AI share of voice
AI share of voice, measured across the whole field
AI share of voice tells you how much of the conversation your brand holds when AI assistants answer questions in your category. We count every brand named across repeated answers, work out your share of those mentions and citations, and report it by assistant, by question type and against named competitors, with the margin each figure carries.
Mention share, one question group
- Rival A31%
- Rival B22%
- You9%
- All others38%
Four measures, defined
| Measure | How it is calculated | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|
| Visibility | Answers mentioning your brand ÷ all answers sampled | How often you appear at all |
| Mention share | Your brand mentions ÷ all brand mentions | Your slice of the conversation |
| Citation share | Citations of your site ÷ all cited sources | How often your pages are the evidence |
| Weighted share | Mention share with buying-stage questions counted more | Share where it matters commercially |
We lead with visibility and share rather than rank position, following research by SparkToro and Gumshoe.ai that found how often a brand appears to be far steadier than where it appears. The sampling behind the figures is explained on the LLM visibility audit page.
Four ways we cut the figures
- I-01By assistantChatGPT, Google AI, Perplexity, Claude and Gemini behave differently
- I-02By question groupDiscovery, comparison and purchase questions reported apart
- I-03By competitorEach rival’s share on the same sample
- I-04Over timeMonthly readings, so drift is visible
A deeper look at individual rivals is on competitive AI visibility.
Kept out of the totals
- Brands we cannot identify with confidence
- Answers the assistant refused on policy grounds, reported separately instead
- Prompts written to steer the assistant toward any brand
- Escort or sexual-services categories
Weighting by what matters
Not every question is equally valuable. A buying question asked by someone ready to purchase matters more than a definition question. We weight shares by question group, usually giving buying and comparison questions more weight, and always show the unweighted figure alongside, so you can see how much the weighting changes the picture. The weights are agreed with you before the first round and kept fixed afterwards.
Mentions, recommendations and citations
| Measure | Why it is reported separately |
|---|---|
| Mention share | How often you appear at all |
| Recommendation share | How often you are the suggested choice |
| Citation share | How often your site is the source |
| First-mention share | How often you are named first in a list |
A brand can be mentioned often but rarely recommended, or recommended without its site being cited. Separate measures show which problem you have.
Trends without overreacting
Answers vary from run to run, so a change of a few points between rounds may be noise. We show each share with its margin, mark changes that exceed it, and look for trends over several rounds rather than reacting to one. When an assistant updates its model or policies, we note the date, because a sudden shift may come from the assistant rather than from anything you did.
Choosing rivals to compare
The comparison set should reflect who buyers actually consider: brands that appear often in answers to your questions, direct competitors you know, and sometimes a marketplace or retailer that dominates answers. Keep the set stable between rounds so shares are comparable, and add a rival only when it starts appearing regularly. Our guide to AI competitor analysis explains the choice.
A worked share calculation
| Brand | Illustrative share of 100 answers |
|---|---|
| Rival A | 35 mentions: 35% |
| Rival B | 25 mentions: 25% |
| Your brand | 15 mentions: 15% |
| All others | 25 mentions: 25% |
Made-up figures. With 100 answers, a share of 15% carries a margin of several points either way, which is why we report ranges and look for trends across rounds rather than celebrating or worrying over one.
Share of voice and sales
A rising share in AI answers does not automatically mean more sales, and a falling one does not always mean fewer. We set share of voice beside your own data: branded searches, direct visits, sign-ups and orders. Where the two move together over several rounds, the link is worth acting on; where they do not, the share is a signal to watch rather than a target to chase. The method for linking the two is in our guide to measuring AI visibility.
Language and market cuts
Brands selling in several countries or languages often find very different shares in each. An assistant asked in English from the United States may name different brands from the same assistant asked in German from Berlin. We run separate question sets per market where it matters, and report shares for each, so a strong position in one market does not hide a weak one elsewhere.
Accuracy alongside share
A high share is worth little if assistants describe you wrongly. For every round we report how many mentions of your brand contained a factual error, and what kind: price, product, policy or identity. A brand with a modest share and accurate descriptions is often better placed than one with a larger share full of mistakes, because buyers who arrive with wrong expectations rarely stay.
How often to measure
Most brands measure quarterly, which balances cost against the speed at which assistants change. Monthly rounds suit brands in fast-moving categories or those running active campaigns, while a smaller monitoring set can run between full rounds to catch sudden shifts. Whatever the cadence, the question set and coding stay the same, so every round can be compared with the last. Our note on prompt set monitoring explains the lighter monitoring set.
Your data, kept private
Share-of-voice reports reveal commercial information: which rivals matter to you, where you are weak and what you plan to fix. Reports are shared only with the people you name, raw answers are stored securely, and we never use one client's data in another client's work.
Limits of share of voice
Share of voice measures what assistants say in response to the questions we chose. It cannot see private conversations, questions we did not ask or how buyers act afterwards. Treat it as one useful gauge among several, read with your own traffic and sales data.
Share of voice in a board report
When share of voice goes into a board or investor report, show it as a range with the sample size, next to traffic and sales. A single headline percentage invites more confidence than the data supports. A short note explaining what moved and why helps readers who will never see the coded answers, and keeps the figure in proportion with the rest of the business.
Prompts that reflect real buyers
Share of voice is only as good as the questions behind it. Questions should come from real buyer language, support emails and search data, not from what a brand wishes buyers asked. A set skewed towards your strengths flatters your share and hides the gaps that matter.
Share of voice reports
| Cut | What it answers |
|---|---|
| By assistant | Where you are strong or weak |
| By question group | Which stage of buying you miss |
| Over rounds | Whether things are moving |
| Against each rival | Who takes the answers you are missing |
Fees are on pricing, and the calculation in our share of voice guide.
Questions
How is AI share of voice different from visibility?
Visibility is the percentage of answers that mention you. Share of voice compares your mentions with every brand mentioned, so it shows your position against the field.
Why weight some questions more than others?
Because a question close to purchase matters more than a general one. Weighting stops a pile of easy informational questions from flattering the total.
Do citations count separately?
Yes. A mention without a link and a citation of your own site are different wins, so we report mention share and citation share side by side.
How often should share of voice be measured?
Monthly for most brands; answers drift as assistants update, so a single reading goes stale quickly.
Is a small change in share meaningful?
Not always. Answers vary between runs, so we show each share with its margin and mark only changes larger than that margin.
LLM visibility audit
Find out how often AI assistants name your brand
Tell us your brand, your market and your main competitors. We run a sample of real customer questions through the major AI assistants several times, record mentions and citations, and send back a readout showing the ranges observed. The first one costs nothing and binds you to nothing.
Request an LLM visibility audit