How to improve brand visibility in AI search

When someone asks ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Google AI Overviews to recommend a product in your category, does your brand appear in the answer?

For B2B SaaS companies, this is becoming an important question. Potential customers can now research software, compare vendors, and get product recommendations directly from AI platforms, sometimes without visiting a company's website.

In our research, How Big Is AI Search?, we found that AI tools generated approximately 49.3 billion monthly sessions in Q2 2026, compared with 97.3 billion sessions across traditional search engines.

However, AI usage and AI search are different. After estimating which LLM prompts were actually search-related, we found that LLMs generated approximately 45.9 billion search-equivalent queries per month, compared with 535.2 billion searches on traditional search engines.

Traditional search still accounts for the majority of search demand. But AI platforms have become an additional channel where potential customers discover and evaluate businesses. You might rank for important keywords on Google and still be absent when someone asks an AI assistant to recommend solutions in your category.

Improving that visibility requires understanding the questions your buyers ask, the sources AI platforms use to answer those questions, and where your brand is missing.

In this article, we'll explain how AI search visibility works and walk through a practical approach to improving it using buyer prompts, citation analysis, content optimization, and third-party visibility.

What is brand visibility in AI search?

Brand visibility in AI search refers to how frequently your business appears in AI-generated answers when potential customers ask questions relevant to your products or services.

For a B2B SaaS company, the objective is to appear for the topics and queries that influence purchasing decisions. For example, consider a company selling global payroll software.

A potential customer might ask ChatGPT:

• "What are the best global payroll platforms for a company with employees in 10 countries?"
• "Which payroll software supports international employees and contractors?"
• "What are the alternatives to Deel for global payroll?"

These are commercially relevant questions because the person asking them may be researching or comparing software providers. If the company's brand regularly appears in these answers, it has visibility for topics that matter to its business.

If competitors appear but the company doesn't, there's an opportunity to improve its presence.

There are three main ways a brand can appear in AI search results.

An AI platform might mention your brand while citing a third-party comparison article. It might also cite a research article from your website without recommending your product. For commercial queries, brand recommendations are particularly interesting because they can introduce your business while a potential customer is evaluating possible vendors.

This is what Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), often referred to as AI SEO, aims to improve: your presence within AI-generated answers for questions relevant to your business.

Is your brand appearing in AI search recommendations?

Find out where your brand appears across ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, Perplexity, and other AI platforms. Identify the buyer queries where competitors are being recommended and opportunities to improve your visibility.

Audit Your AI Visibility

How do AI search engines decide which brands to recommend?

AI search engines use different methods to generate answers, depending on the platform and the question. In many search-enabled experiences, AI systems retrieve information from websites, search indexes, and other available sources, then use that information to construct an answer.

For example, when someone asks Google AI Mode to recommend project management software for a remote team, Google may run several related searches to gather information about available products, capabilities, pricing, and other requirements.

Google calls this process query fan-out. A complex question can lead to multiple related searches before the system generates its response.

ChatGPT, Perplexity, and other AI assistants also have ways to retrieve external information when answering questions, although their retrieval methods and citation behavior differ. This means your website isn't necessarily the only source an AI platform may use to understand your business.

For a software recommendation, relevant information might come from:

• Your product website and documentation.
• Third-party comparison articles and software directories.
• Industry publications and independent research.
• Customer reviews, forums, and relevant community discussions.

The sources used will depend on the platform, the prompt, and the information available.

Several considerations can influence whether your brand is relevant to an AI-generated answer.

• Relevance to the user's question: Your product should match the requirements in the prompt. If someone asks for payroll software that supports international contractors, the information available about your product needs to establish whether it provides that capability.
• Clear and useful content: Pages that explain products, features, use cases, and comparisons directly make it easier for people and retrieval systems to understand the information.
• Credible supporting information: Independent reviews, publications, customer evidence, and original research can provide additional context about a brand and its offerings.
• Accurate brand information: Consistent product descriptions, capabilities, pricing, and company details reduce the chance of AI responses relying on conflicting or outdated information.

