How Do You Measure Generative Engine Optimization?

As more searches are conducted using AI chat, there’s no shortage of advice on how to maximize visibility on the new search engines. But how do you measure the success of your efforts?

“AI visibility can be defined as the measure of how accessible, interpretable, and ultimately, how frequently and accurately your content is surfaced and integrated into responses generated by artificial intelligence systems,” according to SEOSpace. However, when most AI search results don’t result in clicks, the next question is, what GEO metrics actually matter to your brand?

We look at the nuanced and evolving world of GEO.

What matters in AI search visibility?

In the AI-age, search takes many forms—from AI-generated responses at the top of traditional search results to answers in a longer chat—but some marketers may find it helpful to think about GEO in terms of an older digital marketing concept: social media vanity metrics.

For years, social media marketers have talked about vanity metrics, those superficial data points that ultimately don’t mean much. Follower counts, likes, and impressions may look impressive, but don't directly correlate to business success or ROI. Marketers trying to measure AI visibility are now learning how to discern between a whole new set of vanity metrics and what really matters when it comes to moving the needle for brands.

First, you might ask, is our content influencing the answers being delivered? That’s a good sign that your content is visible to AI but won’t necessarily lead to measurable impacts for your brand. So, as mbsearch suggests, you will also want to ask questions that dive deeper into the reality of what visibility can do for your brand:

• Is AI exposure increasing brand demand?
• Is it contributing to conversions?

The factors influencing the answers to these two questions are myriad, but there are a few markers brands should be paying special attention to:

• Where does your brand rank when users ask for relevant recommendations? You want your brand to top any ranked list AI offers.
• Is AI relaying positive, neutral, or negative information about your brand? You want to be sure AI has only good things to say about your brand when potential customers start asking questions.
• Is your content being cited, giving users the ability to learn more if necessary? Links are still the best way to drive traffic, so be sure yours shows up when your content is being used.

In short, focus on meaningful metrics that say more than just whether or not a large language model (LLM) is ingesting your content and regurgitating it. Keep your eye on the ball to ensure you are surfacing in the right ways to drive traffic and conversions.

The mechanics of GEO measurement

Knowing what to measure is one thing. Knowing how to measure it is another. Traditional SEO tools have been around for decades and have had plenty of time to mature. AI visibility tools are another matter. While some offer DIY advice for how to track your visibility that involves manual tracking relevant parameters, automated tools are beginning to emerge.

Microsoft’s traffic monitoring platform Clarity has been updated to measure AI search visibility.

In February, Microsoft announced early access to the updated tool saying, “AI Citations in Microsoft Clarity unifies signals across Bing Webmaster Tools and Clarity to deliver end-to-end visibility across the AI ecosystem, from bot crawling and indexing to how your content is cited in AI-generated answers and drives AI-referred traffic to your site.”

Do GEO visibility tools really work? A survey

In addition to Microsoft’s offer, a number of AI visibility tools and audits have come onto the market recently and SEOptimer has carried out a survey of the field.

According to the survey, these tools work by running prompts across major AI platforms, collecting the responses, and surfacing data on your brand's share of voice, sentiment, citations, and competitive positioning.

The kinds of tracking they perform include:

• AI Overview Tracking

This tracks your brand's presence within Google AI Overviews. These overviews pull from trusted sources all around the web, and appearing in them can significantly boost brand exposure.

• LLM Answer Tracking

LLM tracking involves sending prompts to AI platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Claude, and Gemini, then analyzing the responses for brand mentions, citations, and sentiment.

• AI Brand Monitoring

Beyond raw mention counts, AI brand monitoring captures sentiment, competitive benchmarking, citation analysis, and visibility trends over time.

SEOptimer identified what they considered the most effective of the tools:

Beyond prompt simulation

But is prompt simulation the best way to probe a brand’s visibility to the AI search engines?

Italian agency TSW has raised doubts about the approach. Gilberto Marciano, digital analyst at TSW, observed:

“Many tools on the market today (even the best known) are mainly based on prompt simulations and proprietary scoring. They are useful as an indication, but often they are not very comparable over time, sensitive to changes in context and do not always clarify why a brand is mentioned (or excluded), nor with what quality and consistency with respect to key messages.”

TSW’s alternative approach begins with surveying the brand’s target audience over time to create a database of customer queries and behavior. These results can then be interrogated using customized dashboards, allowing the evolution of brand visibility to be tracked and correlated with optimization actions.

The human factor in AI audit

While the tools examined in the survey above may or may not provide the relevant data, Forbes stresses the importance of the correct interpretation and implementation of audit results:

“An audit isn’t just about data collection. Leaders need to extract valuable insights from the data and understand how to take action.”

Forbes warns that human analysis of the audit findings is still key to:

• Identify the gaps in brand messaging and how to deploy standardized updates that align with people, not just AI bots
• Develop and execute an effective content strategy
• Improve third-party validations through a PR strategy
• Strengthen the website structure so that it aligns with GEO objectives, supports SEO, and delivers a good user experience
• Identify barriers that may prevent AI platforms from crawling, interpreting, and citing the brand content

It will remain important to balance the demands of AI crawlers with the actual humans you hope to connect with. And the truth is, if you’re already following good content practices by creating valuable, authoritative content that answers customer questions, and is structured to be easily readable by humans and machines alike, you may be farther along on your journey to AI visibility than you realize.

About Eidosmedia

Eidosmedia is a global supplier of advanced content-management and digital publishing systems.

Its products are used by large news-media groups for print and digital publishing and by financial service firms for the creation and dissemination of research and guidance.

Customers include business dailies The Financial Times and The Wall Street Journal , as well as generalist news publications like The Times of London, The Boston Globe and Le Figaro .

Find out more about Eidosmedia digital publishing solutions.