How to see what AI assistants say about your company instead of your competitors
To see what AI assistants say about your company instead of your competitors, ask them the questions your buyers ask, without your brand name in the question, and record who gets named. Then read why each rival was picked. That list of reasons is your fix list.
By the Citeably team · · · 6 min read
Step 1: ask the question your buyer asks
Don't ask "what do you think of my company". A buyer asks something like "best tool for X for a small team". Ask that, in each assistant you care about, in a logged-out session.
- Write 8 to 10 questions: some about your whole category, some about what you specifically do.
- Leave your brand name out of every question, or the answer will be about you for the wrong reason.
- Ask each question in ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity, and in Claude if your buyers use it.
Step 2: record who is named, and where
For every answer, write down the brands named, their order, and whether yours is among them. Do it for each assistant separately, because they often disagree.
One answer is noise. Count how many of your questions name you and how many name each rival. That share is the number to track over time.
Step 3: read why the rival was picked
The most useful part of an answer is the sentence that justifies the pick, such as "best for solo founders" or "strongest integrations". Those are the claims your own pages need to make, and back up, if you want to be in the same answer.
Also note which sources the assistant cites when it has live search. Those are the pages worth being listed on.
Step 4: turn it into a fix list
Group what you found into three kinds of fix, in this order:
- Be found: your pages are indexable, in a sitemap, and readable without JavaScript.
- Be clear: a plain description of what you are, who it is for, and how you differ from the names that appear.
- Be mentioned: get listed or reviewed on the pages the assistants already cite for your category.
Doing it by hand vs with a tool
By hand is free and teaches you a lot, but it is slow and inconsistent. A tool asks the same questions in the same way every time, so you can see whether a fix moved the result.
Citeably's free check does steps 1 to 3 in about a minute, with no signup, and gives a first fix.
Frequently asked questions
Why does my brand not show up even though I rank on Google?
Assistants build an answer from the pages and sources they retrieve, and from what they learned in training. Ranking helps you be found, but the answer also needs pages that directly state what you do and who you are for.
How many questions should I check?
Eight to ten is enough to see a pattern. Fewer than five is too noisy to act on.
How often should I re-check?
Answers shift as models and pages change. Monthly is reasonable for a small brand, and after any significant site change.