There isn't one universal set of ranking factors for AI-generated answers. Different systems pick and present information differently, and the same question can produce different recommendations across platforms.

For marketers, the useful starting point is to study actual responses. Look at which brands appear, which sources are cited, and what information those sources provide. This can help identify specific changes that may improve your visibility.

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Growth Lead, Flowcart

How to improve brand visibility in AI search: 5 proven strategies

Improving AI search visibility involves several activities across your website and external sources. But before creating more content or pursuing brand mentions, you need to know where your brand currently stands.

We recommend starting with the commercial topics you want your business to be associated with, analyzing the AI responses for those topics, and using the findings to decide what to improve.

Step 1. Benchmark your brand visibility for the money topics you want to own

Start by identifying the topics that matter most to your product and the decisions your customers make before purchasing it. These are the topics where appearing in AI-generated answers could introduce your brand to potential customers.

1. Identify your target topics and create relevant buyer prompts

For example, a global payroll company might prioritize topics such as:

• Global payroll software
• Employer of record services
• International contractor management
• Global payroll software comparisons
• Hiring and paying employees in different countries

Each of these topics represents a different type of buyer requirement. Someone researching "global payroll software" may be exploring available platforms. A person comparing two providers may already have a shortlist and be closer to making a decision.

Once you've identified your target topics, the next step is to create relevant buyer prompts.

For example, under the topic "global payroll software," you might track prompts such as:

1. What are the best global payroll platforms for a growing company?
2. Which payroll software supports employees across multiple countries?
3. What are the best alternatives to Deel for international payroll?
4. Which global payroll providers are suitable for a 200-person company?

The goal is to understand where your brand appears when buyers ask these questions, particularly when they don't mention your company by name.

2. Track brand mentions, competitors, and citations

Add these prompts to an AI visibility tracking tool and monitor responses across relevant platforms such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Google AI search experiences.

For every prompt, record:

• Whether your brand is mentioned or recommended.
• Which competitors appear in the answer.
• Which websites and pages are cited as sources.
• How the recommendation is described.
• Which platform generated the response.

For example, if your brand appears in 12 out of 40 tested responses, your observed mention rate is 30% for that test set. You can also compare how often competing brands appear for those same prompts. This gives you a baseline of your current visibility.

Tracking citations is equally important. Suppose ChatGPT repeatedly recommends three competitors and cites the same software comparison website. That tells you something useful: the comparison website is appearing as a source for questions that matter to your business.

You can now examine that website to understand what information it provides and whether there are opportunities to improve your own content or earn relevant third-party coverage.

Keep in mind that AI responses can change between runs:

• Testing a single prompt once won't provide a reliable picture of visibility. 
• Use a consistent prompt set and repeat your checks over time.

The output of this step should be a clear list of your priority topics, current visibility, leading competitors, and the sources most frequently cited for each topic.

Step 2. Prioritize content creation and optimization based on citation patterns

Once you've collected AI responses for your target prompts, the next step is to analyze the pages that AI platforms cite. The objective is to find out which topics generate the most citations and whether your website has content that can compete with the pages being referenced.

1. Group cited pages by topic and compare citation frequency

Start by exporting or collecting the cited URLs across your tracked prompts. Then group pages that discuss the same topic or target similar search intent.

For example, suppose you're tracking prompts related to global payroll software. Across different AI responses, you identify five pages discussing that topic.

In this example, the five pages collectively received 22 citations across your tracked responses.

Repeat this process for other topics, such as employer of record services or contractor management software. You can then compare which topics receive more citations within the prompts and AI platforms you're monitoring.

The citation total isn't a measure of total market demand. It tells you how frequently pages about that topic appeared as sources in your specific tracking sample.

This becomes useful when combined with commercial relevance. A topic with frequent citations and a close connection to your product could be a stronger content opportunity than a topic that receives many citations but has little relevance to your buyers.

