), Google is currently attempting to merge both technologies by generating AI-generated answers that are prominently displayed as the first result above the organic search results.

That means businesses must start asking themselves: How can we stay visible in this new landscape, and what does visibility even mean in the age of AI?

AI Visibility: What does Visibility Mean in the Age of AI?

When it comes to the answers provided by AI, there are essentially two metrics that can be used to measure the visibility of a brand, company or product:

• The website is cited as a source and linked (citation), and/or
• the brand, company, or product is mentioned within the answer of AI (brand mention).

In other words, visibility no longer means simply appearing in search results, but also becoming part of the answer.

SEO Visibility – How We Traditionally Measure Visibility

In traditional search engine optimisation, visibility is tracked using keywords. There are two approaches: you can either track your own set of highly relevant keywords, or analyse your domain’s visibility within large keyword samples (for example, using the SISTRIX Visibility Index).

Along with the data provided by Google in the Google Search Console, this gives us an idea of how visible our website is in search engines and how well it performs for specific topics in Google searches.

Google AI Overviews

Since late March, Google’s AI Overviews have also been available in German-speaking countries, albeit in a limited capacity. Initially, they were only shown to logged-in users aged 18 and over. In other markets, particularly the US, AIOs are already a standard feature of search results for all users.

Unfortunately, Google itself doesn’t provide any data about AI Overviews. When your content is cited in an AI Overview and our website is listed as a source, it will appear as an impression and potentially a click in the Search Console’s performance report. However, under the “Search Appearance” tab, there’s currently no additional information about AI Overviews.

Major SEO suites such as ahrefs, SEMrush and SISTRIX have already adapted and now show when Google displays an AI Overview for a specific search query and whether your domain is cited in it.

For the DACH region, however, this was difficult until recently, since AIOs only became visible to non-logged-in users (and thus to tools) a short time ago.

ChatGPT, Perplexity & Co.: Tracking Visibility in Chatbots and Answer Engines

When it comes to ChatGPT, Perplexity and other AI agents, things get even more complicated. Here too, there are different approaches to tracking the visibility of your brand or website within their answers.

Manual Tracking

To get a first impression of whether your brand, company or products are mentioned, you can start by manually asking ChatGPT, Perplexity, DeepSearch, or Gemini. For a more organized approach, you can save the prompts/questions and the AI’s responses in an Excel or Google Sheet and analyse them.

With the help of an API, a simple Google Apps Script, or an add-on like “ChatGPT for Sheets”, this process can also be scaled quite easily

Will Reynolds from Seer has made a hands-on video on this:

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It does get tricky, though, when you want to track development and change over a longer period of time. That’s why more and more tools are entering the market aiming to make it easier to monitor visibility across large language models and AI agents easier.

AI Brand Visibility Tools – An Overview

Profund

At the moment, Profund appears to be the most powerful tool on the market. However, as an ‘enterprise tool’, its pricing is also quite substantial, starting at USD 1,000 per month for one brand/topic.

In return, you get not only the Answer Engine Insights tracking tool, but also a complete GEO suite: the Conversation Explorer is designed to assist with GEO keyword and prompt research, while Agent Analytics provides insights into how often user agents of AI tools access your website’s content.

Peec AI

Peec AI from Berlin starts at €90 per month and currently focuses purely on AI visibility tracking. After entering your brand, website, and an initial prompt, the tool also suggests additional relevant prompts to explore.

By default, it tracks ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AI, with the prompts being queried daily. The responses are then analysed for brand mentions (including sentiment) and citations.

Otterly.AI

The Austrian tool Otterly.AI also aims to offer an extended GEO suite. In addition to tracking custom prompts across ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Google AIOs, it also includes an “AI Keyword Research” feature, allowing users to identify relevant prompts based on their brand, classic SEO keywords, or specific URLs. In that sense, it works much like a traditional keyword research tool—but for prompts..

A built-in GEO audit analyzes your website and brand with regard to generative engine optimisation. At $29 per month, the tool is one of the most affordable options out there.

AI Visibility in Traditional SEO Tools

Established SEO platforms like SISTRIX, Semrush, and Ahrefs are also working to integrate AI monitoring into their toolsets.

While SISTRIX currently only allows users to sign up for the waitlist for the open beta of SISTRIX for Chatbots, SEMrush has already introduced tracking for ‘keywords’ — or rather, prompts — within ChatGPT Search.

However, SEMrush attempts to display this feature within its regular Position Tracking tool, only showing citations, meaning whether a URL from your own domain appears in the AI-generated result. There is no evaluation of whether your brand or product is actually mentioned within the AI’s response.

Ahrefs’ Brand Radar is currently focused primarily on analysing Google AI Overviews. Support for ChatGPT and Perplexity has been announced but is not yet available.

Meanwhile, high-end enterprise SEO platforms such as seoClarity and BrightEdge have already integrated nearly all the key features needed for monitoring AI brand and search visibility.

The Challenge of Prompt Research: Asking the Right Questions

No matter which tool or tracking setup you choose, the biggest challenge right now is identifying the “right” prompts and questions.

How do real users search for companies like mine? How do they search for my products? What questions do they ask? How do they phrase their prompts?

In traditional SEO keyword tracking, almost every tool provides an estimated monthly search volume (usually based on data from the Google Keyword Planner), and the Google Search Console also gives us insights into which search terms users enter before landing on our website.

In contrast, neither OpenAI nor Perplexity, or any other providers, share information or statistics on how often specific questions, prompts, or formulations are used.

That’s why AI prompt research will become a key element of GEO in the future. Which prompts generate answers that mention my brand? And how does my target audience actually phrase their questions?

In the Future, Visibility Beyond Google Will Be Essential

AI chatbots pose a real threat to Google’s search engine monopoly. Even though Google will likely remain the leading search engine for the foreseeable future, certain types of queries are increasingly shifting towards generative AI.

And once your target audience starts searching there, your brand or company need to be present there too, as a source, or part of the answer.

Monitoring relevant prompts and questions across different AI platforms will therefore become a crucial part of any effort to increase visibility in the world of AI.