The field is new, so the terms are too. Every definition here is written to make sense on its own.
A measurable account of how often, in what context and alongside whom a brand is mentioned on AI response platforms such as ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity.
Your own domain’s share among the sources the AI shows in its response.
Being mentioned and being cited are different things. Your brand name can come up while your competitor’s site is the one shown as the source.
Related:Citation
A composite score that reduces AI visibility to a single number between 0 and 100: mention rate 30%, share of voice 20%, position 15%, citation share 15%, sentiment 10%, factual accuracy 10%.
The weights can be adjusted per organization.
The purpose of the question within the buying journey: discovery, comparison, purchase, troubleshooting and reputation.
A balanced measurement needs all five intents represented.
Related:Prompt
The ratio of responses that mention the brand to the total number of responses. If you are mentioned in 32 of 100 queries, your mention rate is 32%.
It is the most basic AI visibility metric, but on its own it misleads — it says nothing about how, or in which position, you were mentioned.
Related:Share of voicePosition
A measurement setup that doesn’t stop at a single question but keeps going with follow-ups such as “Any other options?” or “Something cheaper?”
It represents real user behavior far better than single-question tests do.
Related:Recovery turnPersona
The fictional user profile that asks the AI the question; it includes a role, a goal, decision criteria, constraints and a region.
AI recommends different brands depending on the context of the person asking. A price-focused SME owner and a corporate buyer get different responses to the same question.
Related:PromptMulti-turn scenario
Where the brand comes in the order of mentions inside a response. Being mentioned first is markedly more valuable than being mentioned fifth.
The question text sent to the AI. Measurement uses prompt sets that represent the different stages of the buying journey.
Related:PersonaIntent types
Which turn of a multi-turn conversation the brand first appears in. 1 = mentioned in the first response; 3 = it only comes up once the user asks for alternatives.
Not appearing in the first response and never appearing at all are different problems, and they need different fixes. This metric separates the two.
Related:Multi-turn scenario
Your share of all brand mentions within a set of responses. It shows where you stand relative to your competitors.
If your mention rate is rising while your share of voice falls, the market is growing faster than you are.
Related:Mention rateCompetitor analysis
The crawlers AI companies use to collect web content. There are two kinds: those that collect for model training, and those that fetch content the moment a user asks a question.
The distinction is critical. GPTBot is for training; OAI-SearchBot is what ChatGPT needs in order to show your site in its search results.
A markdown text file placed in the site’s root directory that summarizes the site for AI agents.
It isn’t a universal standard yet and not every platform reads it. On its own it isn’t enough; it complements structured content.
The file at the site’s root that states which crawler may crawl which paths.
The most common and most easily fixed problem in AI visibility is response bots being blocked here without anyone realizing it.
Related:AI botsSearch / response bot
A crawler that fetches up-to-date content when a user asks a question. OAI-SearchBot, PerplexityBot and Claude-SearchBot are in this group.
When it is blocked, your brand cannot be cited in that platform’s responses.
Related:AI botsTraining bot
A markup format that tells machines explicitly what the page content means. Organization, FAQPage, Product and Article are the most commonly used types.
It isn’t mandatory, but it makes the content markedly easier to classify correctly.
Related:GEO contentllms.txt
A crawler that collects content to be used in training an AI model. GPTBot, Google-Extended and Applebot-Extended are in this group.
Blocking it doesn’t directly stop you from being mentioned in responses.
Related:AI botsSearch / response bot
The AI showing a source as a link in its response. It differs from a mention: a source can be cited without the brand name appearing at all.
Related:Citation shareGEO content
Content written to be cited: text that gives the answer in the first 40-60 words, is structured into tables and lists, is sourced, and still makes sense when pulled out of its context.
Classic SEO content is written to rank; GEO content is written to be cited. The difference isn’t in the style, but in how the information is packaged.
The model basing its response on web sources fetched at that moment rather than on its training data.
With grounding on, content changes can show up in responses within days; with it off, the old information held in the model weights is repeated.
Related:AI botsSearch / response bot
The AI producing information that isn’t true, in a confident tone. In a brand context it surfaces as a wrong founding year, a product that doesn’t exist or an incorrect service region.
Related:Brand knowledge audit
Comparing what AI says about a brand with the brand’s verified facts, and tying every discrepancy to a correction plan.
Being visible isn’t enough; you need to be visible accurately. Raising visibility on top of wrong information does harm.
Measuring competitor brands’ mention, position and citation share values side by side with your own, on the same query set.
Related:Share of voice
The discipline of getting a brand mentioned and cited in the responses generative AI systems produce.
Classic SEO cares about your position on the search results page; GEO cares about whether you appear inside the response itself. GEO doesn’t replace SEO — it builds on it.
The discipline of improving a site’s position on search engine results pages.
It complements GEO rather than competing with it: a site that can’t be crawled, is slow and has weak authority won’t be cited in AI responses either.
If you'd like to see these terms in practice, our introduction to GEO and the GEO guide are a good place to start.
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