Metrics
Exactly what mention rate, share of voice, prominence and citation share count — and when each one is undefined rather than zero.
What each number counts, precisely. For an orientation to reading them, start with Reading your results.
Every metric is computed over a scope: one brand, one engine, a date range, and
optionally a subset of prompts. N is the number of responses in that scope.
Mention rate
How often you are named.
text
mention_rate(entity) = responses mentioning the entity / N
A mention is counted once per response. An answer that names you six times counts the same as one that names you once. Counting every occurrence would reward long answers and make the number swing on formatting changes that have nothing to do with you.
A competitor is counted from when you added it. Answers from before then were never checked for it, so its rate is over the answers since. A newly added competitor shows insufficient data until ten answers have been checked for it.
By question type
Your mention rate over the prompts of one intent: buying, comparing, problem, learning or brand lookup. One rate for every prompt can hide a loss on buying questions behind a win on how-to ones.
text
mention_rate(type) = responses to that type's prompts mentioning you / responses to them
Answers are pooled across the type's prompts, never averaged per prompt, so a prompt with 30 answers weighs ten times one with 3. A prompt counts under its current intent. Each type needs ten answers of its own, so a type with few prompts reads insufficient data for longer than the overall rate does.
It covers the same days as the prompt list, up to today, while the headline numbers stop at the last measurement's close, so the totals can differ slightly.
Share of voice
How much of the naming goes to you rather than the rest of the tracked set.
text
share_of_voice(entity) = mentions of the entity / mentions of everyone tracked
The tracked set is your brand plus the competitors you have added. Answers that name nobody in that set count toward neither side.
Shares are over the answers checked against the whole current set, so they always add up to 100%. When you add a competitor, share of voice starts again from the next answers and shows insufficient data until there are ten. Removing one doesn't restart it.
When no tracked brand is named at all in the scope, share of voice is undefined, not zero. You will see no brand mentioned. Zero and undefined mean different things, and treating a dead prompt set as a losing one is the wrong conclusion.
Share of voice rises when a competitor falls. Always read it beside mention rate — if share of voice is up and mention rate is flat, nothing about you changed.
Prominence
Where you appear in an answer, not just whether.
text
prominence = 1 − (characters before your first mention / total characters)
The result runs from just above 0 to 1, where higher means earlier. It is averaged only over responses where you were actually mentioned, so it is undefined until you have been named at least once — the dashboard shows Not mentioned yet.
Prominence is never folded into share of voice or into a single composite "visibility score". A blended score cannot be debugged or argued with, so Shruwd shows the parts.
Named first
How often you are the first of the companies you track that an answer names.
text
named_first(entity) = answers naming the entity before every other tracked company
/ answers checked against all of them
It counts over the same answers as share of voice, so it starts again when you add a competitor. An answer that names none of your tracked companies counts in the total and is first for nobody. A company you don't track can come earlier in the answer, so being named first among yours is a sign of being the first pick, not a recommendation.
It is in the competitors table on the overview, for the 7-, 30- and 90-day windows, and is computed when a measurement closes.
Citation metrics
A citation is a URL in the answer's list of cited sources.
text
citation_share(domain) = responses citing that domain / N
self_citation_rate = responses citing any of your domains,
or a video on one of your YouTube channels / N
A domain is counted once per response, however many of its pages are cited. Which specific page was cited is kept, because that is what several diagnostics need — a competitor citing your pricing page and a review site citing your homepage are different problems.
A cited video counts for the company whose YouTube channel published it, once you name the channel on the brand or the competitor. The channel is the one YouTube reports for the video, matched exactly; a channel whose name merely looks like a company's never counts for it. It applies to answers measured after the channel is named.
Coverage metrics
Two numbers describe what happened in the answers that did not name anyone.
| Metric | Counts | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Naming nobody | Responses naming no tracked brand ÷ N | Nobody owns the category here. Across a group of prompts, this is an opportunity rather than a loss. |
| No AI answer | Runs where the engine produced no AI answer ÷ N | The engine does not answer these prompts. A prompt-set problem, not a visibility problem. |
If no AI answer is high, nothing you change on your site will move the other numbers for those prompts. Rewrite the prompts instead.
Next steps
- Confidence and sample size — why a number may be withheld
- When a number has moved — the rule for calling a change real