2. Decide whether to create new content or optimize an existing page

Next, decide whether to create new content or optimize an existing page. There are two common scenarios.

Scenario 1: You don't have a relevant page covering the topic.

If AI platforms frequently cite pages about global payroll software and your website doesn't have a useful guide covering that subject, consider creating one.

Review the most frequently cited pages to understand the questions they answer, the comparisons they include, and the evidence they provide. Then develop a page that covers the topic properly and offers useful information that existing sources may be missing.

Scenario 2: You already have a relevant page, but it receives few or no citations.

Compare your page with the frequently cited alternatives.

Look for differences in:

• Topic coverage and the specific questions answered.
• Product information, examples, and comparisons.
• Supporting evidence and research.
• Content structure and ease of reading.
• Accuracy and freshness of the information.

The idea isn't to copy the most cited page. It's to understand what it explains well and where your page could provide better information.

For example, if competing pages offer generic descriptions of global payroll software, your company might be able to provide more specific information about country coverage, implementation requirements, integration options, or actual customer use cases.

When creating or updating the content, focus on a few practical improvements:

• Write answer-first content. Give a clear answer to the question near the beginning of the relevant section. Follow it with the details, examples, and evidence needed to explain the answer.
• Use clear headings and structured formats. Descriptive headings, tables, lists, and comparisons can make detailed information easier for readers to follow and for retrieval systems to interpret.
• Support claims with credible sources. Use primary research, product documentation, published studies, and other verifiable information wherever possible.
• Include original research and customer evidence. If your company has conducted a study, analyzed customer data, or documented meaningful product results, use that information to make the content more useful.

Original research is particularly interesting because it gives your website information that isn't available in dozens of similar articles.

At ScaleTheory, for instance, our research on the size of AI search provides estimates based on a documented methodology. That gives other writers and researchers a specific source they can reference when discussing AI search adoption.

You can also use appropriate structured data, such as Organization, Product, or Article schema, to describe the content of your pages. It should match the information visible to users.

However, schema markup by itself doesn't guarantee AI citations. Google explicitly states that no special AI-specific structured data is required to appear in AI Overviews or AI Mode.

The priority is creating content that answers relevant questions accurately and provides a reason for others to reference it.

Step 3. Get your brand included in relevant third-party listicles

For some commercial prompts, AI platforms cite independent comparison articles, software directories, and industry roundups when discussing available products. These pages can become useful opportunities for third-party brand visibility.

1. Identify relevant listicles from your citation data

Go back to the sources collected during your citation analysis and identify pages such as:

• Best software tools in a specific category.
• Product comparisons and alternatives.
• Industry-specific vendor recommendations.
• Software review and buying guides.

Focus on pages that are already appearing as citations for prompts relevant to your business.

For example, suppose multiple AI responses to "best global payroll software for startups" cite an article comparing eight payroll vendors. Your product fits the category, but the article doesn't mention your company.

This gives you a specific outreach opportunity. Rather than contacting hundreds of unrelated websites, you can prioritize publications that are already being referenced in AI answers your buyers are likely to encounter.

2. Prioritize opportunities and reach out to publishers

Before reaching out, evaluate the opportunity.

• Check whether your product genuinely belongs in the list. An article about enterprise payroll systems may not be relevant if your software serves only freelancers.
• Look at the publication and its audience. A specialized industry publication read by your target buyers may be more useful than a general website with little connection to your category.
• Consider how frequently the page is cited. Repeated citations within your tracking sample can help prioritize where to spend outreach time, although past citations don't guarantee future inclusion.

Once you've shortlisted the relevant pages, contact the editors or publishers.

• Explain what your product does, why it's relevant to their article, and what supporting evidence they can use to evaluate it. This could include product documentation, supported features, customer case studies, third-party reviews, or original research.
• Avoid generic outreach asking publishers to add your brand simply because you're trying to improve AI visibility. The request should give them a legitimate editorial reason to consider your company.
• Some publications may offer partnerships, sponsored placements, or paid inclusion opportunities. These should be evaluated separately from earned editorial coverage, with appropriate sponsorship disclosure and link attributes.

