Frequently Asked Questions

Surfaced is an AI visibility monitoring platform that tracks how ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, Grok, Llama, Mistral, DeepSeek, and other AI models mention, cite, and recommend your brand. It provides a composite AEO Score (0—100), weekly automated scans across up to 13 AI models, competitor benchmarking with Share of Voice analysis, content gap detection, and AI-powered recommendations to improve your presence in AI-generated responses.

Surfaced is purpose-built for the AI search era — unlike traditional SEO tools that track Google rankings, Surfaced monitors the AI platforms where a growing share of product discovery now happens. Plans start at $29/month.

AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) is the practice of optimizing your brand's visibility in AI-generated responses from platforms like ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, and Claude. Unlike traditional SEO which focuses on ranking in Google's blue links, AEO focuses on getting AI assistants to mention, cite, and recommend your brand when users ask relevant questions. AEO involves creating authoritative content, building trust signals across the web, optimizing structured data, and monitoring how AI platforms represent your brand.

With over 400 million weekly ChatGPT users and Gartner predicting a 25% decline in traditional search volume by 2026, AEO is becoming essential for any brand that wants to stay visible in how people discover products and services.

Surfaced monitors 13 AI models across all major AI platforms: ChatGPT (GPT-4o and GPT-4o Mini), Perplexity (Sonar and Sonar Pro with native citation tracking), Google Gemini (Flash and Pro), Anthropic Claude (Sonnet and Opus), Grok (Grok and Grok Pro), Meta Llama 4 Maverick (the model behind Meta AI on WhatsApp and Instagram), Mistral Large (leading European AI), and DeepSeek V3 (fast-growing international model).

This gives you the most comprehensive picture of your AI visibility across the entire landscape. Different AI models have different training data and biases — a brand might be well-represented in ChatGPT but completely absent from Claude or DeepSeek. Surfaced's multi-model approach ensures you catch visibility gaps wherever they exist.

Surfaced works in three simple steps: First, you add your brand by entering your brand name, domain, and competitors. Surfaced auto-generates industry-specific queries based on your category, and you can add custom queries too. Second, Surfaced scans weekly — it queries up to 13 AI models with your tracked queries and records every response, analyzing each one for brand mentions, citations, sentiment, positioning, and competitor presence.

Third, you act on insights — your dashboard shows your AEO Score, which queries you're winning, where competitors are cited instead of you, and AI-powered content recommendations to close gaps. You also get weekly email reports, score change alerts, and exportable data. Setup takes about 5 minutes and your first results arrive within hours.

Surfaced and traditional SEO tools like Ahrefs or Semrush solve fundamentally different problems. SEO tools track your Google search rankings, backlinks, and keyword positions — they tell you where you rank on a list. Surfaced tracks what AI chatbots actually say about your brand when users ask questions — there are no rankings in AI search, just answers. Your brand is either in the answer or it isn't.

SEO tools can't query ChatGPT, Perplexity, or Claude programmatically, analyze AI response sentiment, detect brand positioning in AI answers, or track competitor Share of Voice in AI responses. Surfaced is purpose-built for these tasks. That said, AEO doesn't replace SEO — it's the next layer on top. Strong SEO (especially for Perplexity and Gemini, which use web search) complements your AEO strategy.

Many Surfaced users run both Surfaced and an SEO tool.

Surfaced and Otterly.ai both monitor AI visibility, but differ significantly in depth and breadth. Platform coverage: Surfaced scans 13 AI models (ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, Grok, Llama, Mistral, DeepSeek) vs. Otterly's 3—4 platforms. Analysis depth: Surfaced uses LLM-powered analysis to detect brand positioning (leader, recommended, alternative, mentioned), sentiment, and narrative framing.

Otterly uses simpler keyword-based detection. Actionable output: Surfaced generates AI-powered content recommendations and content blueprints to close visibility gaps. Otterly focuses on reporting. Features: Surfaced includes Share of Voice tracking, API access, webhook integrations, team seats, and exportable reports. Scan frequency: both Surfaced and Otterly scan weekly. Pricing: Surfaced starts at $29/mo, Otterly at $39/mo — actually $10 less for significantly more capability.

An AEO Score is a composite metric (0—100) that quantifies your brand's overall visibility across AI platforms. Surfaced calculates your AEO Score by analyzing multiple factors across all your tracked queries and AI models: how often your brand is mentioned, whether you're cited as a source, the sentiment of mentions (positive, neutral, negative), your position in responses (first paragraph vs. passing mention), and your share of voice relative to competitors.

