AI search
What is Share of Answer in AI search?
Share of Answer measures how often AI engines cite or mention you across a fixed set of prompts. Here is how to define it, sample it and compare it.
What Share of Answer measures
Share of Answer is the share of tracked prompts, on a given engine, whose answer cites or mentions your brand or site. It works like share of voice for AI search: instead of asking where you rank for one keyword, it asks how often you show up across the questions that matter to your business.
For example, if you track 40 prompts in Perplexity and 10 of the answers cite or mention you, your Share of Answer on Perplexity is 25 percent for that period. Calculate it per engine, because ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews draw on different sources and often give different answers.
Mentions versus citations
- Citation
- The answer links to a page on your site as a source. It can send traffic, and it shows the engine retrieved and used your content.
- Mention
- The answer names your brand, product or business in its text, with or without a link. It shapes what people think of you even when they never click.
Track the two separately. A brand that is mentioned often but rarely cited is probably being described from other sources, such as reviews, directories or forums, while its own pages go unused. A site that is cited but not named may be supplying facts without getting credit for them.
Why you sample repeatedly and read trends
AI answers are generated, not looked up, so the same prompt can return different wording and different sources from one run to the next. Results also shift with location, account settings, model updates and new content on the web. A single check is an anecdote.
- Run each prompt more than once per period, on a regular schedule.
- Keep the prompt set stable, so changes reflect the engines and your content rather than your questions.
- Read the trend over weeks, not the movement between two runs.
- Note the dates of changes you make, so you can see whether a rise or drop follows them.
How to pick prompts
Good prompts are the questions real customers ask, phrased the way they would type them into a chatbot. Pull them from sales calls, support tickets, reviews, Search Console queries and the questions your team hears every week. Then group them by intent:
- Informational
- How something works or what it costs, for example how often a roof should be inspected.
- Comparison
- One option against another, or alternatives to a named competitor.
- Recommendation
- Requests for the best provider or product for a need, often with a location.
- Brand
- Questions about you by name, which show what engines say about your business.
Include prompts where you do not appear yet. A set made only of questions you already win will look healthy and teach you nothing.
Comparing against competitors
Run the same prompts for a few direct competitors and calculate their Share of Answer the same way. The comparison shows whether a low number reflects the whole category or your site specifically. Then look at which pages get cited when you do not. Those sources show the format, depth and coverage the engine found useful, and they point to the content or listings worth working on next.
Put it to work
- Share of AnswerHow often ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews cite you, prompt by prompt.
- Tracking your Share of AnswerHow often ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini and Google AI Overviews cite you, prompt by prompt.
- CompetitorsHead-to-head scores, the keywords they win, and a plan to get past them.
More in AI search
- What is generative engine optimization (GEO)?GEO is the practice of making your site easy for AI answer engines to find, quote and cite. Here is how it relates to SEO and where to start.
- How do AI answer engines choose their sources?AI answer engines retrieve pages from a search index or a live fetch, then write an answer from them. Here is what that means for getting cited.
- How do Google AI Overviews work?Google AI Overviews summarize answers from Google's index and link to supporting pages. Here is what makes a page eligible and how to control it.
- AI crawlers and robots.txt: what to allowTraining crawlers, search crawlers and user-triggered fetchers do different jobs. Here is how to allow AI search bots in robots.txt and block training.
- What is llms.txt and do you need one?llms.txt is a proposed Markdown file that gives language models a short map of your site. Here is how it is structured and what it can and cannot do.
- How to write content AI engines can citeAI engines quote passages that answer a question clearly and stand on their own. Here is how to structure, source and maintain content they can cite.