The objective is to build an accurate, relevant presence on third-party pages that help buyers compare available solutions.

Even if your brand is added to a frequently cited article, there is no guarantee that an AI platform will begin recommending it. You can assess the outcome through your ongoing prompt tracking and citation analysis.

Step 4. Build visibility on cited social platforms and communities

AI-generated answers can also reference information from community discussions, social platforms, and videos.

For B2B SaaS companies, sources such as Reddit, Quora, YouTube, and specialized industry communities may contain discussions about product experiences, alternatives, pricing, and implementation challenges. But the value of each platform depends on the topic you're tracking.

For example, Reddit discussions might appear frequently in prompts asking for personal experiences with software products, while technical documentation or specialist forums may appear more often for implementation questions.

Instead of assuming every platform deserves equal attention, use your citation data to identify which communities actually appear in the answers you're monitoring.

1. Identify frequently cited discussions and videos

Start by grouping cited URLs by platform. Find out how often Reddit, Quora, YouTube, or other community sources appear across your tracked prompts. Then examine the specific discussions and videos receiving citations.

For example, if several AI answers about international payroll software reference Reddit threads, review those threads to understand what buyers are discussing.

You might find people asking questions such as:

• Which payroll software works best for contractors across multiple countries?
• What issues should businesses consider when moving from one global payroll provider to another?
• Which platforms offer useful integrations with existing HR systems?

These questions can inform both community participation and your own content planning.

2. Contribute to relevant discussions and create useful content

The next step is to contribute where your team has something useful to say.

If a discussion is relevant to your product or expertise, a knowledgeable team member can answer the question, explain the issue, or share relevant experience. Disclose the connection to your company when participating in conversations involving your brand.

For example, if someone asks about international payroll compliance and your company has expertise in that area, you might explain the considerations involved and link to appropriate documentation when it genuinely helps answer the question.

Avoid posting the same promotional response across multiple discussions. The aim is to contribute accurate information that people find useful. Cited discussions also provide ideas for new content. If buyers repeatedly ask about payroll software integrations, your team could create a detailed explanation, comparison, or YouTube video addressing those questions.

For video content, make the explanation specific and provide clear titles, descriptions, and supporting information so users can understand what it covers. You can then monitor whether your participation and published material begin appearing in relevant AI responses.

There is no fixed list of community platforms that every business needs to prioritize.

Start with the platforms receiving citations for your target topics and concentrate on discussions where your expertise is relevant.

Step 5. Keep your website and external business information accurate

AI platforms can encounter information about your company from several different websites. If those sources contain conflicting or outdated details, the resulting answers may describe your product incorrectly.

For example, suppose your company has expanded its payroll coverage from 15 to 30 countries, but third-party directories still mention the older number. A potential customer asking ChatGPT about country availability could receive outdated information, depending on which sources the platform uses.

That creates a problem even when your brand is being mentioned.

1. Review and update your brand information across sources

Start by reviewing the information available across your owned and external profiles.

Check your website's product pages, pricing pages, company descriptions, industry listings, software review profiles, and other relevant public sources.

Look for outdated or inconsistent information about:

• Product features and supported capabilities.
• Pricing and available plans.
• Integrations, geographic coverage, and use cases.
• Company name, product positioning, and business details.

Update your own pages first, then correct external listings wherever you have editorial access or can request an update.

For B2B SaaS businesses, platforms such as G2, Capterra, company directories, and relevant industry websites may need regular attention. Google Business Profile is relevant where local or business-location information matters.

2. Check website accessibility and AI crawler permissions

You should also check whether important pages can be discovered and accessed.

Make sure relevant content is indexable, isn't unintentionally blocked in robots.txt, and can be read without relying on inaccessible page elements.

Different AI crawlers also serve different purposes.