The score is tracked weekly so you can see trends over time. A higher AEO Score means AI platforms are more likely to mention and recommend your brand. Surfaced also breaks down your score per platform and per query, so you can see exactly where you're strong and where you need to improve.

Surfaced offers three plans: Starter at $29/month (3 brands, 10 queries/brand, all 13 AI models, weekly auto-scans, AEO Score, weekly reports), Pro at $79/month (10 brands, 15 queries/brand, all 13 AI models, weekly auto-scans, premium weekly deep scans, 3 team seats), and Agency at $199/month (25 brands, 20 queries/brand, all 13 AI models, weekly auto-scans, premium weekly deep scans, 5 team seats, API access, webhook integrations, white-label reports).

Custom plans with unlimited brands are available for larger teams.

Yes, competitor tracking is a core feature of Surfaced. When you set up your brand, you add your key competitors. Surfaced then tracks how AI platforms mention both your brand and your competitors for every tracked query. The Share of Voice feature shows the percentage of AI recommendations going to each brand in your category, so you can see exactly who's winning and where. Surfaced also identifies 'competitor-only' gaps — queries where a competitor is cited but you aren't — which are your highest-impact content opportunities.

The competitor comparison chart provides a visual side-by-side of AI visibility across all tracked brands. You can add or remove competitors at any time from your brand settings.

AI chatbots decide what to recommend through two main channels: foundation model knowledge and real-time retrieval (RAG). Foundation model knowledge comes from training data — if your brand appears frequently in authoritative sources like Wikipedia, major publications, G2/Capterra reviews, and Stack Overflow, the model 'knows' about you. This is especially important for ChatGPT and Claude. Real-time retrieval (RAG) is used by Perplexity, Google Gemini, and ChatGPT's web search mode — they search the live web when answering questions, so your current Google rankings, fresh content, structured data, and backlinks all influence whether you get cited.

The key factors are: authority and trust signals, content comprehensiveness, recency, structured data quality, and consistent brand presence across the web. Surfaced helps you identify which of these factors to prioritize based on where your gaps are.

No. Every Surfaced plan includes a free score check with no credit card required. You sign up with your email, set up your brand and queries, and start receiving AI visibility data immediately. You only enter payment information if you decide to continue after the trial. If you don't subscribe, your account simply pauses — no charges, no surprises.

Surfaced runs automated weekly auto-scans across all your tracked queries and AI models. Each week, Surfaced queries ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Claude, and your other configured AI models with each of your tracked queries, records the full responses, and analyzes them for brand mentions, citations, sentiment, and positioning. You can also trigger manual scans at any time from your dashboard for immediate results.

Weekly auto-scanning is important because AI responses change frequently as models are updated, new content is indexed, and retrieval results shift. Monthly scanning (as some competitors offer) means you could miss critical visibility changes for weeks.

Yes. Surfaced supports multiple export options depending on your plan. All plans include weekly email reports with score summaries and key changes. The Agency plan and above include PDF and HTML report exports (branded for client delivery), CSV data exports for custom analysis, API access for programmatic data retrieval, and webhook integrations to push data to your existing tools (Slack, Zapier, custom endpoints).

Reports include AEO scores, brand mention details, competitor comparisons, trend charts, and content recommendations — everything you need for client reporting or internal analysis.

GEO (Generative Engine Optimization) is a broader term that encompasses optimizing content for any generative AI system, including AI search engines, chatbots, and AI-powered features like Google AI Overviews. GEO and AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) are closely related — AEO specifically focuses on answer engines like ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Claude, while GEO covers the full spectrum of generative AI touchpoints.

In practice, the strategies overlap significantly: creating authoritative content, optimizing structured data, building trust signals, and monitoring AI-generated responses. Surfaced supports both AEO and GEO strategies by monitoring how generative AI platforms across the board represent your brand.

Yes. The Agency plan ($199/month) includes 25 brands, 20 queries/brand, all 13 AI models, 5 team seats, API access, webhook integrations, and white-label reports. Custom plans with unlimited brands are available for larger agencies. Agencies use Surfaced to offer AI visibility monitoring as a service to their clients, differentiate from competitors still focused only on traditional SEO, and demonstrate measurable results with AEO Score improvements over time.