For example, OpenAI distinguishes between OAI-SearchBot, which supports website discovery for ChatGPT search, and GPTBot, which is associated with model training.

A company can make separate decisions about access for these crawlers. Blocking one does not necessarily require blocking the other.

Google's AI Overviews and AI Mode continue to rely on established Google Search systems and technical requirements. These checks don't need to become a separate optimization program. They should form part of your existing website maintenance and technical SEO process.

Review important information whenever your product, pricing, positioning, or service coverage changes.

The ultimate goal is when AI platforms or potential customers encounter information about your business, it should be accurate.

How Flowcart reached 1,100+ monthly organic clicks in just 5 months

See how ScaleTheory helped Flowcart build organic visibility across Google and LLMs from scratch, with 12 of 20 target keywords ranking in Google's top three and early growth in AI search traffic.

Read the full case study ->

How to measure brand visibility in AI search

Once you've started improving your content and third-party presence, you need to understand whether your brand is appearing more frequently in relevant AI-generated answers.

Traditional SEO metrics such as rankings, impressions, and organic traffic remain useful. However, they don't fully explain what happens when someone discovers your business through an AI-generated recommendation without visiting your website.

We recommend measuring AI visibility using a consistent set of buyer prompts and reviewing the results across the platforms that matter to your audience.

1. Track how often AI search engines mention your brand

Start by measuring how frequently your brand appears in responses to your tracked prompts.

Brand mention rate = Responses mentioning your brand ÷ Total responses tested × 100

For example, if your brand appears in 20 out of 50 tested responses, the mention rate is 40%. Measure this separately for each platform where possible. You may find that your brand appears frequently in Google AI Overviews but rarely in ChatGPT recommendations, or the opposite.

That difference can help identify where to investigate further.

2. Measure how often AI search engines cite or link to your website

A brand mention doesn't always include a link to your website. Citation tracking measures how often AI platforms reference pages from your domain as supporting sources. Track which pages receive citations, which prompts generate those citations, and which platforms provide them.

Citation rate = Responses citing your website ÷ Total responses tested × 100

Use this definition consistently across your reporting. You should also examine third-party citations.

If AI platforms frequently cite a competitor's comparison page or an industry publication, those sources can help explain where the current answers are getting information. This is useful for identifying future content and outreach opportunities.

3. Compare how often AI recommends your brand versus competitors

Measuring your brand's appearance alone doesn't show how competitive it is. You also need to understand which other companies are being recommended for the same questions.

For example, across 50 responses to relevant payroll software prompts, suppose:

• Competitor A appears in 35 responses.
• Competitor B appears in 28 responses.
• Your brand appears in 15 responses.

Your brand is appearing less frequently than the two competitors within that prompt set. This gives you a practical way to evaluate competitive visibility.

AI visibility tools may report related comparisons as share of voice, although the calculation can vary between tools. The important point is to compare brands using the same prompts, platforms, and measurement period.

4. Check how AI search engines describe your brand and products

Visibility is useful only if the information being presented is accurate and relevant. Review the explanations AI platforms provide when mentioning your business. Check whether they correctly describe your product category, capabilities, supported use cases, and other information that influences buyer decisions.

For example, an AI platform might recommend your payroll software but describe it as suitable only for small businesses, even though your product also supports larger companies.

Record recurring inaccuracies and identify the sources that might be contributing to them. Also examine whether the responses accurately reflect your product's strengths and limitations.

This helps you understand the brand narrative buyers may encounter before visiting your website.

5. Track website visits, leads, and conversions from AI search

AI-generated answers don't always lead to website visits. However, some platforms provide source links that users can click when they want more information. Use your web analytics platform to identify visits referred from AI tools where referral information is available.

Then examine what those visitors do after arriving.

Useful metrics include:

• AI referral visits.
• Demo requests and form submissions.
• Trial signups and other relevant conversions.
• Qualified leads and pipeline associated with identifiable AI referrals.

Keep in mind that referral tracking will not capture every AI-influenced interaction.

A buyer might discover your company through ChatGPT, then search for your brand on Google and visit your website later. That interaction may appear as branded search traffic rather than an AI referral.

For this reason, it's useful to examine AI visibility alongside branded search demand, direct traffic, and CRM attribution data. These additional metrics can provide context, although changes in them don't independently prove that AI visibility caused the increase.

6. Monitor changes in your brand's AI search visibility over time

A one-time visibility audit gives you a starting point. To understand whether your activities are working, you need to compare results over time. Use a consistent set of buyer prompts and track them regularly across your chosen AI platforms.

For more reliable comparisons, record the testing dates, platforms, markets, and number of responses sampled.

Review changes in:

• Brand mentions and recommendation frequency.
• Website citations and frequently cited pages.
• Competitor visibility.
• Accuracy of brand descriptions.
• AI referral traffic and conversions.

For example, after publishing new content on global payroll software, you can examine whether your website receives more citations for the associated prompts. If visibility improves, investigate which pages and sources are contributing to the change.

If competitors continue to appear more frequently, return to the citation data to understand what information supports their inclusion.

AI responses can vary over time because of model updates, retrieval changes, and differences in how prompts are interpreted. Individual movements shouldn't automatically be attributed to a specific optimization.

Look for patterns across repeated tests and related prompts.

The purpose of measurement is to decide what to work on next and whether those activities are contributing to greater visibility for the topics your business wants to own.

How ScaleTheory helps brands improve visibility in AI search

For B2B SaaS companies, being mentioned or recommended in the answers to relevant buyer questions can create visibility before someone visits a website or contacts a sales team.

However, traditional SEO remains important. Our research shows that search engines continue to account for the majority of search-equivalent queries, while Google is also expanding AI-generated answers through AI Overviews and AI Mode. Businesses need to consider both traditional search performance and their visibility within AI-generated answers.

At ScaleTheory, our AI search optimization strategy starts with:

• Understanding the commercial topics and buyer prompts where a brand needs visibility.
• We then analyze the responses and cited sources to identify opportunities for content creation, existing content optimization, and third-party brand presence.
• We use VisibilityX, our AI visibility tracking tool, to monitor how brands appear across relevant AI search platforms, compare their visibility with competitors, and identify the websites and topics that may offer opportunities for improvement.
• The focus is on increasing relevant brand mentions, citations, and recommendations while continuing to improve traditional search visibility.

These activities are prioritized around the topics that matter to the business, with performance evaluated against visibility, qualified traffic, and pipeline outcomes.

If you want to understand where your brand appears in AI-generated answers and what you can do to improve its visibility, book a demo with ScaleTheory.

FAQs

1. How can I get my brand mentioned in ChatGPT and other AI search engines?

Start by identifying the buyer queries relevant to your business and checking which brands appear in AI-generated answers. Analyze the cited sources, improve your website content, and build your presence on relevant third-party websites, review platforms, and industry publications.

2. How do I identify the right AI search queries to target?

Focus on the topics your potential customers research before making a purchase. Create prompts around product categories, use cases, comparisons, and alternatives. Prioritize queries where your product is relevant and where appearing in AI recommendations could influence a buying decision.

3. Does ranking higher on Google guarantee visibility in AI search?

No. Ranking higher on Google can support visibility in Google's AI search features, but it doesn't guarantee mentions or citations. AI platforms may also reference third-party articles, reviews, and other sources when generating answers.

4. Can third-party websites improve my brand's AI search visibility?

Yes. AI search engines can cite information from industry publications, comparison articles, review sites, and community discussions. Getting your brand included in relevant, frequently cited sources can create opportunities for greater visibility, although inclusion doesn't guarantee an AI recommendation.

5. How long does it take to improve brand visibility in AI search?

There is no fixed timeline. Results depend on your existing visibility, the competitiveness of your category, and the changes you make. Track the same buyer prompts regularly to measure improvements in brand mentions, website citations, and recommendations over time.